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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

Dinner receipt? Is this the script? In such a muddle

532 replies

JasonWaterfalls · 13/09/2022 10:19

Hi everyone,

my DH has been using the fact that we’re struggling like everyone else financially to not do things together like date nights anymore. No dinners or trips out, etc, as we ‘can’t afford it’ - I found a receipt in his coat pocket which I searched before putting it in the wash for dinner for £90. This was HALF the bill so they split it. Two meals multiple courses, Bottle of wine, the works. £180!!

its printed for the date he told me he was going to meet up with a friend, he said they grabbed a late curry and he only spent £15. He’s been off with me recently because I’ve been a bit consumed with my parents problems (they are not coping with cost of living at all and I think my dad might be dying slowly), says I haven’t been ‘present’ enough at home or giving us or the home enough attention. I feel sick and so sad since I found it, I haven’t said anything to him. I’m approaching 40 and don’t have much of my own.

im just so terrified and low. The £90 hasn’t come out of our joint obviously, so I guess his personal, but he said he didn’t have much and was putting as much as he could into the joint pot. I don’t know how to approach it. I feel like I don’t know anything anymore.

OP posts:
Nolosomi · 13/09/2022 12:50

Why was it so extravagant? Was it the friend/OW’s birthday?!

Ameadowwalk · 13/09/2022 12:50

wow, I am not surprised you feel gutted by this. It’s not really the fact that he went out with this person and had a nice meal (although I don’t think I have ever spent £90 on a meal out in my life for just me), it’s the fact that he was not honest about it and does not appear to have considered that you might enjoy a nice meal out, especially given how hard things have been, and has been actively telling you he cannot afford it. That doesn’t make him a very nice person, I am afraid.

RoseTree37 · 13/09/2022 12:50

Write down everything you’ve said here and speak to him when he returns home from work. Explain that you’re hurt, if he has £90 spare to spend on a meal out with his friend then he has £90 to go out with his wife for a nice meal. You’re not unreasonable to feel the way you do and I would be feeling hurt too.

Annabananna1 · 13/09/2022 12:51

Affair.

None of this sounds likely with someone who is just a friend.
Either he was with this female friend and there's more to it.
Or he was with someone else.

He could have just called her and found out some life update info.. without meeting her at all x

PersonaNonGarter · 13/09/2022 12:51

Hintofreality · 13/09/2022 11:58

Does the receipt have the name of the restaurant on?
If so, I’d casually say to him “Oh, xxxxx called earlier, about the meal you went for with friend’s name, there was an issue with the bill and you’ve been overcharged”.
Let him know, you know.

Don’t do this. If you can - and it is hard - don’t let on at all.

Find out everything you need to know first. Then confront him.

And all that stuff he is saying about how you aren’t ‘present’, ignore it. He is saying it to lay some justification for his behaviour.

Big hand squeeze. BrewCake

TenoringBehind · 13/09/2022 12:53

Sounds like he’s lying but not necessarily an affair. Would they just shag rather than go out for dinner?

RoseTree37 · 13/09/2022 12:54

£90 does sound very excessive for a meal for one if he only paid his half, so I assume he paid for a couple of bottles of wine for them both. I’ve been to a few expensive restaurants before and have had a bottle of wine but have never paid £90.

minticecreamisjustok · 13/09/2022 12:57

That's a date dinner. Either he's seeing her more than a friend or he was out with a different woman.

Watchkeys · 13/09/2022 12:57

JasonWaterfalls · 13/09/2022 12:38

It’s been a difficult marriage in a lots of ways before this, yes. He always finds an excuse not to do things. When we were first together we would go out and have fun but as soon as we were more domestic it stopped, I bent over backwards trying to make the idea of going on a trip or to dinner fun but he’d just agree to it and then if I didn’t plan it it never happened. For a PP telling me I’m obviously a misery drain and he just NEEDS to spend a hundred quid on dinner with another woman as a little treat away from me give yourself a wobble, I’ve been Pollyanna-ing my way through this whole lot of losses and just found out I am even further down the list of my husbands priorities than I already thought, but sure, must be my fault.

Not your fault, OP, but the responsibility for your happiness is yours. Stop abdicating it, which is what polyanna behaviour is. A refusal to face up to the fact that you are not happy and therefore you need to change your patterns of behaviour.

Stay away from people who make you feel crap, including him.

Original poster
JasonWaterfalls · 13/09/2022 13:07

Watchkeys it has been hard to be happy with the stresses of my parents and being frozen out of my old job, that is true, but I have tried hard to put on a brave face on these things and on more recent deprivations of the whole belt-tightening cost of living crisis and I don’t feel that’s an abdication of responsibility, just getting on with the hard times as most people have to. It’s the flagrant do as I say not as I do alongside the lying that’s another gut punch there. In terms of taking charge of my own happiness, it felt like once I was in the marriage there wasn’t much point in leaving because his behaviour changed, sunk costs I suppose, that’s where I have failed myself before, for sure.

OP posts:
Original poster
JasonWaterfalls · 13/09/2022 13:13

And also I simply still loved him, even when things were different. Its the feeling that he’s been sitting on this extravagant romantic side to him which I wasn’t good enough for, but someone else is, as I struggle with a scrimping household drudgery he’s insistent upon.

OP posts:
burnoutbabe · 13/09/2022 13:24

Splitting the bill 50/50 doesn't scream "wining and dining your affair partner"

I mean it's either at the start so he wants to impress so pays all.

Or it's ongoing and why wouldn't they spend time shagging rather than eat expensive meal. Grab room service after.

Obviously lying about family finances is rubbish but I'd not assume affair from this -trying to keep up with an old mate and not lose face by saying he is broke is another option.

Watchkeys · 13/09/2022 13:28

Love the way people are commenting here as if they have any idea at all about the potential affair of a man they've never met. We really know nothing except that he's lied.

minticecreamisjustok · 13/09/2022 13:28

Splitting the bill 50/50 doesn't scream "wining and dining your affair partner"

it may not be a full blown affair but people often do this on a first date, he could be someone he's met on a dating site and the female friend is just a cover.
Especially as he lied about getting a curry.

Original poster
JasonWaterfalls · 13/09/2022 13:30

Rosetree - it’s a crazy amount to me yes. Three courses, good wine, two cocktails each. Won’t say which restaurant because outing I guess but upmarket West london.

OP posts:
RandomMess · 13/09/2022 13:32

Sorry with his other behaviour it does indicate an affair and changing the narrative so it's your fault he had to stray.

Think carefully about confronting him now and more what you want to happen long term.

Flowers
GiantTortoise · 13/09/2022 13:40

The thing is that, like you say OP, even if it isn't an affair it's still an awful, dishonest, disrespectful thing to do - spend a fortune on a meal while you're telling your wife you can't afford date night with her and that you just went out for a £15 curry with a mate. And blaming her for not giving him enough attention Sad

Frogium · 13/09/2022 13:41

Can you verify with the female friend if they actually met that evening? Maybe he cancelled and met someone else?

Can you check if he has dating apps on his phone?

Twawmyarse · 13/09/2022 13:42

Yes, it's the script. All the "you're never there for me" and "the home is a mess" shite is to gear you up for thinking it's all your fault when/if his affair is outed IMO.

I wouldn't put up with my dh going for a meal with a woman who wasn't a relation full stop, never mind going to an expensive restaurant whilst never doing anything with you, his wife, and then lying about it.

If you can be arsed - keep your powder dry and do more digging/keep your eyes and ears open. It'd be game over for me I think.

TrueNorthernBird · 13/09/2022 13:47

I'm so sorry you've had such a shock. Its awful to feel at the bottom of your partner's priorities.

A word of gentle caution - it might not be an affair. I meet one of my male friends a few times a year and we go to expensive restaurants. He always pays. Won't allow me to and bill would be similar to your husbands. I also know he and his wife don't go out for those kind of meals as she doesn't like to. I have no idea if he tells her we are meeting, we never discuss their relationship at all.

I am absolutely not suggesting you shouldn't feel hurt at the lies and behavior - I would if it we me - but it may not be an affair.

Blueberrycreampie · 13/09/2022 13:48

I couldn't live with the knowledge that this has happened- you found a receipt but maybe there have been others. See a solicitor and start divorce proceedings pdq!

StarCourt · 13/09/2022 13:55

The trouble is he obviously feels justified in lying to you. That won't stop

Twawmyarse · 13/09/2022 14:00

A word of gentle caution - it might not be an affair. I meet one of my male friends a few times a year and we go to expensive restaurants. He always pays. Won't allow me to and bill would be similar to your husbands. I also know he and his wife don't go out for those kind of meals as she doesn't like to. I have no idea if he tells her we are meeting, we never discuss their relationship at all.

Im not having a go at you - but how do you think his wife would feel if she knew he meets up with you a few times a year to go to an expensive restaurant? I find it very strange that you don't discuss his relationship at all - isn't that one of the things "friends" talk about quite a lot?

Id be very upset if I was the wife.

Onlyhuman123 · 13/09/2022 14:02

He went for a meal with this friend but lied about what they had/where they went because he wanted to be extravagant/have a lovely meal & wine...but just not with you. That's just bloody awful. Even worse if they are having an affair.

I'd do what another PP has suggested. Leave the receipt out on the kitchen work surface/table and make sure you're there when he clocks it and say 'oh yes, I saw the receipt as a result of washing your clothes today...could you clarify why you lied about where you went last night and how much was spent on a meal on someone other than your WIFE!!....oh when we are supposed to be economising too?'

TrueNorthernBird · 13/09/2022 14:07

@Twawmyarse his wife distanced herself from our entire social group (I've known my friend over 30 years) a very long time ago. All I know is that he isn't happy (has also told mutual, male friends this) but won't leave and has brushed off any attempt to gently discuss. I respect his feelings & privacy on that. I have no idea how she would feel - she has, as said, rebuked any attempts at friendship.