I HATE My Boyfriends ‘Lad’ Friends Should I End The Relationship Now ?

[Mollyma]

I’ve with a wonderful man who wants to settle down with me, but I quite simply cannot stand his friends. He is 30, I am 25 and these friends have been in his life a long time. They were in the same uni

house and all lived with each other through out university and after and they were lads and unfortunately after meeting them a few times now many of them haven’t grown up.

My biggest red flag:

3 of them are married and they recently went on a ‘bros’ holiday and my boyfriend told me 2 of the married ones had a MMF threesome with a woman. He said the dynamic is they usually egg each other on and one of the married guys wanted to get with a girl and he asked his other friend to join in. The friend said yes and they went off and had sex with the girl (unprotected) and didn’t tell their wives about the threesome.

They asked another friend (who has a girlfriend) to get with her friend. He did. So 3 of them cheated that night. It's 6 in the crew.
My boyfriend comes back and tells me all these stories and I’m like ?? Then he says they’ve been friends for 10 years, no ones perfect, these are his ‘boys. They felt bad after and he tried not to judge them.

It seems that he has changed quite a bit from the “old days,” but they are still beer-drinking, rowdy, party people. The kind of friends I don’t want in my life.

I don’t really know what to do. Is it a deal-breaker? Do I just muddle through and hope not to have much contact with these friends?
He has changed a lot and I didn’t know this was his university life but the more time I spend with his ‘best friends’ I’m not sure these are the sort of people I’d want a partner being with.

I’m particularly concerned about this dynamic between them where they egg each other on to push limits. He said in their frat house they’d find ways to push each other to the limit and it appears now at 30 that won’t be changing any time soon. And the fact they can egg each other on to cheat etc and they do it...

I’ve only had 3 boyfriends and they did not have this dynamic with their friends. This is new to me. Neither of my ex’s were former frat bros so I don’t know how normal this behaviour is. The egging each other on to cheat, the fact they have such strong influences on each other. This is all new to me. My last boyfriend was 31 and he had close friends from university but nothing like this.#

He is an amazing guy but he is speaking about the future and I’m not sure if this classes as a deal breaker.....

These ‘bros’ are never leaving and something about once they’re together makes them revert back to their university dynamic is unsettling

Is this a deal breaker for a long term relationship or marriage ?

TLDR: Boyfriend has a strong bond with group of friends who engage in shady behaviour. He is fine but his 'best friends' are not. Is this reason enough to leave?

I think you need to give him the change to choose you.

If you make it clear dud mates are a dealbreaker, it's up to him.

I'm not saying it's massively likely he will ditch his mates for you but he may be growing out of them anway.

well yes we are all autonomous individuals but if your main friendship group is as the OP described at age 30, you'd surely understand that any partner might have some concerns about your own likelihood of thinking cheating and lying was ok? People aren't usually close friends for years with a group of people unless they share some of their values.

I'd be offended if my partner thought that because my friends were cheats, that I was a cheat too. I'm an autonomous individual who can make my own decisions.

You can presumably make your own decisions not to hang out with cheats then.

It's not just that I wouldn't cheat, I wouldn't hang out with them either.

People aren't usually close friends for years with a group of people unless they share some of their values.

Exactly and if you don't share someone's values, it's hard to respect them as a friend.

I wouldn't judge someone on what their friends do. Especially old friends. I have friends that do all sorts of things that I'd never do and don't agree with. You can like someone a lot, love their company, feel deeply bonded over years of friendship and have a completely different set of values for your own behaviour. People are individuals.

It's up to you to decide what what you expect from people and what your dealbreakers are. Personally, I'd encourage continued openness from him and focus on the relationship. What his friends do is irrelevant. Their relationships aren't your business.

That's great that people won't hang out with cheats. But things go on behind closed doors an awful lot.

If we weren't friends with people that did things we didn't agree with then none of us would have any friends.

OP, DISCUSS this with him and see what the outcome is. You won't really know anything until then.

I knew someone like this and his group of friends from uni. At almost 40, they are still the same- identical to how you describe. Even if your partner doesn't do those things, he is still there when it goes on, and helps it to continue. Can you look their wives and girlfriends in the eye for years to come knowing what you know?

It would be tedious to agree with all our friends but we do have to respect them and trust them.

If I know someone to be lying to and cheating and risking the sexual health of their partner and the happiness of their children, I could neither trust nor respect them. Nor could I look their partner in the eye.

@The8thMonth do you realise you've just described your husband and his friends as engaging in rape (the bottle reference)? That is not normal behaviour, by any standard.

@The8thMonth - 'stag parties were awful there was never any sex had with other women'. Hmm, of course there wasn't

Yeah if you stay with him I don't know how you'd be able to wave him off to a lad's event without spending the whole time in a frantic mess with your mind wandering to what he could be up to, it's no way to live.

I couldn't be with someone who friends were like this, its the deceptive nature and disrespect to their wives.

How could you respect them and socialise with them knowing they threatened their wives health.
Ultimately this will cause issues between you two.
You are young so don't settle.

I'm dumping him. Sad but I can't. Thank you so much for opening my eyes ladies

I think one thing that stands out here is how he is still mates with them. You could trust him 100% but he still maintains to be friends with these men who treat their partners like s**t. That's a red flag in itself to me. Sorry op, be kind to yourself and keep talking on here if you need too x

Could it not be a new user with the same name? Obviously the 2013 user would of had to of deleted their account I suppose

Bottom line is he thinks this behaviour is ok. You maybe don't have any proof or hard reason to believe he's cheated on you so far but he has spelled out for you in big bold letters what way his moral compass points. He's not nearly as nice a guy as you think. At the very least he is supportive of his friends' behaviour and presumably has no problem looking their wives in the eye knowing what he knows. Take your blinkers off.

My friend cheats all the time but I do not egg her on in anyway. In fact I usually say what the heck are you doing. I've been in a 12 year relationship and have never cheated.

At the same time, as to be hypocritical to my above stance, I am not sure how comfortable I would be if my partner had friends like this. Hmmm I was helpful.

Guess I got deleted got troll-hunting.

Oh god leave him now. I was with one like this. ‘Lad friends’. They’d been going to sex service strip clubs since before they were 18. The guy I met was my first love. Although he didn’t do any of that anymore. He had and his friend still did. Yeah he was nice however I could see what was going to happen. He has lots of failed relationships behind him and families many years later. He couldn’t resist joining in. Run.