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?

Is this real?

What is mad about it?

There are countless threads on MN where an OP starts a thread, perhaps posts one update very early on, and then just disappears. And literally hundreds of posters put in their opinions - often saying similar things.

I'm really interested to hear how an OP feels about the advice she is given but I certainly don't want to continue watching a thread where people are just repeating the same stuff in a slightly different way with absolutely no further input from.the OP.

Sometimes OP's never come back and there is no obligation for them to do so.
Sometimes a slight nudge gets them to update and thats all I was doing: giving a slight nudge.
Why you have taken such exception to my post is strange.

You may be right but a man who is unable to tell a woman (or anyone else) no in a calm but firm way would be of no interest to me anyway

Because it’s a classic part of ‘The Script’! Tell lots of little things so it appears as though you’re being upfront and honest when actually you’re not. It’s a ridiculously common scenario that cheating men adopt. Over in the Relationships forum, you’ll see it talked about constantly.
Just to be clear, I am NOT suggesting the OP’s DH is having an affair. I just said to be careful of the possibility or even the possibility that he will continue to facilitate the neighbour’s overt flirting because he enjoys the flattery.

Fair enough but some women are interested in less assertive DH's. I would actually say a majority of the male population would've responded in a similar way to OP's DH. Very few would've jumped in with 'this is inappropriate, disrespectful etc'. I would think the most would've chosen the easy option (rightly or wrongly), simply removed themselves and not made a big deal about it (again rightly or wrongly). hoping neighbour takes the hint.

Exactly 👍. Maybe suggest looking for online dating sites.

I agree with this. Men tend not to know how to shut women down and prefer to be polite and walk away. I don’t necessarily think this is the wrong approach. I certainly wouldn’t want my H being overly hostile when it’s unnecessary. If he knows he’s not going to cheat / be inappropriate she can do what she likes.

However the part that would have me on edge is that he can’t acknowledge her behaviour is a problem for his wife and isn’t on the same page as the OP. It might be because he hates conflict and doesn’t want to address it or because he’s enjoying it more than he will admit even to himself. Perhaps it is a bit of both and he hasn’t properly introspected on his feelings and therefore is defensive and contradictory.

This would leave me feeling uncomfortable with the situation unresolved. Perhaps sitting him down and laying out what you think the issue is will clear his mind.

‘I apologise for the interrogation last night. I’m really confused by the whole thing. I appreciate you telling me about what’s been going on and I trust you. But the behaviour you have described is extremely disrespectful to me and I am confused that on the one hand you think she is untrustworthy and may have an agenda which could impact our marriage and on the other hand you think I’m overreacting by talking about it. My assumption is you feel flattered but do not want this to impact our marriage and you are loathed to confront it because it would be awkward. If this is the case I understand and want to deal with it together but making me feel crazy for feeling anxious about it hurt me and made me question your intentions which I never have before.’

Or the much less complicated
"DH, Sandra next door sounds like she is coming onto you so you need to stay away from her OR she will think you are up for a shag. If you are indeed up for shagging Sandra let me help you pack"

He is in the office today and text me on his lunch to ask if I’ve seen our neighbour. Extremely strange.

Oh my....that would make me damn sure to bump into her to see if she had anything to say! 🤨

That's pretty weird OP. I'd reply "why?".

This is so weird. He sounds paranoid. I think he got a little bit carried away yesterday and likely didn’t act as he claims he did.

I’d be tempted to lie a bit and reply “sure have…” and leave it at that. He’ll sweat if something happened, but it’s fairly innocuous if he’s not done anything wrong.

I did, he has read it but not replied (he’ll be working again now). I should have gone with @Gyozas idea in hindsight!

Personally I’d head round and tell her to leave him the fuck alone. Not in a jealous mad neighbour way but in a please just back off and go and bother someone else way.

I would say let him do it but the thing is he won’t.

Go into the garden and potter about a bit and see if she comes out and says anything to you.
That text he sent you asking if you had seen her today was weird.

Or go round and say DH told me about yesterday. I'd like to hear your version of events.

I was out there on my lunch and she didn’t say anything. I’ve got to get some stuff out of our garage at the front after work so she might spot me then.

c Commented on wrong post

I second this. Take around a glass of water so you can respond in a thick cockey accent 'Eee-you faaakin' wot!!!', then toss the water on her. Cue snare drum du du, du , du dudu dudu.

I love these one line cliffhanger updates...

It could be that he is worried he shouldn’t have told you because you may now confront her and it would be embarrassing for him that he felt the need to tell you.

You make that fear come true and pop over to hers and tell her your H mentioned that you asked him to stop in for a drink and he thought you might be having a hard time so suggested you pop by for a cuppa and chat. See how she reacts and you can get her version of events. Also makes it clear he tells you about her behaviour and comments.

If anything has happened it might also freak your H out enough to confess.

Neighbour: He tickled my p*ssy with a feather!
OP: What!!!?
Neighbour: I said we're having particularly nice weather!

How embarrassing for you that you had to do that and he didn’t tell her himself.

@Stace88 my partner would have told me in the way yours did. He also would not want to make a scene. He might worry that I would say something to her, which would make him very anxious. He would not want the neighbour thinking he was hiding behind me. It sounds to me like your DH wishes this would all quietly go away but knows ultimately he will have to say something and is very uncomfortable about all of this. I suspect your DH has thought about what you said and knows you’re right that he contradicted himself as well.

Your dh said it was obvious she wasn’t doing any gardening when she called him for gardening help, but told you you are being silly for being suspicious of her intentions?
As they say on here, this is a dh problem. He shouldn’t have entertained any of it and definitely not minimised it when speaking to you.

(I actually imagined Amanda from Motherland as the neighbour… 😬)

Agree. I have met those wimpy people pleaser types and actually was married to one, to my everlasting regret. Turns out he wouldn't say no to an offer of a fuck from some tart. These type of men are certainly not as eager to please their partners as they are others and they lapse into incredibly frustrating passive aggression (stonewalling seems to be a favourite) when you try to discuss relational problems with them. You just can't get anywhere with people like that. They are unsuitable as partners. If you can't talk things out with your partner you don't have much of a relationship.