To think it's totally normal to love and like your best female friend more than your husband?

[mimblefish]

What the title says, really. I am in constant contact with my best female friend. I adore her, she is the other half of me. My husband has never been remotely bothered about this, I love him and he's a nice man and I find him very funny and he is my best friend after her. We have never had any problems.

A bisexual friend of mine said recently that if she was married to me, she'd feel really threatened by my relationship with my best friend. Now, I am not sexually attracted to best friend at all. If it was between her and husband I'd probably pick her to pull out of a burning building, but that doesn't mean it's a romantic attraction. I get that things might be more complicated if you're not straight, but, eh. What do you think, mumsnet? AIBU to think lots of women love their best friends more than anyone but their children?

@GoatWardrobe

I think that women who've had more than one marriage or longterm relationship that has ended badly especially if it's involved the children's father drifting off and no longer being part of their lives must be very aware (understandably) of the potentially finite nature of romantic/sexual relationships. Perhaps that colours an attitude to longterm friendship as a more stable source of love and support?

(On the other hand, I'm also struck by how often on here the large numbers of women who post about being unhappily friendless and incapable of making friends have spouses or partners.)

I also think that at least some of the women who prize their female best friends over their spouses are the kind of 'Men Are From Mars/Men Can't See Dirt, Bless'Em'' women who think men are fundamentally different to women, unemotional, unobservant, inarticulate etc -- and simply never expect to have long, soul-baring conversations with them, because that's not what they think men are like and/or they have not married them.

The last bit of your message: I agree with you that I think that's true of some women. It definitely isn't true of me, however! DH is an academic who works on Early Modern literature and cries about Shakespeare when he's drunk; I am passionately in love with him and also think he's the most intelligent and sensitive person I've ever met, as well as being incredibly funny. He has never, ever shied away from long, soul-baring conversations and I absolutely don't think I've settled for him. I love him to bits. I just like my best friend even more.

PP have said "it's not fair to compare, they're different sorts of relationships" which...I agree! That was sort of my original point. It wasn't me trying to set the two relationships up as competing, but my other friend who doesn't "get" it.

I had a friend like this, it was amazing. Sadly due to a number of things happening in her life we stopped being close friends quite abruptly. It is still the worst breakup I’ve ever had and even remembering the pain of it is upsetting. I think it’s because with any “romantic” relationship (however good) there’s a knowledge that these things can and do often end. With friendships like that you think it’s for life.

I do think with that sense of adoration etc there are some of the elements you’d normally find in sexual relationships, it can be hard to make sense of because we’re not used these days to understanding passionate feelings without sex. For many people in these relationships I’m sure those lines could blur although for others that would never happen. For me I totally get what PP said about it being a pure feeling. You just love them and they love you.

Ramble aside OP I’m just saying you’re very lucky to have this friendship and anything that brings joy and support into our lives without doing harm should be welcomed and celebrated.

I’ve never really thought of ranking them. My best friend is a huge part of my life, we’ve supported each other through thick and thin, illnesses, bereavements, abusive relationships and more. We understand each other totally, have never argued or fallen out and also talk about our retirement together and what we’re going to do when we’re old women.

I‘m also very close to my sisters and consider them among my best friends. But then I (and they) consider above best friend family too. I don’t think any one person can give you everything. I love my husband and our life together but there’s things that I get from my friendships that I don’t with him, things I’d go to my friends for rather than him. But then of course the relationship with my husband is different to that with anyone else.

I had an ex I was with for many years from being very young. He was my best friend, soulmate, whole world, came before everyone else. He cheated on me and blew my life apart days before our wedding. I’m very lucky that my friends and family were there to pick up the pieces and I’ll never think of them as lesser to a man again.

But I don’t think in terms of who I’d save from a burning building or who I love more or anything like that. I’m lucky to have my amazing best friend and my husband. I’m lucky they get on. There’s things that I get from my friendship that I don’t from my husband, and obviously vice versa. There’s times when I have to put husband first and focus on our relationship for a bit, and times when my friend needs me and husband understand that. As long as everyone is happy then it’s fine.

(Thanks for taking that as I intended it, @mimblefish, on a re-read it sounded pretty harsh and not at all as I intended!)

'It must be different if you're attracted to women, though? Then your wife might legitimately have the same concerns about you being close to your best friend as my husband might if my best friend was a man.'

I'm very close to my female friends, including several of my exes ( I was best woman at one exes wedding) but my DW has no concerns as far as I know. Most of my close friends are straight anyway and I'd be no more attracted to them than I would to a bloke.
It can be hard to explain to straight women sometimes, but I'm not a man so I don't think or act like one. I'm not attracted to my mates, as they are firmly in the mates category, and I don't look at women in changing rooms or at the spa or wherever the way a man might/would. I have everything other women have so it's less interesting or fascinating to see a naked woman than blokes seem to find it.

DH is an academic who works on Early Modern literature and cries about Shakespeare when he's drunk

Ah, Early Modernists are famously terrible drunks!

But that does make your 'choice' of your best friend over him more interesting, if he's not some tonguetied grunting type who looks panicked if you ask him what he's thinking.

Is it fair to ask what need your BF fulfils in your life that your husband doesn't, despite the fact that you adore him at a number of levels and have not 'settled'?

@GoatWardrobe

DH is an academic who works on Early Modern literature and cries about Shakespeare when he's drunk

Ah, Early Modernists are famously terrible drunks!

But that does make your 'choice' of your best friend over him more interesting, if he's not some tonguetied grunting type who looks panicked if you ask him what he's thinking.

Is it fair to ask what need your BF fulfils in your life that your husband doesn't, despite the fact that you adore him at a number of levels and have not 'settled'?

I suppose I would pose the opposite question to you -- is there a reason someone should only have one person who shoulders all their emotional needs, satisfies them intellectually and spiritually, as it were? I think it's easier on my husband, her husband, her and me for us to not be putting everything on one person. It would just never have occurred to me to put her to one side when I got married, or to her to do the same with me. We like having two very close friends each, one we have sex with and one we don't!

I wish I had a best friend. I have friends, but nothing as close as that. Although, what you describe seems a bit too close for me.

I can’t see me ever choosing anyone except my dc over my DH. He’s my best friend.

I agree with your most recent post. It is difficult to compare the two.

I have a male best friend and I am also married to a man. Sometimes there is the trendiest whiff of rivalry, but not really. My best friend is gay, with absolutely no romantic interest in women at all, so there is absolutely no threat to our marriage on that score.

The burning building thing...um.. that's very difficult to imagine, because I probably couldn't lift either of them, but you know. If I had super strength but only enough to pick up one of them, I'd pick my husband I think, but tbh, the thought of leaving any other human, even a complete stranger, in a burning building is a bit traumatic. My imagination is clearly told active today!!!

Would I be more upset if dh or bff died though? I'd be more upset if my husband died, hands down. I would be devastated if either one died, but my husband and our dcs are "my world", (cringe phrase, but it's true). My best friend is amazing. I adore him. But he isn't a major, essential part of my life like DH is. Yes, I know we could divorce and that would change, but then my dcs would be my world. Not my best friend.

Oh x post, I meant the previous post I agreed with; that you can't compare the two.

Trendiest = teeniest

Haven't read the thread but I suspect the equivalent would trouble most women. 'My DH likes and loves his BF more than me and would rescue him from danger before me..' wouldn't be accepted as the basis for a happy marriage by most women.

Told active = too active

Why does autocorrect hate me today?

Honestly though, the last person who told me she loved her BFF more than her DH, ended up leaving her DH and moving in with the BFF. They been together 8/9 happy years now... both women were 'straight' apparently.

@newsyoucanuse

Honestly though, the last person who told me she loved her BFF more than her DH, ended up leaving her DH and moving in with the BFF. They been together 8/9 happy years now... both women were 'straight' apparently.

Good for her! BFF and I have been like this for 26 years so I think if it was going to happen, it would have happened. It's just not that sort of relationship.

@newsyoucanuse

Honestly though, the last person who told me she loved her BFF more than her DH, ended up leaving her DH and moving in with the BFF. They been together 8/9 happy years now... both women were 'straight' apparently.

I also know two couples like this.

Sorry if anyone else has made the same point, but how would the posters agreeing with the OP feel if their husbands had a best friend that they valued more than their wife? if they planned to live together once the wife had conveniently died?
I understand how important friendship can be, but people who marry promise to put their partners first, 'forsaking all others'.
There always seems to be a lot of jealousy from some posters about husbands having external commitments outside marriage and the family. Men who have too much involvement with their birth family or with a hobby (cycling) or with work or with a friend ( female friends are a no no from some posters). These ties can send some MNetters into a rage.
I think it is important for both men and women to have strong friendship groups outside the family and possibly one of the reason there are so many male suicides is that society frowns on men having close friends.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-54088546

I suppose I would pose the opposite question to you -- is there a reason someone should only have one person who shoulders all their emotional needs, satisfies them intellectually and spiritually, as it were? I think it's easier on my husband, her husband, her and me for us to not be putting everything on one person. It would just never have occurred to me to put her to one side when I got married, or to her to do the same with me. We like having two very close friends each, one we have sex with and one we don't!

Well, I actually agree with you on a lot of this -- I get impatient with the frequent posters on here who sniff about how your best friend should be your husband, though it comes up particularly on posts about male-female friendships (one of my best friends is male), and I find the idea that you should 'step back' from any close friendships (opposite or same-sex) on marriage quite mad.

And I agree too that it's unfair in many ways to expect someone to be your sole emotional outlet, source of emotional/intellectual sustenance etc and my friendships are extremely important to me, and probably make my marriage more successful. But you're the one who has set up the either/or 'choice' between BF and husband, and said that if push came to shove, you'd choose her over your husband? (And I know the burning building was a bit tongue in cheek.)

My close friendships are consumingly important to me, but I would 'choose' none of them over DH. Two things -- one, is that I don't have a 'best friend' as such, I have a small number of individual close friendships as 'best friendships', which I prefer, and the other is that I think some of this must depend heavily on life circumstances.

I have been with DH since we were undergraduates, have moved around the world a lot, usually with him, since then, and we've made major life decisions together, with each other's happiness and preferences as a major component in this, had a child together etc.

This to me that he is the person with whom I make big life decisions, live with, and the parent of my child rather than sex is one of the big distinctions between my husband and my closest friendships. I will discuss these major life decisions with my best friends, and be sad that moving on may take me further away from them (as a recent move has), but these decisions don't fundamentally involve them.

Not normal. Sounds as though you’re not that keen on DH so let him go off and find someone who respects him and wants him. Not cool OP.

@GoatWardrobe

I think that women who've had more than one marriage or longterm relationship that has ended badly especially if it's involved the children's father drifting off and no longer being part of their lives must be very aware (understandably) of the potentially finite nature of romantic/sexual relationships. Perhaps that colours an attitude to longterm friendship as a more stable source of love and support?

I think you're bang on there. This is my second marriage. No children from first marriage, but yes, bff has seen me through it all. She's always got my back. Current DH hasn't in the past.

[quote mrsmuddlepies]Sorry if anyone else has made the same point, but how would the posters agreeing with the OP feel if their husbands had a best friend that they valued more than their wife? if they planned to live together once the wife had conveniently died?
I understand how important friendship can be, but people who marry promise to put their partners first, 'forsaking all others'.
There always seems to be a lot of jealousy from some posters about husbands having external commitments outside marriage and the family. Men who have too much involvement with their birth family or with a hobby (cycling) or with work or with a friend ( female friends are a no no from some posters). These ties can send some MNetters into a rage.
I think it is important for both men and women to have strong friendship groups outside the family and possibly one of the reason there are so many male suicides is that society frowns on men having close friends.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-54088546[/quote]
Completely agree with you, as does my husband. He wishes he had a close male friend the way I have a close female friend, but it doesn't mean he begrudges me my close female friend. He does actually have female friends from work because his field is heavily populated by women; he's not anything like as close to them as I am to my BFF, of course, but it doesn't bother me. I think partly because of his work he works on an era of literature where men were often passionately romantic about each other, in a platonic way it is starkly clear to him that this deprivation men currently suffer is unnatural and societally unfair.

He is very close to his mum and his brother.

@EmbarrassedUser

Not normal. Sounds as though you’re not that keen on DH so let him go off and find someone who respects him and wants him. Not cool OP.

But the OP has made it perfectly clear she is very keen indeed on her husband:

I am passionately in love with him and also think he's the most intelligent and sensitive person I've ever met, as well as being incredibly funny. He has never, ever shied away from long, soul-baring conversations and I absolutely don't think I've settled for him. I love him to bits.

I get much more of what I need from my close female friendships than from my marriage, for sure. I think it really depends what your marriage is like. As it happens, most of my friends who are married / in long term relationships, lead pretty separate lives from their partners, and their marriages have become practical & functional rather than intimate and fun. So we are more available to one another.

Sounds very intense. I love my best mate with all my heart, but she is not the father of my children not hte person I choose to have sex with on a semi regualr basis.

If I had to chose, I'd chose my husband, because my kids need him more than her.

I think you can be different with different people.

Family-i do not talk about sex with. I don't go to them first with anything as I don't find them very helpful.

Partner- there for me with anything. I talk to him about all-sorts of things. Wouldn't be able to talk about certain things with him thouh.

Friends- you can often talk to the best ones about everything. My friend keeps my youth alive. We can snigger on the school run about stuff. We can appreciate the fit man on the park jogging past. We can moan about men and housework. Ask eachother things about sex, periods, pains and things. We are also tackling mother hood together and so we have all that to talk about too. It brings you closer.

I think different people bring different value to your life. But out of all the different relationships I have my friendships are the ones I can have more fun and depth in.