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)

Some really odd responses here. Your dh wants to take a single woman out for a drink? Er..no thanks. I’d be saying wtf are you thinking and absolutely not if he values his relationship. I’d also be questioning wtf he is thinking and be extremely pissed off.

Ignore all the weird ‘cool’ responses here. You know it’s not right

OP says things have been rocky recently, and that he's friends with another female colleague but doesn't go to lunch drinks with her. So I can see why suddenly wanting to meet this new female colleague/friend has given OP pause.
OP I hope it is just a friendly drink, and that your counselling and hrt help you.

@lionloaf the point was this :

" He’s never given you a reason to doubt him, so why start now?"

Ask the many women who have been married for 20 plus years then it happens. Time is no guarantee.

Jeez thank God someone said it. I thought I was in a parallel universe for a minute!

Like every man who ever took a younger female colleague out for lunch was only ever doing it for completely innocent and gentlemanly reasons. 🙄 Like pp have said, it’s never nearly-retired Ruth from accounts or Big Bert from the Warehouse is it? Always a young woman…

Eh i don't know. I'd like to think these things are platonic and innocent, but everytime I've had a male colleague make extra effort with me or plan 1:1 time I've always sensed an interest or they've made a move. One colleague I was friends with for 5 years, the minute he split with his fiancée, asked me out and said he'd wanted to do it for years but didn't want to betray his then partner. Well, he betrayed my friendship and his fiancé wasted years on someone who fancied another woman!! One colleague who was 20 years my senior would occasionally give me lifts to the station on site visits, talked about his wife and kids, no weird vibes, almost dad like - got drunk at Xmas party and tried to kiss me. There've been enough others to make me keep distance in the workplace. In hindsight none of these men made the effort or befriended the older women.

So I don't know really. As a rule I don't do 1:1 drinks with a single male colleague alone anymore. Groups are fine or grabbing lunch at work is fine but no alcohol alone. DH is the same. So we have friends of the opposite sex at work but have boundaries on how we spend time with them or how frequently we text. No 'work spouses' for either of us.

It could be entirely innocent but you know your DH best and I would trust your instinct. If you try and stop him he'll likely get annoyed and do it in spite anyway. What you can do it try and bring back the spice in your marriage, reconnect - because if he and you are happy together, he won't be tempted to stray. He prob likes the attention and the chance something could happen but if this woman is anything like me, she'll be grossed out by it and keep her distance. In the meantime spend time on yourself and be less available like he is - so he can't take you for granted.

Funny how it's never the older widow at work or Stan the Man from the ER these married guys want to take on a date. 😂

Group dos with coworkers, fine. But my boundary would be no to single dates. You can date when you're single and paying that child support, dude.

Funny how you call it a date when it’s clearly not.

im a bloke and I’ve met colleagues 1:1 outside of work for coffee, dinner, drinks, catch ups many times. Sometimes it’s been Stan the old bloke, sometimes an older woman, sometimes a young one. It matters not, they’re just colleagues and if my partner prevented me going I’d be reevaluating the relationship.

likewise she’s met colleagues for drinks or dinner. Occasionally they are young and attractive. She spends time with who she chooses.

Well, not really. The woman is her husband's work colleague - assuming OP doesn't work with him too, wanting to join the drinks would be, frankly, odd.

Hmm... I'd say a woman mingling with a whole bunch of male colleagues at a work do is one thing.
A male colleague arranging a lunch with a single female colleague is something altogether different.

Go. Her reaction will tell you what you need to know

Doubt it I think anyone’s reaction would be off if they were going to meet someone and they turned up with there partner unexpectedly
nothing to do with having an affair just plain awkward

if my other half insisted on coming I’d cancel so no doubt by MN rules I’d be oblivious having an affair but the reality is it would be awkward , uncomfortable and embarrassing
that I had to be escorted or I’d be shagging the person I was meeting

I’m truly flummoxed at many of these responses. My husband has plans to meet up with one of his female colleagues over Christmas and it hasn’t occurred to me once that either of them want a shag. I trust him and while I love my husband and enjoy sleeping with him I don’t automatically expect every other woman, single or otherwise. Nor do I plan to tag along and be an awkward 3rd wheel. Far less effort to just piss on him as he goes out the door to mark my territory 🙄

Someone always says something along these lines and it's so disconnected to reality. Yes, men go for one-on-one drinks with male colleagues. Literally all the fucking time. And yes, with older female colleagues too. DP's best work friend is a Greek grandmother who does "fabulously grumpy" like no one else I've ever met.

I have been out for one-on-one drinks with male colleagues both as a young and now less-young woman and in the majority of cases there was never a hint of anything unprofessional.

Insinuating that there's inherently something sexual about two colleagues going for a drink is wildly insulting to women trying to build their careers. It's called networking. It's called building contacts. Our male peers do the same thing with older, senior colleagues every day of the year and never have to run the gauntlet of insanely jealous wives.

It's a very difficult one.

Because, in theory, we should be able to trust our partners and we should all be free to go out for a drink with whoever we like.
My exhusband and I never placed restrictions on each other and we both had a couple of opposite sex friends we met up with occasionally. Other than that, we were always at work or at home with a young family.

Before my ex husband drove, he had a hobby on the other side of town. He told me that one of the divorced women at work (a friend of his I was aware of but had never met) told him that he could crash at hers after the hobby rather than navigate the limited public transport home. I was ok with it but his mum gave me a very stern talking to about 'giving my husband away'. Anyway, he never took this woman up on her offer.

The following year, he had an affair with a different woman at work whose name he'd never even mentioned but, who it turned out, he'd been meeting up with for lunch. I still don't think he'd have cheated with the first colleague because, if he were going to, he would have.

And that the crux of it.

If someone wants to cheat, they will. No amount of 'always at home', 'doesn’t have the opportunity', or weekly lunch 'dates' will make any difference.

But, at the same time, affairs often start in the same way as primary relationships. They don't start in the bedroom. They start with conversations, developing a bond and spending time together. The only thing ever stopping a person from cheating is opportunity (ie mutual attraction) and personal integrity.

I'd never stop a partner from meeting up with an opposite sex friend but would also be aware that it could turn into an affair and that i have no control over that. But, then, they could have an affair with someone they'd never even mentioned. Or have someone throw themselves at them and still never stray.

Only they can make that decision. All we can do is choose someone we don't think/believe would cheat in the first place but, even then, there are no guarantees.

Are you worried about it because it’s something he doesn’t usually do or is it because you feel there’s something different about this situation

The difference is, though, is that sexual attraction is never likely to develop with some bloke in the office.

It's naive to pretend that a man won't have noticed an attractive woman or even had 'would I?" sexual thoughts about a young attractive female colleague.

Even if he never acts on those thoughts, a heterosexual male is never going to have those thoughts about a male colleague or the office 'fabulously grumpy' Greek grandmother.

You're right, it is nonsense when people say men never want to go for a drink with older female colleagues or men (I meet up for weekly after work drinks with a male colleague 17 years younger than me). But it's naive to pretend that men don't see them differently too.

Well yes. But I think if your expectation is that your partner never finds anyone else attractive or notices their looks, you probably shouldn't be in a relationship at all. The point of someone committing to you is that they don't act on that attraction, not that they don't feel it. And for most people there's a huge distance between finding someone attractive and wanting to do anything about it.

My point was also that "it's never Barry in IT or Janet in accounts" crops up like a demented clockwork cliche on all of these threads and I just want to shout YES IT IS every time. I think there are some women whose "spidey senses" get set off by the mere presence of a younger, attractive woman and they are exhausting to deal with (christ knows what they're like to be married to).

Totally agree, I wouldn’t be happy with it at all.

I have too much self respect to ask to tag along! Yuck.

Controlling much?
OP needs to work with her dh on the issues that are worrying her within the marriage.

Strong disagree.

I can't believe the level of insecurity, control and jealousy you would need to feel to react like this. It's absolutely insane to me and I could never ever be in a relationship with someone who responded this way.

If DH or I started dictating who the other was friends with or who they met for lunch it would be game over. We are whole people with friends, interests, hobbies, careers and (platonic) relationships that go far beyond our marriage. We're also married and trust one another and value the other person completely.

Exactly.

If what it takes to keep my DH faithful is for me to constantly monitor him and make sure he never has the chance to cheat, which is impossible anyway, then I don't want him. If he's gonna cheat without CONSTANT VIGILANCE, he can cheat and fuck off. Either he stays faithful of his own accord because he wants to, or he's not worth my time anyway and can GTF.

In any case I'm bisexual and could meet zero people one on one ever if that were the standard. I have older male friends that are former coworkers that I've met for lunch for years. It's always been an enjoyable, satisfying, entirely nonsexual friendship.

Going out with a bunch of work colleagues is one thing, but going out for drinks, alone, is different.

How did ‘Giving a lift’ change’ to a discussion into ‘we must go out for a drink’. Who suggested it?

Also, why does this person need a lift? Why can’t she find her own way home, on the one- off occasion the regular lift-giver is unable to do it?

I would be wary OP,
Your husband has no interest in a one to one drink with 70 year old Maureen or Bert - only the ten years younger single mum.

People saying they go for drinks with colleagues - in the plural no problem - but where are the rest of the colleagues?

@Bookish01 YANBU to be pissed off and concerned. Bet your DH is loving it though that you're insecure and worried. As a pp said, maybe you should get a new male friend and start going out with him - just the two of you!