Dh meeting female colleague for a drink

[Bookish01]

My dh of 20 years is very sociable and has lots of friends. He recently gave a female colleague a lift home from work and since then they’ve arranged to meet for a lunchtime drink soon. She’s about 10 years younger, single parent. She usually gets lifts with another male colleague and assume will continue to do so when their car is fixed.
Dh always been faithful and trustworthy. I’m in a bit of a weird place emotionally and lacking a lot of self confidence recently probably due to empty nest syndrome.
I said to him that I feel uncomfortable with his plans to meet her and he’s not responded well and said I’ve got nothing to worry about and he should be allowed to meet a mate, male or female. He’d be fine with me doing the same.
Aibu to ask him not to meet her? (It won’t go down well)

This! Invite yourself along and see his reaction 😅

I'm going to my works Christmas do tomorrow, staying over in the city and it's mostly men my age. I'll be drinking but there's not a single one I would ever think of in that way. And if they ever thought of me in that way, I'm confident enough to clearly turn them down.

I am biased but I've yet to meet a guy who wants to be a friend and who has zero ulterior motive ever. My twenties were littered with "friends" who were only biding their time before making a move and then blaming me for being stupid enough to think being a friend was enough for them. So I'm well able for any bloke who thinks that because I'm friendly I must somehow be giving him secret telepathic signals.

I mean, men's new friends at work are never Marge in her late 50s in accounts are they? It's always someone younger, and I really do believe that even if they have zero intention of cheating, they enjoy the attention and any flirting from someone they find attractive. And therein lies the line for me. I've no interest in being with a man who would do that, and DH feels likewise.

I do know guys who have a bunch of female friends and who make female friendships that remain female friendships, but they are few and far between.

I think work is a circumstance where you can form proper friendships with people of the opposite sex without any kind of dating related undertones, as there’s no expectation whatsoever.

I wouldn’t say anything about this, and work on your own self esteem instead. He’s never given you a reason to doubt him, so why start now? Plus it’s a lunchtime drink not a wild night out.

Has he been friendly with this woman for a long time OP or is it only recently they have become close enough for him to give her lifts and meet up for lunch?

If she is a long term friend then OK. But otherwise if this is a new friendship it sounds rather as though they are having a date together.

I wouldn't be happy with his reaction to your concerns either. You are his life partner and he should be reassuring you and taking your feelings into account.

Is it a lunchtime drink on a working day? or at the weekend of after work?

where I am from, it's quite old school, if your in a couple and a bit older, you wouldn't really do this.

It depends on the industry. This would be very normal in my industry, and not a sign of cheating. I go for drinks and lunches with people of all ages and genders. It used to be a male dominated industry though, and it has changed a bit in recent years, perhaps due to increasing numbers of women in the profession - more coffee daytime meetings, less drinks in the evening meetings.

You said "He’d be fine with me doing the same". Let's see if he will really be fine with that.

Would he be ok with you meeting a male single friend for a drink? If you trust he wouldn't cheat then to ban him from doing so could seem a bit controlling. It does make it sound like you feel he can't be trusted. With no evidence he'd ever cheat it's not a good feeling to give someone.
Maybe she'll turn out to be someone you can be friends with also? If you met her you might get on really well.
I honestly think if he's ok with you having male friends, in principle, then it should work both ways.

Some of you would have a field day with me regularly going off to another country to stay with a male friend. OP, you've said you've got confidence issues - please work on this for you, so your light shines again. Before your confidence issues (understandable by the way) would this have been an issue for you?

My husband has lots of female friends always has done. I wouldn't be at all concerned if he met a female colleague for lunch or a drink - he often does. I trust him. I actually like the fact he's always had female friends. I think it shows he sees women as human beings rather than just something to sex with. I find it a bit weird when men only have male friends. I wonder how much they understand women.
I just have this attitude that if DH is going to cheat he will do and me worrying about it makes no difference. If he wants to throw away 23 years of marriage then that's his mistake. I can't see it happening though.

I suppose it very much depends on the grand scheme of things. When my DH has free time he takes me out for lunch. He also goes with female and male colleagues but as a group. Going out one to one will imply very special close friendship for him. There is an old female friend who will be in this category and if she will visit our town I can easily imagine them go out together for lunch but going out in your circumstances will be very out of character for my DH, however it might be normal for yours.

But why make if is problem? You understand the issue is your mental health, you know you’re doing something about it, hopefully you get better, but why try to emotionally manipulate him into not going.

do you see how much bad feeling this would cause. Either way he will resent you. He works with this woman. Quite frankly if he wants to cheat, he will, stopping him having a drink won’t change that. He sees her at work. He can go out with her any time and you won’t know. He can even just lie and aappease you.

why not recognise it’s your issue, and not make it his problem?

FWIW being the female friend in this sort of scenario where the male friends’ wife gets insecure and doesn’t want them to meet up is quite horrible too.
Ive lost 2 very long friendships with men when they got married and their wives decided they were no longer allowed to meet up with me.
I think this would be the difference for me though too. If he has been friends with this work colleague for a long time and has decided to go for a drink with her because of the connection from giving her a lift, I would be less worried. I would just assume she was saying thank you to her friend by buying him a drink.
If she’s a shiny new work colleague or he wasn’t friends with her before giving her the lift, then I would be more suspicious.

He may be totally trustworthy, but spending hours with an attractive (possibly available) younger woman, chatting about all sorts of stuff and having a few drinks can lead to a level of friendship that can drift into something more. As a one off I would let it go, if it was being repeated I would be concerned. Having an odd lunch with several colleagues is a different thing, even if it ends up one to one on an occasion. Meeting up with an old friend is also a different thing, if anything was going to happen it probably did back in the day and is now in the past, or it was never that sort of friendship.

It's probably because many,many of us on here have learned the hard way. My husband left me and our two boys aged 3 and 2 for a 17 year old from work. She was just a colleague, I shouldn't be so paranoid, so old fashioned, I should trust him. Blah fucking blah. He'd been fucking her for months.

I’m the only female in my team and it would be a lonely workplace if none of the men were allowed to socialise with me. I’m happily married, as are they (as far as I know- we don’t talk about the state of our relationships), I travel a few times a year with the team and someone always makes sure I get back to my room safely (never come in or invited in) and we have lovely, genuine, working relationships that are friendly.

I wouldn't be happy at all...ten years younger and single....what a cliché

This would annoy me if my DH never took me out for lunch/drinks. Do you ever go out like this together, OP?

He told you about it, so there is that. He isn’t hiding it like a guilty person would be inclined to.

Bloke hasnt tried to shag you, therefore he must be gay right.......

I wouldn't want DH there in this situation not because I have anything to hide, but because it would be super weird and controlling for him to invite himself along to my lunch with a work friend, where they don't know each other at all, may well not like each other, and we won't be able to talk about work or anything work-related without leaving him out. It would make it a totally different social encounter with a totally different, and much worse, dynamic. Not to mention imply that apparently he thinks I'll fuck anything that moves unless he babysits me.

I would feel uneasy too, and don’t blame you for feeling insecure about it. It’s a one to one regular arrangement, and I wouldn’t be happy, and don’t believe other wives would be either. It’s so easy for one thing to lead to another an emotional affair, perhaps leading to a physical affair. I think he’s hurtful and inconsiderate of your feelings.

Good for you.
You are talking about your situation, not OP's.
For a start her DH is arranging a one -to -one meet up with a woman 10 years younger than himself. And she is not " happily married", she is a single parent. And she is apparently someone her DH has just become close to.
So how does your situation inform OP about what is happening in her life?

This is absolutely spot on.

You’ll get a 1000 responses saying “I’d be fine with it/you either trust him or you don’t/I meet my male friends all the time” etc etc.

but as a previous poster stated, it wouldn’t be happening if she wasn’t attractive to him - or if she was Arthur from accounts.

There are posts here every week of people saying “my DH was the least likely person to have an affair” so trust your gut on this one. It’s the fact that she’s a new colleague and he’s arranging social meet ups.

I’d let it go for now but keep an eye on it. If he does fancy her, there’s nothing you can do to stop it but be aware in case the worst happens and you need your ducks in a row.

I work in IT and DH is in education, and my workplace is mainly men and his is mainly women. I will meet male colleagues for an occasional drink, exchange messages and he does the same with his female colleagues. One woman on his team he's matey with is gorgeous. Likewise he may notice one or two of my work friends are attractive. I've been cheated on in my previous relationship and I've completely changed my outlook on these things, if DH cheats on me then obviously I'd be devastated but I hope he's faithful to me because he loves me and has morals, and can be just friends with the opposite sex as much as I'm capable of doing the same, not because I've kept him in a cage or shielded him from being tempted. I think it's insightful you've recognised your low self esteem and empty nest syndrome and I think you should focus a bit more time on what you enjoy doing and being kinder to yourself.