Husband holding hands with male friend.

[User3679963]

I would like a little perspective please.

My husband told me that a male friend (who he rarely sees) holds his hand when they meet up. I think this is odd, I cant imagine walking through town to see my husband holding hands with his friend. But my husband genuinely sees nothing wrong with it. When I said I thought it was odd, he stared at me blankly and just said 'Sorry I dont see what's wrong with it.' His friend is straight, as is my husband (although during his teens he apparently used to hold hands with another male friend, who he thought he had feelings for but in the end they were just very good friends. They both had hard upbringings and were like brothers).
I asked him if he thought it appropriate to hold a female friends hand, and he said if she was to reach for his hand he wouldn't have an issue with it. We are all British, so it's not a cultural thing. (I know in some cultures it's the norm for male friends to hold hands)
So as not to drop feed, my husband isn't the most affectionate person. We're intimate on average once every 4 months, sometimes 6, and he sees this as normal and has no worries about it. We rarely kiss other than a peck when one of us is going out, and hes not the type to cuddle up on the sofa in the evenings (it wasn't like this before we got married) So I can't tell if he is either genuinely detached emotionally, so something like hand holding isn't an intimate action to him, or whether there is more to this.

I'm sorry if this seems like a ridiculous thing to ask.

OP - my exh admitted that he had a relationship with another male student when he was 17. Of course after that he married me but your husband's experience sounds similar. I accepted what he said then as people experiment at that age. Wish I'd listened to my instinct more because if I'd persuaded him to open up more I wouldn't have been deceived when he entered the 6 year secret affair with his best mate.

'my names Richard but I like dick'
sorry I had to.
I do think he may be gay though OP.

Theres definitely no chance of a physical affair (except if the handholding was genuine) because he barely goes out (once every few months to the local with a couple of friends). He works from home, and he rarely sees friends and when he does, there is usually a girlfriend or two tagging along. We live in a small town so theres no way he would be doing anything he knows he shouldnt (he literally bumps into my family, friends and neighbours every time hes in town). And the fact that the handholding was done in public makes me think he genuinely didn't see it as anything but a friend. I mentioned that it would be awkward if say, my mother saw them, and he said 'why?hes just my friend. I dont get it's. Unless if he's a serious gas lighter covering his tracks, hes not silly enough to parade around if he was having an affair

Ok op, he is not neuro typical and that's the reason for all of it.

🤷‍♀️

I don’t think he is trying to tell OP he is gay more like he is trying to convince her and himself this is normal.

I think PGtipsplease has it right there. And more than that, he's also trying to convince you that you should be happy with it whether it's normal or not because "he doesn't think we need to fit into the norm to be happy" Well he might not think that, but that doesn't mean that all you need to be happy is sex once in a blue moon and a peck on the cheek. What makes him happy and what makes you happy might turn out to be two very different things.

Anyway, he's trying to convince you that you should be happy with it and you're trying to convince yourself the same. But gay, bisexual, or autistic you have no reason at all to be happy with his (lack of) sexual desire towards you and (lack of) physical intimacy towards you, and you have no reason to like his greater physical intimacy with this man either.

He could possibly be autistic but all that means is that this isn't going to change. What you see is what you've got. It will always be jam tomorrow. You aren't going to have a sex life.

Don't share this thread with him. It wont help.

When we were dating he said he doesn't get the point of porn, and that he literally has no interest in it. I found female based porn in his browser once years ago, but nothing since. We argued because he claimed to have no sex drive, so I couldn't get my head around how he could say that, whilst watching porn, whilst not being affectionate with me.

Oh. So you're saying he's lied to you in the past?

Why would you get together with a man who claimed to have no sex drive? Isn't that a bit self destructive?

I don't envy any counsellor trying to sort you two out.

Several points here for thinking over:

1. If he wouldn't be happy if you held hands with a male friend that means he is fully aware of the romantic connotation of handholding in the British culture. Otherwise, if it was 'normal' for two men to hold hands and not to have romantic relationship, why wouldn't it be normal for a straight woman and straight man to do the same?
2. I would be very, VERY concerned if my husband erased his search history on our computer on a regular basis. That means that there are things there he doesn't want you to see. That, again, completely collides with the entire 'he's open and would admit to me' idea.
3. The same applies to counseling. If he is happy to go 1on1 counselling but not couples counseling - that means that there are things he'd rather not discuss with you/in front of you (nothing wrong with that, just that it effectively kills of 'he'd admit to me if he was struggling with sexuality')

I really think you need to think about all of this seriously and then tackle it with your husband with or without help of a professional.

Your husband is gay OP, I'm sorry.

AmaryllisNightAndDay Our relationship was wonderful for the first few years before we got married. I had absolutely no worries then. I had known him for a long time before that, and he confided in me about previous relationships as a friend, so I had no reason to question whether it was genuine or whether he was hiding his sexuality.

YANBU, especially as he's said he had feelings for a man before. It sounds like he's a little bit bisexual at the very least.

OP I think you are drip feeding about your DHs ‘off’ behaviour in order for posters to reassure you he must be on the spectrum and that explains his ‘weird’ behaviour. He may or may not be, but him being on the spectrum won’t change your relationship. You need to address the lack of affection and intimacy.

With regards to ASD you’ve had my input about people with ASD who are affectionate and the input of another poster whose exH is a person with ASD who is not affectionate, and there will be many people with ASD who are somewhere inbetween, you could post thousands of hours of your DHs behaviour on here and we won’t be able to reassure you that it’s ok your DH acts the way he doesn’t because he’s on the spectrum, it won’t change his behaviour and it won’t magically transform your relationship.

You need to have an honest conversation with yourself and with DH about your relationship and how you see your future because what you’ve described is a relationship where your husband is just not that into you.

Bluntness is correct
❤️

Sorry, I hadn't meant to drip feed, the original post was just meant to show him that most people dont see two men holding hands as usual (because I genuinely thought it was a difference in how he sees social situations and how hes not generally physically affectionate). But once it turned into questioning his sexuality I wanted to give more context.

OP stop twisting yourself in knots trying to justify your DHs behaviour, he was fine the first few years to convince you now he doesn’t need to. Be brave and have an honest chat with him.
He shows you no affectionate but can with his friend, that says it all.

Oh I see. Before you got married he was affectionate and interested in sex with you and he told you he wasn't interested in porn. After you were married told you that he had no sex drive while looking at porn and being unaffectionate to you.

So things changed.

It's not at all obvious to me what's wrong. But it does seem that something is very wrong and that your DH is trying to paper over it and normalise it.

I don’t think OP is implying he’s not neurotypical, many men are blunt and gruff and awkward, I think she’s just trying to explain the nuance of his character.

I don’t think the nuances are relevant though, as it doesn’t make holding hand with a bloke outwith a relationship less odd.

My friend used to be married to a very similar sounding bloke. He'd be affectionate and touchy feely with his mate but not with her. He was also "on the spectrum" and claimed he did not need intimacy in their marriage. After a long while they figured out that he was gay but always thought marrying a woman is what guys do so that's what he did as well..

He was on a date with BF and he bumped into one of your family/friends.

He's now trying to shut the stable door after the horse bolted.

And gaslight you, cruelly.

Oh haha, I missed the post where OP says just that.

Yeah, I don’t think ASD can be used to explain any of this.

I link arms with my friends if we are walking somewhere. I'm female. Never really thought about it being a big deal (or others think im gay in that matter)
Do you not like him doing it? Have you asked him to stop? What's his reaction?

Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt, you know?

You said the friend lives abroad. Is the friend now living in a culture where it's common for men to hold hands? Because the only way I could see this happening is if the friend is working in Africa (for example) absent-mindedly goes to take your DH's hand. Your DH (being super woke because of his work and knowing his friend isn't gay or interested in him) goes along with it.
the only place I've sent men hold hands with each other is Africa hence why I used it as an example

Hes really big on being empathetic and emotional (mostly the last few years, before then his persona was pretty blunt and grumpy, but because hes also kind its what his friends and family love about him.) but it's almost as if hes programmed himself that way because he knows it's the way a human should be.

You've said he has lied to you and that he programmes himself to fit expectations of what a human should be.That makes it hard to know which bits of your relationship were/are genuine and which bits were taking on a role.

He could be autistic and gay or bisexual, they don't rule each other out. Maybe he was able to programme himself into a "straight" persona as a younger man, including rejecting his gay friend and being a lot warmer to you, because that's what he thought he should be.

JessJonesJumps I've just checked and it's Malaysia, I'm not sure of the customs there , before that he lived in Dabai if I remember correctly.

I don’t think OP is implying he’s not neurotypical,

Apart from she said she thinks he may have autism?

*Dubai