Colleague’s wife upset about our friendship, am I being naive?

[Bingowashisnameoh1]

I have a fabulous, kind colleague at work, he’s great fun to be with and I feel very lucky that we are friends. We share lots in common and could honestly natter for hours. There are many other lovely people in the department who are good friends too. It’s not exclusive.
Out of the blue his wife called me late one evening, I didn’t answer and there was no message. I assumed from his wife as the caller profile photo was of the two of them. We have never met so it was odd that she would even have my number. I spoke with him about this and he explained she’s been upset about our friendship for a while and had seen some of our messages.
I’m happily married and have no intention of leaving my family. I understand how she must feel and I’m sorry, but it really it is just friendship. There is no physical attraction there. Friends have always been very important to me and I think in life when you find such a friend, it’s a rare thing and their gender shouldn’t matter.
I have confided in a friend and she thinks I am playing with fire. Am I being naive?

I don’t think sexuality comes into it. The issue is whether you have a partner who is uncomfortable with the level of contact and suspects it’s more than a friendship. If that’s the case and you value your relationship, then you owe it to them to at least examine your own behaviour to see if there’s genuine cause for concern.

I think you've been buying your head in the sand because you've been enjoying yourself.

There is no physical attraction there

For YOU maybe, but why do you think that just because you don't feel any, that he mustn't either?? That just because you have no intention of leaving your husband for him, that this isn't the case for him and the way he feels about you?

You sound like you really dont care how his wife feels? You’re enjoying the attention and if you were decent you would allow her to speak to you and you could have a conversation about not fancying him. But you are enjoying your emotional affair too much to give it up.

@thesealion So what??

I know if may be a shock to you, but people don't, and shouldn't live their lives or define their relationship boundaries for the convenience of bisexual people. The fact that you're bisexual is absolutely nothing to do with them. They don't owe you anything.

“Intruding on the relationship” ew ew ew. This attitude gives me such an ick. I can and will communicate with my friends whenever and however frequently I like, it doesn’t detract anything from my relationship.

Ok I think you’ve worked yourself up into some kind of heteronormative rage. I’m curious to know why this logic only seems to apply to opposite sex friendships when - newsflash - people exist who are attracted to the same sex. If you follow this logic through then bi people just shouldn’t have any close friends, which is obviously ridiculous. It’s very funny that pointing that out makes people so angry.

Your attitude gives me a total ick @thesealion. You don’t value other peoples commitments, only your own impulses and needs. You’ve found yourself on a thread defending someone trying to start an emotional affair.

There’s no such thing as an emotional
affair. Yes, of course I value my needs first and foremost? I’d have a pretty miserable life if I didn’t. If other people’s commitments curtail their friendships I feel sorry for them.

Yabu @Bingowashisnameoh1
Keep work relationships professional

lol, I think you will learn about this as you get older

Disagreeing with someone isn't 'rage', but nice try at trying to invalidate my point.

Again - none of what you wrote is other people's responsibility to fix or accommodate in their personal lives.

But what even is your point? You don’t have one!

I think the point is that just because you are expressing an esoteric boundary-less personal approach, this doesn’t affect the fact that OP is BU.

It’s not making OP’s husband uncomfortable though.

Judging by his wife’s behaviour I suspect he has a history of having female ‘friends’ otherwise why would she be suspicious. You say you feel no attraction towards him but does he feel the same about you? If it is purely friendship why don’t you socialise as couples? No, I don’t think you’re being totally honest with yourself. You mention his wife is upset having seen the messages between you which makes me wonder what the content of those messages were. I suspect they were very flirty and that as you well know is totally inappropriate. You should distance yourself from this man. I don’t think you’re naive because I think you know what you’re doing and YABU.

Oh yes there absolutely is. Most of us, even those with friendships with people of different sexes, comprehend this. Not being able to is a 'you' problem. Perhaps you have an issue with boundaries...(oh, and emotional intelligence).

Only because he doesn’t know about it. She’s going to tell him when he gets back from working away, apparently.

@thesealion Being bisexual has nothing to do with the issue. People can have same sex/opposite sex friendships and spend time texting them, but OP has made it clear in her posts that her behaviour has been inappropriate and that she can see why his wife is unhappy, yet she persists because she wants the attention. She clearly has a very unhappy marriage and rather than address that, she’s choosing to be complicit in causing another person pain.
I have a few bisexual friends, all of whom would absolutely agree that the OP is out of order.

You just want to take over the thread arguing with people when there’s no argument to be had. If you’re so desperate for a stage, perhaps you should start your own thread

She isn’t though, is she 😅 OP would not dare to let her husband know what’s been going on, because he will either leave her or put a stop to her nonsense, and she won’t risk not being about to talk to this amazing man from work with whom she shares such a special connection!

lol you absolutely know what you’re doing, what’s the point of this post? You aren’t gonna leave him alone anyway. Pointless posting for opinions when you know you aren’t gonna respect his wife’s wishes. There’s more to this as why would she be so funny about it.

There is such a thing as an emotional affair. Just because you don’t believe they exist doesn’t mean they don’t.

Sadly we can be with someone but get better vibes of someone else. The wife was right to get anxious. I do not know how to handle it. I suppose be abit more secretive with the guy at work and downplay it alittle and engage but keep everything platonic.

Yes, you are and you’re hurting another woman while doing it.

i read this earlier and replied, but been out with collages for a meal tonight, mentioned it, and we all agreed your nothing but a marriage wrecker wannabe… leave the man alone, you can’t be happy in a relationship if you’ve nothing better to do than act like a desperate for attention time waster ..

Because you are being ignorant.