Suspicious of neighbours behaviour towards my DH

[Stace88]

The couple who lived next door to us when we moved in broke up a few months ago and the man has since moved out.

The woman who lives there rarely spoke with us before but since breaking up is always chatting to my DH when she sees him. I can be stood next to him and she doesn’t look at me and aims any conversation towards him. She also refers to him by his name but doesn’t ever say mine.

That alone isn’t what my post is for. In the last couple of weeks she has made comments to DH - she saw him get back from the gym and asked him if he’d be her personal trainer (note - DH isn’t in bad shape but is a once a week gym goer and certainly isn’t a PT!). DH politely replied and she said she hasn’t had any workouts since becoming single and added ‘if you know what I mean’ with a laugh - fairly obvious what she was insinuating.

Yesterday, I was out all afternoon for a friends’ baby shower so my car wasn’t on the drive. DH told me he was pottering in the garden when our neighbour called his name over the fence and asked if he could help her with moving something in her garden which was too heavy for her, DH said yes and she told him to go down the side gate.

When DH went round she was wearing a bikini and in his words had clearly not been doing any gardening. He moved a pot at her request and then she asked where I (“your missus”) was. DH said I was out for the afternoon and she then asked if he fancied having a drink with her in her garden. DH politely made his excuses and came home.

I trust DH completely but feel like our neighbour is starting to stray into CF territory and I worry what her intentions are. DH thinks I’m being silly. Do you see where I’m coming from?

Barbara Windsor

I think you need to get your H to admit that what she is doing is inappropriate and is trying it on. Without bringing it into the light there is always a chance this will go down a very bad route.

He’s told you about these incidents not because they were normal interactions with a neighbour. Either he was uncomfortable and he’s being transparent with you because he doesn’t want anything to happen, in which case his denial may be because he doesn’t want the hassle of shutting it down OR it’s because he actually liked the attention and wanted to talk about it because he’s been going over and over it in his head, and he’s been sure to add the ‘I said no’ to prove how trustworthy he is.

If it’s the second scenario he needs a head wobble and a reminder what a threat to his marriage this could be if he dream walks into an inappropriate situation that he didn’t intend.

Once he accepts she has been making inappropriate passes at him, I would be tempted to inadvertently say something rather than approach her directly. When you know she is in the garden and can hear you, both of you joke how desperate she is with your husband clear that he is uncomfortable. That way she’s not even important enough to approach directly and hopefully the embarrassment will stop future passes.

If not then you need to agree with your husband under no circumstances does he go around there or let her in your house. A quick ‘sorry I’m really busy right now and not sure it’s appropriate’ is all he has to say.

I know there is no obligation on OP to reply but she has got 100 or so replies with posters giving a variety of advice to her. It would be nice to hear her thoughts on some of it.
I hope it isn't going to be one of those threads from a first time poster where they just disappear leaving the rest of us to go round in circles - we 're already on page 5.

I think if you do trust your DH, this is irrelevant really and I wouldn’t waste any brain space thinking about it. She’s embarrassing herself and wasting her time.

I’d suggest your husband starts shutting her down though, and calling out her inappropriate behaviour if he feels able to. But at minimum, cutting the small talk short.

I have just caught up as a lot of posts over night and I appreciate everyone’s input.

Some of the replies yesterday did make me wonder, if DH thinks I’m being silly, why did he tell me about this in the first place?

I asked him in bed last night and he seemed
a bit irked at me bringing this up again. Eventually he said he told me incase ‘she tried to twist anything’ - I asked why she’d do that if nothing happened and he said that he doesn’t trust her. I pointed out that him telling me I’m being silly contradicts what he said here. He said he was too tired for an ‘interrogation’ and put his sleep mask/ear plugs on to go to sleep.

I have slight alarm bells ringing I must say, DH has contradicted himself and seemed to muddle through that conversation last night. I told him that he needs to make it clear to her that he isn’t interested and he just said he will avoid her in the future (not sure how given she is our neighbour)

"he just said he will avoid her in the future"

That almost certainly won't work. He need to face this head on and tell her, firmly but politely, that he isn't interested and nothing is going to happen.
Anything less than that is very likely to be twisted by your neighbor into being a case of you directing/meddling.

Conflict is never enjoyable, but it sounds like if he doesn't confront this then things are only going to get worse. Very sympathetic to your situation, OP.

@Stace88 your update would concern me. He’s definitely told you his version where he was the clueless husband and she was the predatory female. I would be fuming with his response. As you say it doesn’t add up. He doesn’t trust her but thinks you are being silly for being worried.

I would assume she has been flirty and he’s enjoyed it - maybe even made some comments back and then got fearful you would find out and got in their first. The fact he doesn’t want to talk about it is because he doesn’t want to trip himself up / keep on lying.

I would tell him I am very disappointed in how he has handled this situation (with you) by downplaying your concerns while at the same time admitting she’s a threat. Whilst you have always trusted him implicitly this has really shaken you and you just want fully honesty.

The poor woman clearly has identity issues. She identifies as Barbara Windsor from the unreleased 70s movie, Carry On Babs. She'll be having all kinds of mishaps with that bikini top pinging off at the most inopportune moments, mark my words.

Agree with this.

In case she twists things?
Like what exactly?
I would not be happy and he would know it.
He needs to explain himself clearly, not shut you down so he doesn't trip himselfup.

I would be very disappointed.
Yanbu.

HE needs to be the one to tell her to back off, in no uncertain terms. If it comes from you, she will assume that she has got you rattled, as there is something in it from DH.

I also want to add there is another element. All you have actually seen is her address your husband rather than you. Could it be because he’s the one who has been very friendly and therefore she thinks she knows him better?

Then he’s been taking small interactions and blowing them up to you to make you jealous? I mean all of the dialogue and details I.e. she was in a bikini and didn’t look like she had been gardening, she said she hadn’t had a work out in a while 😉

Why tell you all that if not to make you jealous and concerned? Now he’s making out you are crazy when clearly, based on his behaviour, that was his intention.

Yeah... we had one of these. Not a neighbour, but similar behaviour from a friend... well, more of an acquaintance.

DH tried to deal with it by being really cool and just avoided her as much as possible. She ended up messaging his sisters, who she looked up on social media, asking if he was alright etc. Pretty embarrassing for her. At which point, DH had to send a really blunt message saying it was totally inappropriate for her to be contacting family and he didn't want to hear from her again.

Moral of story = he needs to deal with it now, it's only likely to escalate. No matter how little he likes confrontation. If he values your marriage, he'll have to bite the bullet and get on with it. If he doesn't, I'd suspect he was secretly enjoying the attention. This would be a dealbreaker for me.

My DH is pretty dense about this sort of thing but even he would knwo what was going on there.
Your DH knows and likes it, he is the best one to shut it down so he has to not you

I agree with other posters that DH needs to nip comments in the bud.

In regards to his reaction when you brought it up in bed, I'd be unimpressed if my DH started trying to have a chat just as I was going asleep. Once I get into bed, that's it, sleep time 🙏 don't even try and start a conversation 😅

If it was me, I'd be putting it to the back of my mind now until you catch her making another comment & then address with DH that he needs to say something.

Personally, I would make it known in no uncertain terms that he is your husband and you will not tolerate her innuendo or attempts to encourage him to stray. Give her the address to the nearest Ann Summers and a few numbers for handymen as your husband is no longer available for anything she needs help with. I bloody hate women who think it's acceptable to encourage married men to stray.
You said you trusted your husband, but now you're wondering, well, he told you these things to prevent her making stuff up so give the poor man the benefit of the doubt and ignore the men-haters on mumsnet.

FWIW as a bloke my interpretation of the DH's behaviour is as follows;

DH found the neighbours behaviour weird and is slightly intimidated by it, but also mildly flattered. Calling OP silly was meant to reassure her that he absolutely wouldn't stray but it had the opposite effect, because it failed to ackoweledge the disrespect the neighbour is showing towards OP.

DH most likely wants an easily life, doesn't like confrontation and doesn't want the recent behviour to turn neighbour relations sour. He probably hopes the neighbours behaviour will die down once she's started dating and found other targets. Possibly he also likes the ego rub he gets from the comments and naivley views them as harmless.

I would avoid severely interrogating DH on his comments verbatum as he'll likely think "fuck it, I won't bother mentioning next time". It's quite draining when someone interrogates what you say with a fine tooth comb.

Instead focus on emphasising how disrespectful her behavious is to you OP and that it needs to be nipped in the bud by him otherwise you'll tell her yourself. Although imo OP you're probably best having a quite word yourself to ensure the message is received loud and clear. Coming direct from you also sends the message you aren't to be messed with.

Yoooo Hoooo! Hi James! Could you slip in the back gate and give me a hand with my big pots.

I don’t think your DH has done anything wrong. He clearly knows what she’s doing but if he says ‘She’s absolutely gagging for a piece of me babe! What can I do?’ He knows that will probably upset you and not go down well.

I think it’s on you to nip it in the bud - I’d call over next time you see her. ‘Hey Claire! Lovely day! Need any pots moving today?

And leave it there, she’ll know what you’re doing.

I would also say there's lots of right ways or acceptable ways to resolve these situations.

A few years ago we had new bathroom fitted A year afterwards DW informed me the fitter had sent some inappropriate messages to her after. She text again thanking for the work and stated she loved the new bath.

He responded with 'send some photos of you in it then'. She nipped it in the bud with don't text me things like that and decided not to inform me (as she wasn't sure how I'd react to him).

Think it must have ate away at her she hadn't said anything so eventually she told me. My response was 'well we're not using him again'. I felt no need to storm round with a bruised alpha male ego and state I'd thump him if he did it again (or similar typical guy reponse).

Instead I'd ackowledged she responded in the way she felt best at the time, and reassured her to tell me next time as I prefer a pragmatic approach to one that's led by a knee jerk emotional response. Doesn't leaving me question if she's concealing any else just her decision making puts the well being of the relationship first.

So to OP's situtation nipping it in the bud way well be the answer, but there's no guarantees the neighbour will take that on board and in may be the brushing off approach that DH is taking may be the most effective course of action.

OR the person who is being flirted with etc could actually assert some boundaries.
OP's H doesn't need his wife to protect him, he needs to sort this out - unless he doesn't think its a problem
In which case it IS

What a weirdo she is!

Two can play at that game... Next time DH is out and she's in the garden, ask her round to help you move something. Make sure you are completely naked with a great big muff.

Matron! 😱

Well yes in an ideal world that would be the best response. But the world aint ideal. You can't just tell an anxious person to be more social, or a people please to be more assertive. If DH isn't the confrontational type him trying to tell the neighbour to pack it in may end up being a disaster with him fumbling his words and end up feeling embarrased. Again that could give neighbour power that she 'rattled' him.

I would say if he was too embarassed to confront her then simply ignoring, not engaging with neighbour, or making excuses to abruptly end any coversation with the neighbour are acceptable alternatives.

And here

Christ, I hate mad posts like this 😆