Saw DP getting touchy feely with colleague

[petalpotter]

Just after some advice really, will try and keep it simple.

Been with DP for 6 yrs, both mid 30's.

He has a close female colleague. They are not in the same team, but I am assuming they were/are stakeholders. He has never seen her outside of work, it's purely a working hours relationship. They often go for coffee while in the office, maybe once a fortnight.

DP is leaving his workplace and he invited this colleague to his goodbye do. I work in the same area and by chance ended up going to the same pub they were at.

To put it bluntly his hands were all over her. Back, waist, bum, legs. I could also hear him tell her how attractive she was.

I left 5mins after seeing this. I confronted him when he got home. He admitted getting very touchy feely with her, but has sworn nothing has happened pre this date.

I believe him, but wow, this hurts. We are planning children/marriage soon (though not engaged), but it has me thinking whether I am enough for him and whether he is still on the lookout for something better.

Would I be unreasonable to leave him because of what he has done?

It's quite telling that you haven't really said a single thing about your relationship with him. Is it good? Are there problems? Does he treat you well? All you've mentioned are the practical issues if you were to split up. It all sounds a bit cold. You haven't laid down the law re: your expectations when you brought the situation up with him. I just can't understand this! It's no good having an internal limit of what you will accept - you need to tell him what it is, get upset with him, so that he can see how much his behaviour has hurt you. If it WAS genuinely a bit of drunken groping that was completely out of character then he should be feeling ashamed of himself and be on his knees begging you to forgive him for his crapness and terrified that you are ending the relationship. He's not. seems like he can't be bothered. It's just a bit of extra hassle to him having to do all that. You're lying down and taking it, making things so easy for him. I would be tearing my DH a new one.

God, OP, you are still so young, and you've only been with him 6 years. You haven't even GOT to the hard part of a long term relationship yet - the strain of kids, redundancy, major ill health, all of which put on massive pressures on a relationship and might explain a one-off make a drunken show of yourself in the pub scenario. This is the easy part of a relationship. The time which you enjoy most as a couple, you have time to focus on and cherish each other. Only he has become bored with you and wants to cherish someone else. I understand that's massively hard to accept. But this really should be the signal that tells you you're not the perfect fit for each other.

You don't have anything really important to stay for. House schmouse. It's just bricks and mortar. What really matters is what goes on inside it. And if that is you sitting at home worrying every time he goes out, or suspiciously checking his emails, then that is no warm loving home. That is just 4 walls that are keeping you there. Not much more than a prison, then. And you are potentially going to bring a baby into that?

I've been where you are OP. My exdp of ten years humiliated me at a wedding with an old uni friend of the groom. Watching them on the dance floor made sense of a lot of strange behaviour not only that day but in the previous 6 months and I had no doubt that something had gone on with this girl during exdp's visit to his friend.

We argued about it, he minimised, He said I was crazy, he was just drunk. We had a nice lifestyle, flat in central London and I didn't have a clue how to start leaving it all behind so I did nothing for 6 months and plodded on as usual. One day I came home from work early and heard him arguing on the phone to someone. He said it was his brother... 1471 and a check on his mobile told me it was a client (he was a personal trainer) he had mentionitis about. I left him the next day.

You are in shock at the moment and need time to process all that has happened. Don't feel that you have to decide everything right now. If you can take a few days away from him please do, you need to think about what you want from your life. Agree with posters that he will do it again, this woman will not just simply disappear now you have found out.

take care of yourself.

I really appreciate all the responses.

To date, my relationship with DP has been close to perfect. We have a great time together, we spend a lot of time together but also have separate activities we enjoy - me, time with the girls, and he enjoys keeping fit.

We have built a lovely home, put that ahead of getting married due to cost and it was the right decision for us, especially given London prices. He supports me 100% and vice versa.

I am very outgoing and he is more reserved. What he did was completely out of character. I have confided in some of our mutual friends and have been met with total shock. He has many female friends, some mutual, and they are all extremely surprised.

Their opinions don't matter.

Well, he's hardly likely to broadcast this, is he?

Of course they were surprised. Just as you were...

Ultimately he did what he did. I have chosen to forgive him as I believe he made a mistake. He acknowledges this. I hope he does not do this to me again.

Why does it matter who else is shocked and surprised? So were you. But you still saw what you saw. You're seeking out friends' biased opinions to help you rewrite what actually happened because the truth is too painful or scary or whatever.

I'm sorry this has happened to you but brace yourself for more of the same if you stay with him.

What was the "mistake"?

The bit where he arranged things do he could try and sleep with the woman he's been having an emotional affair with for month?

Or the bit where you caught him before he was ready to dump you for her?

X-post.

Have you ever mistakenly groped someone?

We have built a lovely home, put that ahead of getting married due to cost and it was the right decision for us, especially given London prices.

You keep mentioning this like it's important. Another reference to your "lifestyle". Love is more important than a Kensington 2-up 2-down.

You've been unemotional here and sparse with details - which of course you don't owe us - about exactly how he has made you feel he acknowledges that what he did was a selfish, secretive, awful thing that he will never EVER attempt to repeat. This is why we're all a bit "WTF?"

Your funeral, lady. I'm out.

You've put a lot into this relationship.

Getting married costs very little. Having a wedding is what can cost the big bucks.

I just think what could be happening here is you are holding out for 'the dream' - perfect man, perfect house, perfect wedding, perfect family with a man who, by his actions, either does not want those things with you, or is not mature enough to actually handle them.

I hope the decision to stay doesn't come back and bite you. Reality is someone who doesn't believe this behaviour is acceptable doesn't behave this way. IMO you are with someone who believes doing this is fine because he's a twat or not that into you and too cowardly to say.

Don't settle for being second best.

I feel unemotional

I didn't come here looking for sympathy, but I hope people understand why I have not left because he drunkenly made a stupid mistake to touch another woman in public.

It wasn't a mistake.

He made a plan (while sober) to have a woman he has been pursuing for months at his leaving do while you were out of town.

Feeling her up in public was not something that just happened, it was something he intended to happen.

What is he sorry for?

That he had a long-term emotional affair he was planning to make physical?

That's a massive thing to get over in the context of a marriage with children.

But this dude is just your boyfriend.

And you are all "oh, no big deal that you have found someone you prefer. As long as you stay with me I don't care if you don't love me much."

I don't normally post in relationships but I can't believe how naive you are op!

Touching her up wasn't a mistake. The mistake was getting caught.

"I hope people understand why I have not left because he drunkenly made a stupid mistake to touch another woman in public."

Where there are many years of a good marriage and children involved, we could understand that. Most people could see the need to try and work through whatever caused a genuine one-off. But where you are young, and free of the consideration and responsibilities of children and can start again with someone who really loves you (and vice versa), people will struggle to understand why you are choosing to stay.

You are unemotional for a reason. Either you actually deep down don't truly love him (you just want to preserve your assets) or you are trying to bury your head so far in the sand to avoid reality and the feelings of hurt that it would bring.

Where is the "I am devastated - he is my world, how could he do this to me? I feel so humiliated! I loved him so much but he obviously doesn't feel the same otherwise he wouldn't even think about touching someone else like that. He is begging me to forgive him. I've suggested counselling and he is willing to do it, if it means saving our relationship."

There is none of the above in your posts. Just a sort of numb, calm acceptance that you will see how it all pans out. Just strange, OP. Are you absolutely SURE you love him??

Read your OP again:

"We are planning children/marriage soon (though not engaged), but it has me thinking whether I am enough for him and whether he is still on the lookout for something better.
Would I be unreasonable to leave him because of what he has done?"

And you're not engaged because....??? I really think you've answered your own AIBU question in your very first post.

He didn't make a mistake. He invited her when sober. And being drunk doesn't excuse touching her, and talking about her body.

He will do this again if you stay with him.

He didn't drunkenly make a mistake.

As others said he has been having an emotional affair with her for a while.

He invited her to his leaving do which was planned for a night you planned to be out of town. If he was respectful of you he wouldn't have been sending those creepy emails, having those coffees, he wouldn't have invited her to his leaving do or if he couldn't avoid her coming then he would have invited you too. He would have done that if he had respect for you once he realised he was attracted to her.

He didn't do any of that. He indulged his attraction and built a relationship with her behind your back and then touched her up while she was falling down drunk.

And you still want to be with him?

I understand incredibly well. While you were figuring out what you could afford if you split, my mind went straight back to the first flat I bought with XH1.

I am 25. I'm sitting on the bed, surrounded by sheets of paper and a calculator, doing the same thing. I figure I'll be able to buy on my own, but I'll have to move out to Zone 3 or drastically cut down my living costs. I moved to London for 'lifestyle'; it's a big part of my job and social life; there'll be no point to living in a good part of town if I don't go out or have cool clothes. I get on the tube and visit Zone 3. I can buy a bigger place here. Hmm! It's only a couple of years since mortgage lenders have taken a woman's salary into consideration. Many won't lend to a solo woman. I visit some lenders. It's going to cost more, but I can do it.

I'm scared. None of our friends have mortgages yet, and I've only ever met one woman who bought her own place. Not sure I'm this confident. I put my calculations at the back of the high shelf in the wardrobe and wait.

When he found my paper, he was angry. I didn't know, then, that it's okay to ignore such bluster - I was 'trained' to placate men. I told him this was just how upset I'd been about his (possible) cheating; it didn't register.

Eleven years later - now in the perfect little house, with the perfect contents - I walked out on him. During those years I'd pretended to be okay with his occasional use of escorts provided by clients, and had overlooked numerous indications of affairs long and short. I had convinced myself I was cool with it all. But I had stress-related illnesses and was drinking too much. That Christmas I forced a showdown - the one I'd bottled out of at 25. We split.

Now, he was a narcissistic twerp and I gather your DP isn't. He sounds quite a bit nicer than XH1 in many ways - and also quite similar in his desire for the adoration (and 'ownership') of pretty women. You sound really a lot like me! Not the me I am now, but the me whose story I've just told.

If you take any advice from me, make it this: Love yourself more than you love anybody else (until/unless you have children.) When I say love yourself, I mean act like you do. Put yourself first, nurture your individual future, guarantee your security, treat yourself with the utmost respect. And take no shit.

Just caught up on the cross-post! Where was Mumsnet when I was 25???!!!
Well, the internet was only just being invented but ykwim

….but I hope people understand why I have not left because he drunkenly made a stupid mistake to touch another woman in public.

petal my DH and I have been together in total over 30 years. In that time I've been out with him when he's sober, tipsy, three sheets to the wind, and stinking fucking drunk off his arse. And never, never in any of those states has he ever touched another woman inappropriately. Never has he made a remark to one of them that I considered inappropriate or that made me feel worried about his fidelity. And I daresay his behaviour is more representative of committed men than your DP is.

Don't make excuses for him, there are none. Own up to his behaviour and your acceptance of it. To do otherwise does a disservice to others who may read your thread and feel that what he did was excusable and decide to accept such behaviour in their partners. You may have decided to accept it, but that doesn't mean it was acceptable. Because it wasn't.

Sorry, didn't he also send emails and shit presumably while sober? Or have you conveniently decided to forget that? This was not a one-off spur of the moment thing, but you seem to have convinced yourself it was. We clearly won't change your mind, so good luck with your Kensington 2-up 2-down.

Have you read this, petal? www.mumsnet.com/Talk/relationships/698029-Right-listen-up-everybody