To think my marriage is affair proof?

[PinaColada66]

My DH is a lovely, lovely man. He believes passionately that family is important and the centre of everything and he’s very anti cheating.

However, he has a relatively new female friend who he’s clearly very taken with. They get along like a house on fire and if he was single I think he would definitely want to be with her. I’ve met her several times and she’s very nice. I see why he likes her so much.

So my question is, because I know how strongly he feels about ‘family’, can I feel safe that he’s not going to cheat on me with her?? Is any man affair proof? What can I do to keep our marriage ‘safe’?

He goes out of his way to help her with things. I don’t know, I can just tell. He gets a bit defensive about her.

You see this isn’t a normal friendship. What to do?

Honestly I think it’s very hard. There is potential risk. You could...

• talk to him and ‘make him see sense’ - but he’ll probably be defensive.
• be moody and upset - which might mean he sees new friend as even more attractive.
• invest in yourself. Get focused on doing things you like and buy yourself new clothes / hair. Go out with a male friend and talk about him. This can jolt some men but then it can also turn into the ‘pick me dance’ where you are just vying for your DH. However hanging out with another man is sometimes the only way to show what he’s doing.
• book a lovely holiday and romantic stuff with DH. As why shouldn’t you? He’s your husband. Your man and it’s great to reconnect and remind yourself how much you care for him.
• give him examples of the man who lost his family over infatuations and regretted it. Not tell him. Find someone that’s happened to and make sure he hears about it.
• manipulate the situation. Which is horribly not what most women like you who okay by the rules and are honest. I’m honest too. But honestly when cornered do whatever you want. Your marriage is being attacked. It’s warfare!

It’s pretty rubbish I’m sorry you are in this position. Protect your family.

OP I would have talked about my husband in the way you do up until a couple of months ago. He was always very vocal about his disdain for people who had affairs including my sister.

I think my username will tell you what happened.

He seems quite shocked by what he did, thought he wasn't like other guys. Says he never intended to have an affair.

No marriage is affair proof.

Hi OP. 7 pages of responses, wow! Not read all of them, so not sure of this has been said or if you can be bothered to read it now, but...

I think the only way to help the safety of your marriage is to be constantly open and vulnerable and encourage him to be. He is allowed to say he is attracted to her and you need to be able to let him say that (he should also give you the same grace). I don't believe we have a soulmate, or eyes for only 1 person, but I am also passionate about being faithful so I think it's ok to be honest. He also, though, needs to be humble enough to take precautions in his relationship with her, to never discuss any issues with you for example, to reduce contact out of work to once a week max. No late night friendly texts etc. This is precautionary, but if he's passionate about his family and his marriage, he should be able to see that this is important and not to assume he's the one superman who will not be tempted.I would suggest these kind of things come from discussion with him, and from him not you.

If he's honest about potential for straying/ attraction to other people emotionally as well as physically then relationships with the opposite sex are fine, but it's those who think "I would never do it", where the danger comes in. If he is unwilling to talk, and is very 'poo poo'/ defensive about the possibility of attraction then he doesn't know himself very well, I think and the possibility is always there.

I was wondering if he'd met her at work and having checked your previous post was right.

I had two female friends at a work place - one who was definitely started an affair with a married man - both were in unhappy or stale marriages - luckily they ended the affair. Her/my friend who was single at the time also started a relationship/friendship at a similar time with a colleague who was married but almost separated - they didn't do anything as such but had an EA for a short time beforehand. He left his wife and separated and then they both started a relationship, now married, DC etc. at the time I was in a relationship, living with a man but it wasn't great either.

With this friendship - she's left the company now and he wants to keep in touch - well sometimes due to work relationships you have to do this - for work purposes, he appears to have clicked with her. I wouldn't tell him not to stay in touch etc but would semi monitor when he goes out etc.

You need to talk to your DH. If your marriage really is affair proof he will understand & back off from this woman.

I would not advise this. Unfortunately. From bitter experience!

If he understood he would not be doing this in the first place. He has turned off his morals and is convincing himself it’s all innocent. But of course he’s entering into an emotional affair.

My DH is a lovely, lovely man. He believes passionately that family is important and the centre of everything and he’s very anti cheating.

He sounds exactly like my ex-husband before he had his affair.

*Honestly, as a guy, feeling like I'm on a leash makes me want to pull on that leash

Nothing to do with being a guy, I'd be like that too if I ever felt someone was trying to control me.*

If I felt like DH was trying to control me, I'd walk.

If DH told me that my friendship with another man felt like an emotional affair and made him uncomfortable/unhappy, I would consider my actions and weigh up what was more important to me.

One is healthy, one is not. OP is not being controlling.

No, like a pp said you can never trust anyone 100%. Once you accept this and realise nothing YOU do will ever stop it happening then you'll be okay.

Platonic friendships with the opposite sex happen when there is a gap to fill in a relationship. This leads to physical attraction.

It's the old 'When Harry met Sally' adage..men and women can't just be friends..not close friends anyway.

What nonsense. Platonic opposite-sex friendships happen in exactly the same way as platonic same-sex friendships do -- because you meet someone you like, who has similar interests, to whom you like talking, and want to have around in your life.

The people who think this is impossible appear to be those who lead very sex-segregated lives, and who are so prudish/sex-conscious that they genuinely cannot conceive of not being conscious of the possibility that you could have sex with your opposite-sex friend at every single second you spend in their company. They are absolutely baffled by those of us who don't think there are pink and blue interests, and who are capable of spending hours one on one with a man without thinking about shagging him.

OP, as others have said no marriage is affair-proof. And I'd go further than previous posters -- I don't think there necessarily has to be anything 'wrong' with a marriage for infidelity to occur.

He believes passionately that family is important and the centre of everything and he’s very anti cheating

Yes. This (smokescreen) is invariably what they all say...then everyone is gobsmacked when they find out he's been shagging someone else.

What littleyellowpencil said. Defensive = 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩. I'm in the process of divorcing a family man who thought the world of us.

I haven’t rtft right though but I’d be wary. No marriage is ‘affair proof’ and my dh’s emotional affair (never got physical but I think she was hesitant and just enjoying the drama) started much as you describe.

"He believes passionately that family is important and the centre of everything and he’s very anti cheating" this is how not only I but his closest friends and family would have described my ex...

...until he cheated!

Mentionitis
Defensive of her
Telling her everything about his life

How much time are they spending together? Where? How much are they talking?

I think you need to talk to him about your concerns and make it clear that you will consider an emotional affair just as unacceptable as a full blown physical & emotional one and define what you would consider an emotional affair/unacceptable behaviour.

"Every divorced woman can tell you one thing... we never expected our husbands to be the bastards they turned out to be. We didn’t choose them wrongly either, they changed." This!

No relationship and no person is affair proof.

There was a poster on here, not sure if they still are with all the name changes and security issues, who was very brave and admitted that she had previously been a poster that believed you trust your partner 100% and if you value and make an effort to sustain a good relationship then your partner won't cheat, she totally believed hers would never cheat that he'd no "reason" to, then he did. She was completely blindsided by it.

I agree with the PP who said he’d pull on the leash......no idea why he got such sarcastic replies ‘oh the menz here, bow down’ it’s his opinion, mine too....I take it we’re all allowed one?

Yep, my OH is all about family and the kids, always completely anti cheating after watching a close family member's marriage fall apart due to an affair. Still went on to have an affair though.

There are no such things as wholly good or bad people. There are just people, and they can and do many good and some bad things in their lives. 'Good' people have affairs, just in the same way 'bad' people do wonderful things like work for charities or care about animal cruelty etc. If you think your marriage is affair proof simply because your husband is s good man, I'm afraid your defense is flimsy.

The first thing you could do is ask him how much contact they have now that she has left the company. And what sort of contact. Then you can take it from there.

Yes talk to him if you are uncomfortable but I don't understand everyone's LTB attitude.

I haven't seen a LTB attitude at all. Most people have just advised OP to talk to him and keep her eyes open.

OP it does sound concerning to me too and once you have your conversation with him I hope he pulls back a bit. The fact that you think he would defend her over you and that he would want to be with her if he was single is worrying.

No marriage is affair proof, it just isn't, despite people wanting to convince themselves otherwise. I agree with a PP above that sometimes there doesn't need to be anything wrong in a marriage for an affair to happen.

OP he hasn't shown any indication of secrecy, lying or cheating in fact he's been open and honest about talking about her to you.

That doesn't always mean anything.

Of course there is every chance that nothing has happened yet, or never will, but I would be talking to him and keeping my eyes wide open.

The best advice here is the one pp who suggested welcoming her with open arms and making her a family friend. I, too, would pull at a leash, not that my husband's ever been foolish enough to try and use one.

Honestly, as a guy, feeling like I'm on a leash makes me want to pull on that leash

Nothing to do with being a guy, I'd be like that too if I ever felt someone was trying to control me.

If I felt like DH was trying to control me, I'd walk.

If DH told me that my friendship with another man felt like an emotional affair and made him uncomfortable/unhappy, I would consider my actions and weigh up what was more important to me.

One is healthy, one is not. OP is not being controlling

Bit of a Black & White response there Lemur, it's never that straight forward & you took my reply too literally. By controlling I might having an issue with my having male friends & not trusting me. I would initially kick back at that & then kick them into touch. I wouldn't be leaving though. They would

If DH told me that my friendship with another man felt like an emotional affair and made him uncomfortable/unhappy, I would consider my actions and weigh up what was more important to me. One is healthy, one is not. OP is not being controlling.

I agree with this. However her DH will probably not and will label OP as controlling. Why? Because, like others have said, he’s merrily declaring he’s a family man who would never do this and he needs to believe it himself. Yet he is acting the opposite and will not take kindly to anyone, least of all his wife, pointing this out. So it will be, she’s so controlling. And another reason to get closer to his friend, and tell her his wife is being controlling.

It’s happened to me. I’ve been told I’m controlling because I tried to tell OH how hurt I was about his friend. He still brings up how unreasonable I was. It’s awful as it was clearly an EA and I don’t think we realise how far down the line our husbands are.

When they are being defensive about the friend over our feelings, it’s already too late to have a reasonable chat.

On "keep your enemies close" advice

My ex cheated with someone that was supposedly my friend too, who I'd helped and supported and welcomed so...

I disagree that's good advice

Honestly, as someone who is friends with married men, this thread makes me feel sick.

The "gap in the marriage" I usually end up filling is "person to ask for advice when your Linux server dies" or "person to play a game with". Why does a wife have to be the sole source of everything?

Tech is a male dominated interest area, but if I'm reading this thread correctly, the only people my male friends should be talking to about it is their wives (who generally don't know much) or other male friends.

That's incredibly isolating for women.

When they are being defensive about the friend over our feelings, it’s already too late to have a reasonable chat. Makes sense. The person they empathise with is the person who's feelings they care about.

I find this 'pulling on a leash' shit so infantile. It's part and parcel of the 'ball and chain', 'her indoors', 'she who must be obeyed' trope, whereby marriage traps unwilling men, rather than being a partnership between two adult equals. She's your wife, not your fucking mother!

I'm of the 'of course men and women can be friends, WFT are you talking about suggesting they can't?' persuasion, because that's been my life, my experience, my inclination

I am too, male friendships when nothing would ever happen - not remotely of the When Harry Met Sally variety. When you fall in love it feels completely different. And you don't feel hot chemistry with all men, so there are lots of men we can be just friends with...

OP I think I would trust some men not to have affairs, but the problem here is more than that - does he have feelings for her - which would be a problem for you whether he acted on it or not, I think? That is what I meant to say in my first post. The problem is not just whether or not he is going to be unfaithful but the fact that you suspect he has feelings for someone else. And as a part of that, the key things are whether or not you both want to continue in the relationship, because you still have strong feelings for each other, because you have family commitments, dc, whether or not you can accept his feelings, and trust him not to act on them etc.

I do think some men can be trusted to not act on their feelings just as some women can. Probably a small minority, but hey, some. But having feelings for someone outside the marriage is a huge thing in itself leaving aside acting on it.

And you aren't sure that he has feelings for her?

So he doesn't actually HAVE to speak to her? They no longer work together, right?