Am I overreacting to my wife chatting with dads and coaches?

[thunderkiss77]

At our son's games and practices, my wife is very chatty with the other dads and coaches and it's starting to get on my nerves but I want to be sure I'm not overreacting or being jealous. She'll walk off from me to go talk to another dad or one of the coaches and I think that's sort of rude. She will occasionally send me to go ask something for her, but a lot of times, its something I don't think is worth asking in the moment and if don't budge, she'll go. Last week she left our spot in the bleachers to go chat with one of the other dads who was spectating by himself (granted we all know each other of course). She was there for about 15 mins until some other parents showed up whom she doesn't care for. I'd understand chatting in passing, but leaving your seat in the middle of the game to go visit? I don't know.

I don't think it's her flirting and she's very social and an involved mom and it's related to our son and the game mostly. I do think the optics are bad, especially while I'm sitting around while she's in the face of some other dad. Last season, she was talking to one of the assistant coaches for 45 mins on the phone (regarding the team- our son was around but not me for most of it) and it was a call I thought was unnecessary and went too long. Now, I do think she has a bit of a liking for this guy. He's married and we saw him with family at a game last week (his kid is on the same team) and she led the charge to go speak to him, and his wife interjected with a big "hi" looking right at my wife, almost as if sending her a message- at least that's what I read into it.

Another season, there was a quiet dad she seemed to happy to talk with (seemingly more than him even) who I never had an exchange with. She may have known his son prior through teaching if I recall. She was always engaging this guy and even once left me in the middle of a game to "get a better spot" but wound up right next to him, grinning and chatting away. I was fuming. He was married but the wife didn't show that often. I actually looked up his phone number in the team directory and checked our call log to make sure I didn't see any calls between the two.

Sorry for being so verbose. Do I need to tell her to chill out or am I just being jealous? If we had a girl in sports and I ran around chatting with all the moms and female coaches with and without her, I'm sure she'd have something to say.
I feel like it's borderline disrespectful and she's doing more than necessary.

It might instigate a conversation though as it doesn't sound like they talk much, why would it be wrong for him to talk to females or is this another one of those 'it's one rule for one and one for another' situations.

I know of three people who's affairs started at their children's soccer practice.

If you think it's rude, and you'd have the same issue with her chatting to women and ignoring you, fine.
If it's just because they're men, there's a problem.

And controlling on this thread too, he is absolutely adamant we must agree, makes you wonder the point of the post at all…just wanted women to tell him he was right that his wife was awful so he could show her I guess.

We're operating under two different sets of rules and it's starting to feel like I'm leaving myself shorted, that's what I'm saying. I am the laid back person in our marriage. She would tell you that.

You are a man, and as such your wife can do no wrong on MN. Even if she did something outrageous, it would be entirely your fault.

Leaving a partner sitting alone at an event to talk to others for more than a few minutes is poor form, regardless of sex. Poorer still if the objects of attention are mostly the opp sex.

oh come on, kids sports games are boring af. the only way to get through them is to chat to other parents. nothing wrong with that at all.

Yes, I agree, but this (if true) appears to be a little bit beyond normal for someone attending with a partner.

I understand this is a female dominated site but I'm replying based on the words and not the gender of the person replying. You all are coming in as if you're ready to do battle with an evil, aspiring patriarch and not a regular guy with a concern who has went out of his way to NOT be controlling. Now, I am very aware of my need to respond to everything and it's just a bad habit of mine. Sorry. I'm probably worse on geopolitics lol.

My bet is that she is talking to these parents because she is trying to get more info about the team, how your son is perceived, what positions others have been picked for, any extra training they are doing etc.

To be honest she sounds like she is the worst kind of pushy sports mum. And that’s what’s driving these conversations, not flirting or anything you need to be jealous of.

The warning look from the coach’s wife could easily have been a “Oh jeez not this woman” look because the coach has complained to her about this Pushy Mom who needed to have a 45 min conversation about her kid. Rather than a “back off my man” look.

What you ought to do is convince her to chill out about the game and just let your son enjoy it. Not come down on her about supposed flirting which really doesn’t seem like it is.

TLDR: she’s not flirting, she’s doing Pushy Sports Mom strategising. You still need to get her to back off doing that - but for entirely different reasons, she is being a pain in the butt to the coach and already embarrassing your kid.

Well, he doesn’t appear to talk to women at the games/practices, possibly because the coaches and most of the parents on the sideline are male (which was the case once DS got past a certain level) , or because he’s socially awkward and not given to striking up conversations, or because he’s too busy timing his wife’s conversations and checking her facial expressions. But he’s obviously free to do so if he wants. No one can stop him.

That wasn't what I asked. My question was 'What are you actually trying to achieve here?'

And just in case you can't see this in yourself, you've done it again 'a regular guy with a concern who has went out of his way to NOT be controlling'

You should not need to go out of your way to not be controlling. You talk as if you are doing her a favour by trying so hard not to be controlling. This is not normal.

I would love to hear her version of these events.

We both socialize. I'm not sitting around grumpy with my arms folded. We typically find a good spot to set up and ideally, it's around the parents we know. It's mainly an annoyance of mine when she gets excited over something like she has ants in her pants and needs to run off to go find a dad to download to. In the case of her wanting me to call the other dad over, for example, it was as much about me wanting to be considerate of him because he looked like he went to where he was just to focus on the game. If he was looking for familiar faces to sit with, he could've easily found us.

I think over the top social people are inconsiderate partners in public settings.

You spend a lot of time speculating why other parents sit where they do and their motivations behind their facial expressions and how they say something. And a lot of your speculation backs your own thoughts. It's your own bias.

Maybe you should stop doing this. You are not a trained behaviour analyst. And when you're already obsessing about something, you're going to read into every little detail as a way of making it fit your narrative. Doesn't make your view on it accurate though.

From several things you've said in this thread - you do come off as socially awkward. It's perfectly normal to go up to another parent and have a chat with them. It isn't normal to assume that they'd rather be alone or they would have come over. You know it works both ways right? If the other guy thought the same as you then no one would ever be connecting.

You say your wife is not flirting, so you're being unreasonable getting irritated that she's having conversations with the coaches and dad's - which in a sporting event does make the most sense if your wife is really into it because the mom's are less likely to be as engaged with the technical side of the games as the dad's. It does sound like she has tried to include you by waving someone over to join the two of you or asking you to ask the coach something she'd like to know, but you dismiss it as unimportant. Sounds very much like a you problem. And she does not have to sit by your side the entire time, only engaging with you to appease your jealousy. That's ridiculous.

You say that when the roles are reversed your wife is the same as you. If that's true then you both have a problem. It's very immature, insecure behaviour. But I bet it's more to do with her pointing out the hypocrisy when you start chatting to other women at these events and less because she actually has a problem with it.

We have only the OP’s word for it that his wife is ‘over the top social’. If, as seems likely from his posts, he’s socially awkward, insecure, terribly concerned about ‘the optics’, and typically spends all matches and training scanning and analysing the facial expressions of his wife and whoever she’s talking to, he’s not exactly coming at his idea of acceptable levels of sociability from an unbiased or neutral position.

I came in looking for insight. I accept that she's social and the possibility that I'm being irrational. I don't accept the notion that I'm controlling or trying to stop her from talking to men. I do think I initially failed to state that this is not a romantic jealousy, mostly, but feeling like I'm being made to feel irrelevant and subordinate to other dads in my own household. I've probably gathered as much feedback as I can and could disengage, but I talk a lot and don't have too many people these days to talk to in my personal life.

How would she react if you brought to her attention that her overly chatty ways might be annoying to others? Does she realise these people might just want to watch the game without someone bending their ear? Does she realise assistant coach might have had other things to do than spend 45 mins on the phone?

Contrary to what seems like majority on here i think your wife is in the wrong here and seems to be quite self absorbed. Maybe she is being pushy sports mom, who knows.

Is she a bit like this in other setting too?

Well if you have a tendency to view her thoughts/questions as unnecessary/unimportant (as you pointed out earlier when she wanted you to ask the coach something), then it's completely understandable she'd want to seek out conversation with people that don't shut her down and come off as superior/right all the time in conversation.

Spend some time self reflecting on how you might be contributing to this situation.

This isn't for him to decide. If other people find her annoying - they are adults and responsible for saying so or creating distance with her if they don't like it.

At this point, her 'bothering' other people is simply his opinion, driven by jealousy. It may actually be the case but it's impossible to determine by what he wrote. Let's not feed controlling behaviour.

feeling like I'm being made to feel irrelevant and subordinate to other dads in my own household

Then you have an ego problem. You are not threatened by her talking to other women because you don't feel subordinate to them, just to other men. It's an outdated and sexist attitude.

If you value your relationship and want to stay in it then you are going to have to try and change this attitude. People are people. No one is better than someone else just because they are male.

Have you ever had therapy to address this because it must be quite stressful in life to always be so alert and on guard for perceived slights against your fragile manhood.

And you don’t see why posters have asked you to consider how deeply patriarchal all your assumptions are, when you’re still, apparently unironically, writing stuff like ‘being made to feel irrelevant and subordinate to other dads in my household’?

For a start, if you need your wife to be glued to your side at football training in order not to feel ‘irrelevant” you really need to work on your insecurity.

Secondly, you’re not head of your household. You’re in an equal partnership. It’s not your wife’s job to cosplay deference to you by not talking to pther people at football matches. Your freakish concern with ‘the optics’ suggests you’re operating off some set of 19thc assumptions that other people are witnessing your lack of control over your wife because she doesn’t spend entire matches sitting by your side?

And thirdly, it’s very obvious that you struggle socially and don’t have many people to talk to. Maybe work on expanding your own circle rather than trying to get your wife to curtail hers?

Nothing you’ve described remotely resembles you “looking for occasional validation”. You are jealous if your wife speaks to other men socially or even as part of interaction with other parents at your child’s sports activity! You are timing her conversations and stated that she should only talk to other men if you consider it to be necessary. You have been put out because she doesn’t just “take your word for” things and assume your opinion is always right and instead considers your suggestions and asks others their opinions before deciding if she agrees with you, which is rational and considered decision-making. You are then annoyed that she hasn’t stroked your ego by showering praise on you about how clever your suggestion was and explicitly emphasising that something was your idea. You sound extremely needy, insecure, controlling, jealous and unpleasant to be around. Your posts come across as patronising, arrogant and self-righteous and all responses to those who disagree with you have been like this and very defensive, despite you asking for our opinions: perhaps you only wanted the opinions of those who agree with you? Your displeasure that some (most?) of us do not is very apparent, and if this is the manner in which you speak to your wife it is unsurprising that the relationship is not a happy one.

Do you not talk to other parents? When DS played cricket it was me and one of the fathers who were the parents who organised transport, we spent hours on the phone . Not an issue.

It's often the timing of the questions more so than me deeming her questions unimportant. And it's a case by case basis. Sometimes I'll go ahead and do it, sometimes I feel like the timing isn't right and we're being "extra." One time, it was her wanting me to call the assistant coach (same one w/ phone call) to see if he was showing up because practice started and he wasn't there. This guy leaves work to show up and I thought we should be respectful of him having his own affairs to deal with. Sometimes it's not other parents but her wanting me to come out the stands to go micro-manage our kid on the sideline. Nobody does that and it's not my approach. I also don't want to come off as the overbearing mom and dad to the coaches. Our kid is good but he's not the team focus and they have other kids to manage including their own.