Something isn't right - emotional affair or just friends?

[FourAndFive]

Name changed for this. It's a bit of a blur, and long, apologies in advance.

I need help and/or a slap to either wake me up to an emotional affair and huge gaslighting from my DH (47), or to help me deal with a shiny new friendship my DH of 24 years has.

He's hidden a friendship from me that has been going on for nearly a year. He has never, ever done this before, and has been a completely open book in all our years together. The last five years have been so good for us emotionally, and our relationship felt solid as far as I was concerned.

He has a hobby that he is obsessed (not lightheartedly obsessed, genuinely obsessed) with, and while doing this hobby he meets people from time to time. He would usually mention these people in passing, and I'm happy he's happy, so all good. About 6-7 weeks ago, he started to mention at funny times how he was meeting 'great people', and 'so many people to chat to' and 'I know so many people now' while he's doing his hobby and I thought yeah, great, but it was out of tone, and quite odd.

Fast forward a week or so, and he keeps name dropping and then tells me that I have to meet someone (single F28), because I'd really like her, and she does the hobby a bit more than he does, and has done it all over the world and how nice she is etc. and so I found myself meeting her for a few hours across two days, alongside some of her family members, who all knew about my DH and the shared hobby and thought how sweet it was... It was so very odd, and I couldn't put my finger on why, and I was so uncomfortable.

To cut a very long story short, it turns out they've been regularly meeting up since late last year, texting multiple times a day, including gifts and planning things around their hobby... I've since seen most of their messages. I have never seen my DH speak to anyone like he speaks to her (except me). He is a man who I know has strong moral boundaries, and keeps a safe distance from other women, doesn't encourage and is completely platonic with all of his female friends - which is clearly no longer the case! There is no 'sex' chat, and he talks about us occasionally (we have 2DC) but it's overly affectionate/mutual appreciation and excitement for finding each other - and I've hated reading them. (I asked him for phone access after all the minimising he was doing, and he said he'd deleted all messages - but he forgot to remove them from his deleted items, so I restored them. I know this is a massive red flag.)

I've told him that I need him to cut all contact with her - but he had serious meltdown (talk of CS), insists it's just friends and that I should trust him. I am finding this impossible, considering the lengths he's taken to hide her until recently. He hasn't done anything to reduce contact, and has even initiated meeting her multiple times, even though I specifically asked him not to. I know they met today for the hobby, and I know they've text each other, because he is telling me - at my request. But I shouldn't worry, because he loves me blah blah. I just want a bit of respite from it so I can get my head around his utterly bizarre behaviour, and consider everything that's happened. It's so unlike him.

I feel sick. The trust isn't there. I feel anxious all the time. I know what I should be doing, but I don't want him to be unhappy at the same time - especially if it is actually platonic. Thoughts please wise MN women! How do I navigate this shit show?

Totally agree with you.

I dont understand the posters who are advising OP.to humiliate herself by going along to this event.
OP has no alternative but to " let " him go if that's what he choses to do.
But if she doesn' t tell him the marriage is over if he does - and mean it- then she is resigning herself to a three way relationship and all the mental health issues and erosion of self esteem that will inevitably result in allowing this manipulative, callous man his dream .

I'm also finding this thread too painful to follow.

I wouldn't tell him to go. I'd tell him that if he goes it is against my wishes.
While he was away, I'd be packing his belongings in black bin bags.

I'd be tempted to get a PI.

I agree with not going to the event and being shown she's the 3rd wheel. Why would she deliberately humiliate herself?

@Homeandgarden has the options right. @FourAndFive is going to have to decide what her goal is, to save her marriage at any cost including accepting the affair and her husband's wildly toxic manipulation or leave the marriage.

If she wants her marriage more than anything, she accepts being the lesser partner and yes, that will eventually erode her mental health even more and her self image will be in the toilet. Her boundaries will be non existent. As it is, she's not reacting to threats of suicide. Her kids will have to watch their mom shut down more and deteriorate in multiple ways and she's modeling future relationships for them.

If she chooses herself, she leaves her toxic, manipulative spouse to his toxic EA and gets on with her life. With distance and time and therapy, she can recover. Her kids will be watching and learning from her behaviour.

What on earth is the point in a PI???

At this point whether her H and the woman are having sex is actually quite irrelevant because their emotional enmeshment is a total betrayal of OP and her marriage anyway!
For heavens sake he has said he would kill himself if he has to end his relationship with this woman ! Would them having sex make OP feel much worse when she knows already his depth of feeling for her?

You need to act OP. Each day you are under the same roof at present, he is giving you his version which you know to be lies and gaslighting, and you are being drawn in, so in a sense colluding with his apparent requirement to be a nice guy. He isn't and he needs to confront that fact.
Its understandable that you don't want him to go as he might then have an "excuse" to go to OW, and make himself the victim of you throwing him out.

But you do need to give him an ultimatum so that he takes responsibility.
So instead you could say to him - "You need to decide - your marriage or your friend.
I am going away for a few days, and when I am back I need your decision". Then leave, stay with a friend or go somewhere you've always wanted to see, and don't let him contact you. This in no way stops you from deciding at any stage to end the marriage yourself, but he needs to be clear he caused the problem.

Alternatively tell him that if he goes on the weekend away your marriage is over, and he need not come back. His decision. Still go away yourself now though, so as to put distance between you so he has to confront himself and what he is doing. That way he cannot easily frame you as a perpetrator and himself as a victim, allowing himself to maintain the good guy lie. Confide in a relative or friend you can trust. You need to get this out, not keep his secrets for him. If he threatens cs again, take it seriously - alert the NHS or social services or police, but don't get involved in discussing it with him. Good luck OP. 🍀

I am a character which could easily do this. Go with mum, without telling dad and treating young protege in such a way that she runs away screaming

In a world where patriarchy is gaslighting women. Being best buddies with her dad, how convenient. I'm following still because want good for op, but you are very flat, op. Is financial worry stopping you acting or ....

My ExH had affairs throughout our marriage and always promised each was the last, begged for my forgiveness blah, blah, blah. When I finally called time and started divorce proceedings I was told that I could only cite ‘unreasonable behaviour’ rather than ‘adultery’ as in the eyes of the law, I was deemed to have condoned his behaviour having allowed him to stay so many times.

OP - please shine some public light on his antics now with your parents. Ill-health or not, they will be worried about you. And as others have said, he must not be allowed to rewrite your history.

I think you need to make a decision about this trip away. He has the right to go with a friend but you have the right to not want a husband who carries on with a female the way he is. This is going to be make or break. If he goes and you accept it, that's giving him free reign to continue trampling over your boundaries and your marriage.

In your shoes, I'd make it clear it's his decision if he goes but it's your decision if you want a husband who puts a hobby and another woman before you and that if he goes he's not coming back. If he still goes, tell absolutely everyone that you've split up and why. Control the narrative and let him live with his actions. It's still awful for you and the kids but do you want to be with someone who puts you after another woman and a hobby?

I have close friends that I'd do anything for but I wouldn't put them ahead of DP or my children. His priorities have shifted and he's controlling your reaction with his emotional outbursts and threatening cs. When you back off he probably tells himself you're ok with everything, until it flares up again. You need to do what's best for you, irrespective of what's best for him. He won't put you first so you must do it.

You can't stop a man from falling for someone else by holding him closer unfortunately...
All you can do here is hope he means it when he says he loves you and his friendship with her isn't romantic.
Because imo if you clamp down on it it's more likely to become romantic.
I speak from experience on the otherside of it.. only in my defence the man was not married and I had been friends with him years before his relationship with the woman started. She took a dislike to me.. made an ultimatum to him.. well we've now been married 12 years and have 3 kids together.. and there was genuinely nothing sexual going on between us before this ultimatum nor would there ever have been.. but it kind of pushed us together in quite an emotionally heightened way. When the friendship was at risk it highlighted what we potentially meant to each other.
I genuinely think we would not have been together if she hadn't been like that with him. Obviously I liked him alot and admired him but it never entered my head we would be together romantically. As far as I was aware he was happy in his relationship. Until he became unhappy because she started to threaten his friendships. To be absolutely fair though I wasn't the only friend she took a dislike too and it seems she was becoming more and more controlling in general.. messaging women he knew at work angry messages etc.. zoning in on his male friends as well...
So it's not similar to you in that way as you sound like a reasonable person.. and it's understandable the secrecy has upset you.
I too would be confused and upset by that.
But I still think that no one in the history of ever, prevented their partner from leaving or cheating just by policing them better. Unfortunately you just have to trust people to know which way their bread is buttered. It's painful and vulnerable but it's more painful to cling to someone who has checked out.
To be fair i do not think your husband has checked out. He eventually did introduce you which means he probably has no intention of leaving you.. the secrecy is a red flag but he seems to have realised that was wrong.
Honestly it just seems the excitement of having a friend with the same interest. Your best plan of action is to also make friends with her. That's all you can do imo.
Asking him to withdraw against his will only pushes them together abd makes the whole thing more emotional when it doesn't have to be.

God what an awful man- telling her father is really something else. Shows that he really sees himself as a cosseted child. Such a breach of privacy, so cruel to his wife - and actually to her parents too. Spreading misery because he can’t face up up to reality.

And then trying to make her responsible for his mental health with little hints about ongoing suicidal thoughts!

I really wouldn’t want this man in the house with me. Ick!

I can’t really understand - given the behaviour patterns shown- why any woman in the wife’s position would want to save a marriage with this awful whinging spoilt self-indulgent man-child. Unless her self-belief & confidence have been utterly destroyed, of course. I mean, how could you ever respect this man again? Let alone find him attractive, or rely on him, or enjoy his company?

He’s got a best friend, let him go and stay with her, right now, today, & destroy her confidence & family relationships while whinging about how much he’s suffering. I estimate she’ll put up with him for about 5 days, max. Then let him enjoy the delights of a friend’s sofa.

Yes but friend, your story only confirms men don't regard women as just friends....

So the two friends ended up romantic. It kind of proves the point and I think you're being pretty disingenuous here. But your friend wasn't in a long term marriage with kids, right?

Did your friend now partner threaten suicide more than once if his long time wife said going on an overnight trip was inappropriate and shouldn't happen?

The situations aren't close.

I think you should use your time now to be proactive, find a solicitor, without him knowing, phone round for one you like the sound of, the first half hour is free. Take all papers dealing with both the money details, mortgage, pension, savings etc and the texts. Find out where you stand legally for the children’s education sake if nothing else, if you choose to walk as a consequence of him leaving this weekend. If you are ‘happy’ with the interview you can decide to give him his marching orders if he still sees fit to go or keep quiet to get more ducks.

I think @FourAndFive is just in shock to be honest. Shock can make you feel numb and sound flat. Her emotional energy is probably drained. Look after yourself @FourAndFive x

So your now-husband chose you, instead of his then girlfriend, when made to choose.
That means you meant more to him than she did. And if she'd just put up with your friendship, which was clearly much deeper than that as far as he was concerned, that would have been fine for her? It really wouldn't and she knew it. Good for her.

Well i don't know about that. I can say though that I genuinely believe we wouldn't be together now if she hadn't done that because he wouldn't have thought about what it meant to him.
I would never in a million years have come onto him in any way. And knowing him as I do now, I hand on heart think he would never have tried to initiate anything with me.
I enjoyed his company and vice versa. We have a lot in common. But that was enough at the time. It was just a happy friendship. But when it was under threat it did take on new meaning. Amd the happiness it brought was put into contrast by the misery brought by the people we were actually with.
As I said though his partner was generally becoming more and more unreasonable.. we had never met up alone or anything like that. Not once in the years we were friends. We were part of a bigger friendship group that did things together. So it is different to the situation with the OP.
I just share it because from that experience I do know the extra charged emotion caused by putting a friendship under threat or sanction.

She was right though. Your friendship wasn't platonic.

I agree with speaking to the OW and I'd probably tell her about the suicide threats too so she can understand how far it's gone.

Well i don't know about that. I can say though that I genuinely believe we wouldn't be together now if she hadn't done that because he wouldn't have thought about what it meant to him.

I think it worked out well for her. You're the one stuck with the emotionally incontinent gaslighting cheat, and your shared narrative that she "drove him to it".

How far away is the ‘trip?’ Ask to see booking confirmation and details and what rooms they have.
You shouldn’t have to ask him not to go, he should already know that it’s unreasonable but he clearly doesn’t care.
I think inviting you into call your bluff. I’d be tempted to go!!! And keep a very close eye whilst there.
Personally I wouldn’t be able to stay at home with my imagination running wild. I’d have to go and see for myself.

He really loved her when they got together. He seemed very happy. I was happy for him as he had been through a hard time. He never confided in me about the issues at the time. But I now know she became more and more controlling about various friendships of his.
She really sabotaged her relationship.
Now I don't think OP is doing that AT ALL.
But what else can you really do but end the relationship or trust your partner?
In my mind ultimatums just do not work, they cause massive issues.

From a PP:
A married heterosexual man having a close relationship (including time alone, prolific secret messaging, overnight stays together etc) with a young, single, presumably heterosexual, attractive woman is not compatible with a happy marriage if your wife doesn't like it...

He is taking you and your dad for fools.

Have also just remembered that 2 very charismatic and very boundary-blurring men I knew in the past have said this - independently, and during the kind of 'my wife doesn't understand me' conversations (both in their 50s if this is relevant): "I'm really close to my FIL and I wouldn't break things up because I'd lose such a diamond friend as well".
One of these guys apparently also said "I married you as much for your Dad as for you, at the time" (he is a relative but appears to have grown up, a bit, now).
I'm recalling it because I didn't understand it in either case. But it looks a lot now as if it's another excuse in the recipe of 'why I won't leave my wife' cake- bake it-or-eat it.

I understand. Your story is yours. But men do see many friends as potential partners. It's how they are.

Look i seem to have derailed this with my story and it's only relevant in me saying I think ultimatums are a bad idea.
So I won't be carrying on replying.
But your response to me is incredibly biased isn't it? You don't know me or him, or her. And if you did trust me, you would 100% neither think nor say that if you knew all the details of what she did.