AIBU to change schools over my husband helping a neighbour?

[Schoolchanging]

Dh had always done school drop off and pick up due to my work hours and over the last 18 months I’d got increasingly irritated by him walking with or giving a lift to a neighbour whose child goes to the same school.

So I decided we would change dc to a different school a little further away and they are due to start there in a couple of weeks.

I didn’t want to spend time on discussions and boundaries and wanted to just eliminate the stress on our relationship. I told him I wasn’t comfortable that I’d asked him to stop and as he wasn’t I was changing schools to which he said ‘fine that’s your choice’. Dc are ok about it as we know people who go to the new school as well.

Neighbour has just spoken to us as we were leaving at the same time and she said to dh ‘back to the usual routine soon then!’ And I said ‘actually no, dc are going to be at a different school so all change for us !’ To which she turned to dh and said ‘why haven’t you told me this already?’ Which I found odd.

@shuggles
If this is something that you are sensitive about that stresses you, then you should have had a relationship with a man who does not speak to women. Instead, you chose a man who talks to other women and has friendships with them. That was your decision and your choice.

I would actually recommend therapy for OP to deal with her issues over recommending she find a man who is genuinely willing to not speak to women and not also a misogynist, as usually the two go together.

Exactly. You seem focused on tackling the logistics of this issue rather than confronting the big issue in your life which is that you don’t trust your husband.

Moving school, moving home etc is all papering over the cracks. If your husband wants to cheat he would cheat if you moved him to Uzbekhistan. You won’t fix this until you confront the fundamental problem in your marriage.

Meanwhile your children are collateral damage in this petty point scoring.

Deal with your marriage first before you start uprooting the family.

Yes, this. Just rip the band aid off and face the issues in your marriage (whether that’s your trust issues or him cheating) rather than telling yourself that changing schools will help.

God, poor kids.

OP, you need to understand that children often say they are ok with things that make them very unhappy in order to appease or 'parent' a parent.

It's really awful that you've put them through this in order to soothe your own insecurity. Even if you're right and your husband can't be trusted, you need to deal with adult issues as adults, not through your kids.

controlling much?

this is way over the top, no need to move the kids.

Erm in most schools there are thirty parents per class. Some of those parents are people who are weird. Some of them will think you are weird.

changing school because you have a “bad feeling” about another school mum is very very unusual behaviour.

I’m going to assume that you have MH issues around anxiety because it is totally normal for children who go to the same school to walk there together and if your dh said to your neighbour that he had been forbidden by you to walk to school with her and her kids she would assume you are extremely controlling.

this is very abnormal behaviour for the U.K.,

I find it hard to believe that any mother would change her child's school because she was jealous of the neighbour her DH was giving a lift to. I don't think this is real, but if it is, that's terrible thing you did to your kid.

(Why does this British website default to American spelling?)

I trust him he has female friends and colleagues. I think it’s just her I don’t trust or like so just limiting the opportunity for contact as dh kept carrying on associating with her.

It’s easier to change schools than move we only moved here 2.5 years ago and it was a big move (wales to north of England) so def don’t want to move again soon if ever. I just don’t like how she acts she also rarely speaks to me on many occasions has blanked me totally.

This is absolutely mental.

So you know he's only seeing/talking to her on the school run, a busy walk with the kids and other parents constantly there, so nothing could conceivably happen. You aren't worried about living next door to her or him seeing her in any other capacity. But you've uprooted your kids to a different school??

What happens if you start (gasp) walki and talking with a dad when you do the school run? Will your husband be allowed to unilaterally decide to move them??

I’d home school AND emigrate. Cant take any chances.

that’s enough internet for me today….

In answer to your question @Schoolchanging

Hell yes, totally unreasonable.

No, that's not enough. The whole family needs change their identity too. Perhaps plastic surgery as well as name changes.

This cannot be real? Unless there’s a lot more going on here than the OP has explained, it’s seriously weird!

@NullaEffugium a man who is genuinely willing to not speak to women and not also a misogynist, as usually the two go together.

That's just false. The most sexist men are those who talk to lots of women and try to have multiple partners, not the men who don't talk to people.

I think it's weird that your husband wouldn't stop doing something that was upsetting you. He is the problem here - moving the kids' school kicks the can down the road, when what you need to address is why your husband wants to spend time with this woman and won't stop, even though she makes you feel uncomfortable. Something isn't right there - it's not like you were asking him to ditch a longstanding friend. She shouldn't be important enough for him to disregard your feelings on the matter.

Why should he?! He sees this woman literally walking to the school! With kids and other parents around! No great affair going on there.
Unless there is a massive drip feed coming, the OP sounds selfish and frankly unhinged.
Upheaving the children from friends and routine because she has some weird issue with someone she barely knows.
V v unreasonable.

This isn’t normal, OP.

Why was it a problem?
Your poor children 😞

@Schoolchanging
Going by the way I read your message
I think you picked up on something that couldve been subtly there going by the way she asked him about the changes
But
I think uprooting the kids to another school because of it is extreme
And as your husband seems a convivial sort of chap, you might find yourself in the same boat yet again........

Very weird and controlling behaviour @Schoolchanging

@ForRedPoet it's not impossible to start an affair from the school run. I think intuition exists for a reason - if OP was saying that she didn't want her dh to have any friends or hobbies outside of the marriage, I'd think she was controlling. But she's got a feeling about this particular woman, has asked her dh to distance himself and he's refused. So he's telling her that this contact is more important than it should be, more important than her discomfort. It's the thought process behind that which needs addressing. Obviously OP is worried enough to do something quite drastic. They need to address the root cause of this - clearly OP doesn't trust him and I wonder what the background to that is.

Clearly you don’t trust him. If you trusted him, this woman’s antics would be an irrelevance.

You are being ridiculous to move the children's school and ridiculous to think there’s anything wrong with her comment. If I normally walked to school with a neighbour, presumably chatting on the way, I would think it was very odd if I discovered they hadn’t told me they were moving their DC's school.

I think you have misunderstood the comments about you needing to move house. I read them as being sarcastic, not genuine suggestions!

Incidentally, does your DH not get a say in which school his children attend? You sound as if you made a big decision like that without even consulting him.

You changed your DC school because you didn't like your DH doing the school run with a neighbour?

That is one of the most bonkers things I've read on MN this year.

Sort out your DH problem and stop using your DC as pawns.