AIBU to think telling your partner something I told you in confidence makes you a bad friend?

[Ifiwere]

So I've got a friend I've been close with for years, genuinely one of my best friends. I told her something a while back, nothing huge in the scheme of things but it was clearly personal (not going to say exactly what but it very clearly wasn’t someone I’d want just anyone knowing, and also I kindof think exactly what it was is besides the point ) but to be clear it wasn’t just chit chat , it was the kind of thing you say because you trust the person you're saying it to.
Anyway turns out she told her husband. Found out sort of by accident, he said something that made it obvious he knew, and when I mentioned it to her she wasn't really that sorry about it. Her whole reasoning was that I should have just assumed she'd tell him because they're married, like that's just what happens once you're with someone, everything gets shared automatically.
Honestly I was kind of stunned by that response. If I tell you something, that's between us, being in a relationship doesn't mean your husband is secretly in on every conversation we have unless I say otherwise. Maybe, maybe, I could get it if she was really worried about me and needed to talk it through with someone for my sake, like an "I don't know what to do, I'm actually concerned" situation. Even then I'm not sure I'd be totally fine with it if I'm honest, but at least there'd be some logic to it. This wasn't that though, it really was just a "well obviously I tell him everything" kind of answer, asking like I’m being unreasonable and overreacting to feel hurt about this!
To me that just says she doesn't actually value what I share with her, or the trust bit of being friends, if it's just going home with her every time regardless. Am I being unreasonable thinking this is actually a pretty big deal? Do people genuinely think this is fine? Would you say you're a good friend if you did this?

So you've always assumed that their permission is implicit and that it's what most people would expect.

Now you have read this thread and seen the poll, you know that it is directly contrary to what most people would expect, so will you be changing your approach in future and seeking explicit consent from friends before sharing stuff with your husband?

That doesn't really answer my question about why it would be important to any relationship to be able to gossip about other people's secrets?

I really hope that none of the ‘I share everything with my husband because we’re one person/entity/being’ don’t work with children, vulnerable adults, as police officers, nurses, doctors, midwives, health visitors, social workers, carers or any other job that requires confidentiality, safeguarding or discretion. The reality is, lots of you will which means that some of you must breach laws and your employment contract every day because you don’t keep secrets…. Or does it just apply to gossip and personal details your friends tell you?

Kick up a fuss and they will label you a man hater whos trying to destroy her marriage 🙄🙄

Just dont tell her anything you dont want repeated

Yanbu though

If it impacts my spouse or their relationship with the couple involved, I’d share it. If it doesn’t, I think it’s shitty to blab about other people’s private lives. I don’t consider it “keeping secrets” to not tell my husband my friends’ business. Being married to me doesn’t entitle him to private information about my extended network of he doesn’t have a close enough relationship with to hear first hand.

Personally if I were sharing with a friend, I would always clarify with my friend that I expected them not to share with their husband before I said anything. Because I know people do feel differently about this and I wouldn’t want to share with a blabbermouth.

I'd say I'm somewhere in the middle. I don't divulge every conversation but also do share broad topics.

If I've had a long call with a close friend he might ask how they were and so on. Say they had spent most of the call talking about something that was happening at work and highly personal. I'd say "she's having some issues at work but otherwise she's good and says Hi" I wouldn't give a blow by blow account of how this happened and that happened. Similarly, this is the level I would share with them about my partner.

If I do need to decompress I talk to people completely removed. I have friends all over the world from completely different times of my life. I haven't had to do it but I have a friend who uses me in this way. She is the go to person for a friend who had a difficult love life some years ago. She was very intense and some times my friend needed to talk things through. All I know about this person in terms of identifying characteristics is the country she was born in and where she met my friend. So I feel safe to keep her secrets and support my friend in supporting her. If there was any chance that I would be able to identify her or come into contact with her I wouldn't be happy for my friend to talk about her to me .

How was your day?
Great. Elizabeth is having menopausal flooding and Louise is thinking of upgrading her car.

Some information is not for sharing!

I tell my husband everything and expect anything I tell my friends to be shared with their husbands. I can't imagine a world where me and my husband weren't treated as one really.

A fiend told me something in confidence once. It was quite significant and told me not to tell anyone even DH. I didn’t tell anyone but then at a dinner with some friends a mutual friend and her DH asked us what I thought about it… in front of my DH! I looked dumbfounded and she said ‘oh Janice said she told you already’. D H was literally the only one round the table who didn’t know and he was pretty cross about it although he understood when I explained to him. but it put a dent in our confidence in each other and I looked and felt like a mug.
Based on that experience I’d probably tell him now. He’s not a tittle tattler anyway.

so, if me and you were best friends and I was raped, needed your support desperately and begged you not to tell a soul, you’d still gossip behind my back and tell your husband, who is an entirely different entity to you? You’re that bad a friend?

I find that so depressing. When I married my husband, I didn't lose my identity as an individual. I joined my life with his, but not my identity.

This is an interesting thread.

It turns out that I am more of a gossip than I thought.
I do tell my DH stuff and I would generally expect my friends to tell their DHs' stuff - but there's plenty that wouldn't interest him/them and there's also plenty that I know is confidential and I don't pass that on.

I have probably made mistakes in the grey areas though because I am a fairly open person so tend to mind less if people pass stuff on about me.

I will genuinely reflect on this having read this thread.

I realised a long time ago that anything I told my closest friends was getting told to their husbands. So when I finally got married I've done the same! There are times where one of us will say - please tell noone, not even Mr TigerJoy, and I of course keep my trap shut

However my husband and friends' husbands have the good sense to act as if they don't know.

My husband has been telling me about his close friend's breakup, sometimes he asks for advice on what is the best thing to say. He is also genuinely upset at how his friend is behaving and wants to discuss it. I don't see it as gossip and we speak respectfully about this kind of thing.

This comment horrifies me! You really don’t see yourself as a separate entity to your partner? That seems so unhealthy to me.

I still have confidences from friends I haven't seen for years, I never told my DH as they had asked me not to say anything.
A relative of DH told me something in confidence, after a couple of days I did ask if I could tell him as he would be able to offer help and support, it was only after their agreement that I told DH.

It is quite worrying, isn't it?

Maybe their OWN secrets, but they have no right tattling to their spouse about the secrets of other people who are not part of the marriage. What's your friend's secrets got to do with your spouse?

OP, yes, it's not acceptable to share one's friends private issues with one's spouse. It's even worse that your friend doesn't even see she's betrayed your trust. I hate the excuse that because you're married to someone you morph into being one and the same person. No.

You want you and your husband to be treated as one person?

Wow I cannot imagine ever ever wanting this. I'd be so offended if people tried to.

I am genuinely shocked that posters expect this.

Do your friends know this? That you are unable to keep a confidence?
I have many friends who know that if they confide sensitive information it stays with me. And I expect the same from them, or the friendship ends.

Your husband "having the sense to act like he doesn't know" doesn't negate the betrayal of trust or the feeling of violation a friend might have, even if they never find out their confidence was broken. Honestly, arguably it makes the whole thing a bit ickier, not less, because it means you're relying on damage control and good acting rather than just... not breaking the trust in the first place. It's not "no harm done", it's "no harm done as long as nobody slips up."
I get that this might be a clear, mutual understanding between you and your specific friends, that's fine if so, that's your dynamic and you've presumably both agreed to it. But if it isn't an agreed thing, which it clearly wasn't in OP's case, and it's not some universal given in every friendship, then it's really not okay. I don't get why so many women on here seem to think it just automatically is.

Why would you even talk to your husband about your friends private matters? Do you not have anything else to talk about?

I agree. My DP is not interested in my friends secrets anyway and I'm not interested in his

Shouldn't have secrets between them I agree. But it wasn't her secret so she had no right to tell him. I'd be pissed off

It's not 'keeping a secret' from your spouse or partner, if it's none of their business and doesn't affect them in any way!

And they're clueless twats if they think it's ok to mention something extremely personal / sensitive in passing when it wasn't disclosed directly to them.

If a friend told me something that was obviously sensitive then I wouldn’t tell dh. I think it’s ok to keep a friend’s secret from your dh.