Is this friendship wrong?

[twirlypoo]

The aibu thread is making me wonder (er, that's not me by the way )

I have a male friend who I've known 16 years. We all used to hang around in a crowd together but I moved other end of the country and the group drifted apart over time. He got married to another one of the members and although I am friends with them both on fb etc, I don't keep in contact with her any more in person / via phone (that's partly location tho, I'm a 5 hour drive from them!) and he sometimes works near me.

I have recently been made aware that my male friend deletes all my messages as his wife doesn't like us being in contact. There is NOTHING going on, no flirting - never had been. Nothing I could think of as being construed as an ea, although he did confide in me about their miscarriage last year. We are in touch every few days - mostly very early as my ds is up at 5 and he starts work then.

Now I know she's uncomfortable I feel like I'm hesitating before I send a message, I don't want to upset anyone but I'm a bit confused as to what I've done other than being female if you see what I mean?

I would say this guy is one of my best mates, and I don't want to lose that, but equally - it feels tainted now and like I've done something wrong? I def don't want to upset his wife, I really like her even though we aren't close any more.

Added info. I am now single but she met my ex a few years ago as we all went out for a meal and it was a joint friend thing if you see what I mean, rather than me and him being friends and bringing our partners - does that make sense?!

Do I need to lose this friendship? Is there anything I can do to make this better? She's really lovely, and even tho we aren't close any more I really don't want to upset anyone.

How did you find out he deletes your messages - how'd that conversation start?

He sounds like a total shitbag actually.

His answer to being open and honest with his wife, following his affair, is to be deleting anything he thinks she might not be happy seeing?

No wonder the poor woman sounds paranoid.

This should be friendship over - through no fault of yours, it all lies with him, unfortunately you are no friend to their marriage.

this may sound odd but to me the telling you he deletes them and that his wife is weird about women feels like a testing of the waters. re: step one is find out if you're comfortable with being clandestine and a kind of conspirator you know?

it reminds me of my father, also a cheat, telling me negative stuff about my mother or things i wasn't to tell her. so it may be me projecting but i would feel this was a test on his part itms.

That's what I was getting at Honey, in asking how the conversation started. It's all a bit "my wife doesn't understand me, so it's best that we keep our friendship just between the two of us" .

Honey / wicked - that had never occurred to me, but I was - and have been- uncomfortable with our discussions about it and I'm wondering if that's partly why.

I can't remember who asked but we were chatting on what's app (about drink ) and I got a normal text message saying "I got told off from X for deleting your whatsapps. I'm going to leave them incase she reads them. Hope that's ok" which then sparked the whole conversation off.

Oh! And srartingagain I am a few hours away from you but happy to travel for cake

This is horrible for you

You have a longstanding friendship with someone you think is nice and reasonable.

And you find out that he deletes all his messages so his wife thinks he never speaks to anyone female.

I think that's s good way to look at it - that you are no friend to their marriage but because of the way he's behaving.

I would have messaged back saying "Wtf? Why are you deleting our messages? There is nothing to be a secret. No wonder your wife is suspicious. That's not paranoia because not only are you hiding stuff, you're hiding unnecessary stuff. I don't want to be part of this secrecy nonsense thanks."

Sometimes being a bit snippy can go a long way.

Don't know if this will help at all but some years ago I had to put a friendship on ice. The complication here was that the friend was actually my ex-boyfriend from way back - he was a bit of a prat as a boyfriend but a really, really good friend. DH was fine with that for many years but when he (DH) had some work issues and I was struggling with the kids' toddler and early school years, I found myself unloading about my life to this friend (who was also going through work issues and issues regarding his wife's MH), and it felt more of a release than it should have done, IYSWIM. I knew I was never going to do more than talk to him, there were no feelings of that sort for him any more, but it felt a bit like things had got too intimate.

So when DH said he wasn't happy with the friendship any more, I could see where he was coming from. I needed to put my emotional energy into my relationship with DH and my DC's and this friend was a distraction (my view, not DH's - if DH had said that I would have told him where to go. ) I had a very frank discussion with my friend, who told me his wife felt exactly the same way (actually I don't blame her, I wouldn't want my MH condition discussed outside the family either) and it wasn't appropriate to carry on the friendship. I was sad, but it had to be done.

In your case, it's clear that your friend is playing mind games by deleting your messages. You don't want to be caught in a manipulative triangle like this, so in your position I'd detach. Leave him to sort out his own marital problems.