Opinions on male female friendship?

[mangomuncher]

Hi all - asking for opinions on this situation please.

I'm happily married and started a new job about a year ago, which is pretty much my dream job/career. I absolutely love the team and have become friends with them quite quickly. We're often all out for drinks together, group WhatsApp, individual texting etc. There is one man at work who is my age, single and super friendly/smart/funny - overall an enjoyable person to interact with. I do not find him good looking at all. We work closely together and are often emailing throughout the day about necessary work matters. I'd say we were friends & have been for drinks together as a group. A few days ago he expressed exasperation about a work colleague matter that couldn't be discussed over email and I told him to give me a call about it (this would be normal for us).

However he sent a voice note to explain everything to my personal WhatsApp and we've ended up chatting on and off for the last few days, sometimes until 11pmish. Nothing inappropriate at all, sometimes play the messages in front of my DH as they're funny, have mentioned my DH multiple times during the convo. DH unbothered. Does this seem inappropriate? There's nothing flirty at all in the messages but the convo is ongoing. I can't work out if I'm encouraging something I shouldn't be. I guess I usually only develop close female friendships naturally. Colleague is extremely outgoing and chatty to everyone & I'm enjoying the chat because we work in a field that we can't really talk to outsiders about. I'm probably overthinking right? Thanks!

I have made three great make friends through work so inevitably as part of becoming friends we messaged more. I have two ‘best’ mates one a woman I have known for 35years and the other a bloke I have known for a decade who came round one day to tell me I had left my lights on! We got chatting, got on and he came for tea a few days later. I haven’t had any issues with keeping friendships just that and friends of either sex will sometimes message late into the night. If you are good with friends then having older, younger or male friends is normal.

You really think we should be aiming at being 'normal', @WhiteCircles ? How old are you?

Nearing retirement and old enough to have seen this go horribly wrong very many times.

How many affairs have you actually seen start, @WhiteCircles ? It can't be that vast a wealth of them that you feel yourself to be an authority on the subject, surely?

I did ask specifically what boundary was being crossed, but you chose not to answer that, because there's no boundary being crossed, presumably.

I think late night messaging with a newish colleagues is a boundary crossed and normalising that is where things can start going wrong.

I'd say ive seen 2 affairs a year start for most of my working life . Almost all "just friends", but strangely don't include partners or colleagues in their meetings from quite early on.

I think late night messaging with a newish colleagues is a boundary crossed and normalising that is where things can start going wrong

But what boundary is it? Are we allowed to text up until 8pm? 8.05pm?

We don't know if OP is a late nighter generally, we don't know if she has conversations with other people at the same hours... You and I are effectively sending messages to each other now, have we crossed the same boundary?

There is no boundary, in marriage vows, relationship trust, partner commitment, that says you mustn't communicate with someone after a certain hour. I myself have a male ex-colleague who is now a friend, who I might easily have a late night chat with. It means nothing.

I wonder what proportion of platonic friendships have also started in your plethora of experience with witnessing affairs starting, and I wonder how you know they were having late night conversations at the start of their affairs. You seem to know a hell of a lot about it.

Surely most boundaries are intuitive rather than written rules?

Anyway, that's how it's been through my working life. A very high stress environment that probably contributed and lots of close friendships that became affairs without the protagonists realising until it was too late. I know because I'm the counsellor they came to when their lives started falling apart! I expect there were more who didn't seek counselling.

I daresay there were platonic friendships started in that time too, but I don't think they would have this intensity if they were to stay successfully platonic.

As PP says, this post is a big case of mentionitus and OP already knows something is off or she wouldn't have posted.

There is no standard boundary in relationships that says you shouldn't talk to someone else at certain times of day.

I think you've got a distorted view because people came to you within your role to talk to you. None of the people starting friendships or having other none boundary crossing situations would have come to talk to you about that. Most people have friends at work, some close enough to talk to outside of work, and without having affairs. OP is not attracted to this man, and can say no if she finds he is attracted to her. There's no risk unless she either doesn't trust him to respect her 'no', or doesn't trust herself to say it. There's no suggestion that either of those things is the case.

Well @WhiteCircles that’s not been my experience - it’s perfectly normal for me to talk to friends late at night and for friendships to form with colleagues, male and female. Not a single male friend has ever made a pass at me and I can’t think of anyone I know who went on to have an affair with a friend. Not saying it doesn’t happen, but your experience isn’t representative of all opposite sex friendships.

this thread shows so many people hold such old fashioned views. Not appropriate to talk to men after 10pm! If you become friends with a man you won’t be able to stop yourself having an affair. Men are only after one thing even if they’ve been your friend for 20 years! Men and women can’t be friends or even have a conversation because they are so different.

Of course there are some men and women who can’t manage friendships with the opposite sex. But I would say that’s dysfunctional.

we are all human and are perfectly capable of having relationships without trying to romanticize our friends. I am straight but definitely don’t fancy every single man I come across - more like less than 1%. Do the women claiming they can’t have male friends fancy all men no matter what?

I have close male friends and a close friend who is a lesbian. We have absolutely loads in common as I do with many other male friends, relatives and acquaintances. None of us are attracted to each other- we are all friend zoned.

the idea that men (and women) can’t control themselves around the opposite sex is offensive imo.

No one has said men and women can't be friends. No one has said they can't control themselves or that there should be no contact at all in the evening. I have several male friends. In fact I received a message from three of them last night. A message checking somethign specific and I hadn't seen them for a few days.

OP is talking about something that has become intense very quickly, something that she clearly has concerns about or she wouldn't have posted, regular lengthy text exchanges after a day of messaging at work.

Kid yourselves that's normal if you like, that's what people so often do. However, how many female friendships do you have like that, if this is no different?

Kid yourselves that's normal if you like, that's what people so often do. However, how many female friendships do you have like that, if this is no different

How patronising. People disagreeing with you aren't kidding themselves, they have a different opinion to yours.

I've had 2 longstanding friendships that started out very intensely and then settled into something that you would regard as 'normal'. Both with gay women (I am a gay woman), one of whom was in a relationship and one of whom was single.

Not everybody has the same experience or opinion as you, @WhiteCircles It doesn't mean that they are wrong or deluded. It means they're not you.

I made a point to message some male friends after the 10pm cut off last night 😂 my husband thought it was hilarious.

I’m going to Canada ALONE to stay with a male friend. We’ll probably be talking past 10pm each night IN PERSON while my boyfriend is back in England.

My boyfriend is bi, and is going on holiday alone with his gay male best friend next month. Clearly we’re both having rampant affairs.

That's exactly it though. You had to make a point to do it. You're not doing it all day and all night every day.

@TedMullins I laughed so much I snorted! (Enjoy Canada!!)

Kid yourselves that's normal if you like, that's what people so often do. However, how many female friendships do you have like that, if this is no different?

Isn’t it quite common? My closest female friendships definitely “blur the boundaries”, according to the “rules” here: we talk about our sex lives and relationships; we talk about things we wouldn’t always tell our partners or which our partners aren’t necessarily aware we talk about; we will text late at night - and I wouldn’t show DP some of the messages, because my friends’ business is nothing to do with him unless they’ve chosen to share it with directly. My women friends are a mix of straight, bisexual and gay women, and I’m bisexual, but despite the closeness and intensity of our friendships we’ve never made a move on each other.

Yet if those friends were male, this would be considered affair territory and a definite likelihood that we were going to end up having sex.

If you have to hide it then there's a problem!

All my bfs are male, a few partners have been a bit off about it but eventually when they realise there's no threat there's been no problem.

Let your partner meet him, your allowed male friends!

Don’t forget this is mumsnet.

woman with new and slightly intense friendship with a man - absolutely fine

man with a new and slightly intense friendship with a woman - “I wouldn’t stand for that”

Like @WhiteCircles I'm 60 and old enough to have seen platonic friendships go very wrong too. Just as an example my lovely son is 24, he's got tons of female friends, one in particular he gets on with really well and is desparately hoping she finishes it with her long time boyfriend so he can 'make a move' - she may not remotely think or feel that way - but he definitely does and I don't think she would have an inkling!

That's not an example of a platonic friendship going wrong. That's an example of someone keeping a relationship platonic due to having respect for the other person's relationship.

@Watchkeys yes possibly not the best example, but it is an example of where one has feelings but other person unaware- and I think plenty of women on here would be a bit uncomfortable with being very close friends with guys that were really wanting to be more than friends- some wouldn't have an issue- I realise that

What’s wrong with a man asking you out if you’re both single? Honest question.

If you’re not single, be friends by all means but put your partner first.

I think that if someone has feelings for someone else, and is respectful, most people wouldn't mind. It's only when they get disrespectful that it becomes an issue. Being asked out by a polite person, telling them no, and having that respected really isn't a problem. Being sleazed over, flirted with etc is.

I'd be wary if I were you. This sounds very similar to some situations I've been in that have gone wrong. I've thought about it and I think it's down to the way the friendship develops and the difference in how men and women view friendship in general.

Down through the years I've had friendships that I would call 'falling in love' friendships, where I've met a person and we've just clicked in a major way. One example is a woman I worked with. For the most part it was just the two of us in the same office, we were both new to the city and I was in an LTR with my now DH so we'd spend all day in the office together and then I'd go to her house afterwards for the evening. We spent hours and hours together talking and I can genuinely say I adore her. We're both straight so there was never any suggestion that we'd get together or there'd be anything sexual - we just love each other and have now been friends for about 12 years. We both understood the relationship and embraced it and it's never caused any issues for either of us. This has also happened with a couple of other women - I do quite intense, loving friendships, that's just how I am.

I've also had to same thing happen with a couple of men - it's equally likely IMO that I'll click in the same way with a man. But I'm at the stage now where if I feel it happening I just back off and either reduce contact drastically or end the friendship. That's because (and this is a generalisation but one that I've found to be consistently true) men don't tend to do intense loving friendships. What has ended up happening is that the man has started to feel what I think is a normal 'falling in platonic love' process, where there's nothing sexual but you really love being with the other person and are enjoying getting to know them so you want to be around them a lot. This confuses the shit out of them - they are used to love being romantic and women being sexual so they can't get their head around the fact that they love a woman but don't want to sleep with her. So it's starts to get messy and complicated. One man told me I was his best friend after we'd known each other only a few months - I hardly knew anything about him but he was so unused to an open, sharing relationship that I think his mind was blown and he couldn't get enough of actually talking to someone. That blew up spectacularly because he couldn't handle his feelings at all.

This is a convoluted way of saying that my advice would be to address this with him, openly. If he freaks out or confesses some sort of feeling maybe talk to him about the fact that this is a friendship and it's fine to feel love but it won't go any further than something platonic. If that doesn't work then you know you have to walk away. Like I say I just don't bother these days, it's just too complicated.