Am I wrong to be bothered by DH going to cinema with female colleague

[Anon1234567891]

Just that really. DH has been to the cinema a few times with a female colleague as she doesn’t have anyone else to go with that likes this type of film, including her own DH. I don’t believe they are having an affair, physically anyway, as this is the only time they go out alone and it’s only a few times a year. So am I wrong to be jealous / annoyed? It’s complicated because things haven’t been great the last few years and because of various things I have probably been quite withdrawn from him so probably couldn’t blame him and he doesn’t have much of a social life so not surprised he wants to go out. Just feels like he is more happy to go out with her than he is to make the effort to go out with me.

Oh so now we have a drip feed...

Either you trust him with this woman or you don't. And if you think he's got something going on, whether an EA or full blown affair, then you are not powerless here. You can decide you're done, if this marriage isn't working for you, and he's not making sufficient effort. He doesn't have to be cheating for you to be unhappy with his general lack of giving a shit how you feel.

@Anon1234567891
did you like the film
did you get offered to go with ?

then how can he spend time with you at the cinema if you dont like the film ?

One of my most anti-Mumsnet opinions is that the only kind of affair is a physical affair.

To me, when people talk about emotional affairs they just mean they/their partner has made a friend.

Now some people obviously won’t countenance their partner making an opposite sex friend. I wouldn’t want to be in a relationship like that but each to their own I suppose.

He went as she asked him to go as she didn’t have anyone to go with her, including her own DH. He didn’t even particularly want to see it, he went cause she wanted someone to go with.

Yes, I think take him up on that. Close your eyes and think of England!

which i get but if ive read your posts corretly you too could have to, but you didnt like the type of film ? so how can that be your dh's fault ?

I can see where he and she are coming from, it’s challenging to find people to watch movies with sometimes. I had tickets booked to a French comedy horror movie and when our babysitter canceled my dh couldn’t come and I couldn’t find anyone else who would use his ticket. So if I had a friend who would join me I would hold onto them tight, including if that was a male friend!

I wouldn’t be happy, but then I don’t think married people should go out one on one with people of the opposite sex

Maybe he only asked me cause he knew I wouldn’t want to go.

I really wouldn’t like this. I feel like going to the cinema is quite a cosy, intimate (and bloody expensive) experience? I’ve only ever been with partners or my DC. If I desperately wanted to see a film and DP/DC didn’t want to or couldn’t, I’d go by myself or wait until it come out on telly. I certainly wouldn’t ask a male colleague to accompany me. I’d be curious and slightly fizzy if DP told me he was taking his female colleague to the pictures!

It sounds like you might have bigger issues going on though. You’ve recognised your connection isn’t very strong right now. What can you both do to try and improve that?

I agree. But the emotional affair brigade can’t accept people have different opinions so they just shout “cool wife” at you.

I feel like going to the cinema is quite a cosy, intimate (and bloody expensive) experience?

Well traditionally a lot of snogging can go on in the dark, but at the very least you are sitting shoulder to shoulder in the dark which is kind of intimate.

ETA and if it's scary ... well you might just accidentally-on-purpose need reassuring ...

I never saw myself as a "cool wife" or cool anything in fact until I joined MN! I realise after being on here my attitude to things may be in a minority. We don't own other adults, a spouse isn't a possession. I don't see it as being a "cool wife" because while I'm working on the assumption of mutual trust, I'm not telling him who he can and can't be friends with, or policing what he does, he also knows my boundaries. He knows in no uncertain terms that I'd be out of the door if he abused that trust, and I'd expect no less the other way around. It would be fucking awful, but I have always made sure I could manage by myself if I had to. I want to be with DH, of course, but I'm not dependent on him, and couldn't give a shiny shite what others' opinions about divorce are. I was raised by a single mum who taught me never fully depend on a man and don't put up with BS for the sake of not being alone.

I am very far from a "cool wife" - just a secure one. And far too tired and peri-menopausal to take any crap!

This is what I find very strange. He doesn't want to go but is going because she wants someone to go with her. Isn't that her DH's job and not your DH's? Her DH should go if she has no one else. That is a compromise to do things for your partner to make them happy. But instead your DH has to compromise and go because she wants to go. I would not be comfortable with that at all. This makes it seem more like a partner type situation.

When was the last time your DH went out of his way to do something you wanted to do even though he didn't want to? From the sounds of your posts never, and that is the problem. If you wanted to watch a movie he didn't want would he go out of his way to take you? Again, I bet that answer is no. Your DH is worried about pleasing her instead of working on his own marriage.

As for the texts, it is strange he had to check there was nothing inappropriate. I think chances are they may lean a little too much on each other and it would make me wary of them spending more time alone together. Boundaries get blurred very easily and even the good ones make regrettable mistakes. I would be honest and tell your DH you would rather he invest those evenings taking you out and working on your marriage instead of him dating his co-worker. If he wants to be rebuild your marriage he should be willing to do this for you.

you still could of said yes

Totally agree and it happened to me.

This is a bigger red flag than anything else on the thread. I can't imagine even respecting a man who disliked women so much.

I agree. I had no idea before reading MN that so many relationships had a basis of paranoid batshittery (and extremely conservative ideas about men and women socialising) to them.

No new friends once you're married? Batshit and sounds horrendous.
Married people shouldn't be alone with the opposite sex? Batshit and something I thought was only a rule in the Bible Belt.
Innocuous activities like dinner and cinema are automatically dates? Batshit.

The absolute weirdest thing is that you can say that none of these things automatically lead to an affair - evidence, the hundreds of times I've done them with male friends with no sex occurring - and yet people still seem unable to comprehend that.

I'm sorry "shoulder to shoulder in the dark" is not especially intimate at all.

I've never felt the cinema to be a remotely romantic place. You can't see the person you're with and you can't talk to them. And I thought kissing in the cinema was only a movie trope? I'm there to pay attention to the film - if a man started pawing at me and interrupting what I'm watching I'd be pretty pissed off.

Hear, hear. It seems as though the general Mn struggle to make and keep friends extends in particular form to opposite-sex friendships. As if a disproportionate number of Mners simply can’t conceive of an unproblematic male-female friendship, so it’s definitely always about sex or sexual attraction, and if those involved think it isn’t they’re in denial.

I’m another person who’s been happily married for aeons and who has close male friends, with whom I succeed in not having sex despite going to the cinema, to restaurants, for a drink or away for a weekend with them. I’m going to see a French film with a male friend tomorrow night. We’re going for a drink first. I am seeing some female friends tonight. The two outings are the same. Just seeing friends. No footsy under the table or snogging in the back row.

Yes, I couldn’t conceive of marrying someone for whom women could only be related to sexually (or as mother/sister). How lopsided would that man be!

I worked in a male dominated environment, and smaller than that, I shared an office with one other - a man.
He was married, I was single.
We got along job wise, but never really shared much personal stuff other than "had a good weekend?"
The one thing we did have in common was Lord Of The Rings.
We went to all the films together.
His wife said to me on the phone "if you go with him it will save me going!"

We worked together for 5+ years and are still in touch now - sometimes I see him with his wife, sometimes not.
I can certainly have a platonic relationship with a man - and if the man thinks otherwise, which they never have, then that friendship would end

I agree, it’s so bizarre. This idea that your one and only emotional connection should be with your spouse is so sad and limiting, too, as well as all the Mike Pence-like ideas about men and women spending time together. You’re supposed to have an emotional connection with friends and do things for them and put effort into the friendship! Sometimes, if the friend is having a rough patch, they might take priority over your partner! I don’t think it’s healthy to think a romantic relationship is the one and only source of emotional support/fun/social activity/interest etc or that friends are only surface-level decoration that should be discarded on some weird protectionist whim. My friends are as important as my romantic relationship, it’s quite depressing how little some people value friendship on here.

And having good friends, with whom you have a proper emotional connection, absolutely improves your marriage/romantic relationship.

A worryingly large proportion of MN sees people through the prism of their gender first, not as individuals. So many threads on here where it's just accepted that all men are like this, all women are like that. And a worryingly high amount of evolutionary psychology nonsense of the sort I used to think was confined to MRA and incel forums.

Or maybe they're all just obsessed with sex and can't imagine that a man and a woman can bond over music or film or sport or politics.