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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Female 'friend' sent this to DH - can anyone translate from Polish?

184 replies

tippingpoint14 · 13/04/2020 05:54

So, my husband has a female friend. Big deal, he has many. I've never had a problem with his female friends. Ever. In fact, I've become friends with all the others. Love them to bits.

Until this one. She's also married and something about her jars with me. Then this popped up on his phone yesterday. He had sent her a picture of our son excited about Easter eggs. She replied with this meme, followed by the word for "sweetie" in Polish with hug emoji.

If someone out there speaks fluent Polish, please translate and let me know AIBU to feel uncomfortable with this woman sending this sort of thing to my husband. Much appreciated.

Female 'friend' sent this to DH - can anyone translate from Polish?
OP posts:
HavenDilemma · 13/04/2020 15:15

@chiyo666 @lonelySam @few43453545,

Thing is, we're in the UK. This is our culture. There has to be comprimise. If we visit/move to another culture then we adopt & respect theirs.
I visited a Muslim mosque once with school and we all donned scarves over our head and us girls made sure our uniform was appropriate.
For that day, we compromised and respected their culture 🤷 . And we were happy to do it. We didn't waltz in there, in rolled up skirts and school shoes (which revealed ankles) ranting about how it's our culture, like it or not!

YouJustDoYou · 13/04/2020 16:18

I've known quite a number of polish women over the past few decades and would never ever describe any of them as "flirty"?! Maybe a bit serious, but I've never even heard of them being "known as flirty" until this thread.

MonaLisaDoesntSmile · 13/04/2020 16:31

@Chiyo666 I am not questioning the quality of your upbringing- I was thinking more in the line of some families/milieus being more open than others within the same culture. I travelled through Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary and have visited people's homes where the atmosphere was very warm, informal and open and others in the came country where it was very formal and strict. My point was that it was more of a personal characteristic rather than a national thing/stereotype.

lonelySam · 13/04/2020 16:45

@Havendilema but actually this is about an interaction between two people from the same culture. Both OP's DH and his friend are Polish. There's no misunderstanding between them and she wasn't flirting with him which many Polish people on this thread said many times. Why do you think they should adhere to English norms in that situation?
Part of preserving a national identity is preserving the norms and customs of that culture. It's unrealistic to expect people to apply English norms (as ponchek tried to explain) to a friendship between two people from outside that country. My friendships with non - Poles are different to the ones with people from my country. Quite frankly, people who describe me as a 'friend' in English, to me are marely acquaintances to me.

ponchek · 13/04/2020 16:52

Fizzy has called it.

Don't ever stay with someone who watches you be disrespected and laughs. Who takes part in making you feel bad, and is fine with it.

And yes, it's not to do with the meme or nationalities.

It's making your partner feel like an idiot and a loser while you respond to someone in a private language. In front of them.

I'm constantly in bilingual and trilingual situations and I know that the most disrespectful thing is to exclude anyone. And I also know that even if they don't get the words, they will feel and understand the energy of others.

A Polish wife would not tolerate her husband exposing her from conversation with another woman like that. After she had spoken to him in private, he would never speak to that woman again.

OP, I've been there. Of course one can't generalise, but a lot of Polish men are used to a strong matriarch and need to know where the boundary is. It needs to be made explicit.i was warned by Polish MIL to send him to Coventry and not look at him for a week if he over stepped.

I was appalled and said no, he's an independent adult with his own moral compass. I have to trust him.

But she was right. He was like a dog. If you let them get away with it, they will.

So not my type at all. I got there in the end. If I need to show him the whip and go out of my comfort zone to make him behave well, then he's not for me. I'm not a dog trainer.

You have to tell him it's not in and makes you feel upset tone excluded like that. See how he responds.

He needs to respond well. Be heartbroken he's hurt you. Say omg she's just a Polish friend but sure of course I don't want you to feel jealous. And stop talking to her.

ponchek · 13/04/2020 16:53

I meant a Polish wife wouldn't put up with being excluded like that

Chiyo666 · 13/04/2020 18:59

@HavenDilemma what so UK culture trumps any other culture every time? I married someone from a different culture. We learnt and adapted to accept each other differences no matter where we lived.

Winterlife · 14/04/2020 03:03

He can’t not be aware of it. Why would he delete her messages if he thought that it was all 100% innocent.

My husband routinely deletes all his messages, and none are from anyone other than our children or his family. He's also very flirty with women from his culture, not with others, as he understands the culture he's living in.

Calling the woman "mama" is weird, as children call adults auntie or uncle, not mama or papa. I would ask about that.

OP, stop snooping through your husband's phone. If you don't like his relationship with this woman, tell him, and tell him why. He should be respectful of your feelings.

EveryDayIsADuvetDay · 14/04/2020 04:00

people generally (including those that wouldn't dream of it normally) seem to be forwarding all kinds of crap at the moment.
I wouldn't read that much into it as a PP has said its doing the rounds on social media.

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