Uncomfortable about husband and friend spending the weekend together

[Aliceintheattic]

Name change for obvious reasons.

So, I've been married for nearly 20 years. Two young teens.
Husband and I have very long term friends who are a couple. Really, I made a friend, and we dragged our husbands along. We've done a lot together.

About a year ago, the vibe between my husband and my friend got a bit too enthusiastic. Nothing concrete, but I really felt invisible.

I had to get pretty direct, and it stopped.

Out kids are both into the same activity, and there's a event on this weekend. I have to visit a relative, so I'm not going. My husband and my friend are each taking the kids. They aren't travelling, but will be spending a big part of the weekend together. I'm not super comfortable with this, but really not sure how to approach it.

Cancel seeing your relative. Go with them. Put a stop to dh and friend spending 1 on 1 time together. In fact if she's such a good friend why not tag team: she minds your child at this event, DH covers the next one. Same for the activity. Make it clear he needs to pull back from her.

This is what I would do and I would definitely start drawing away from the friend.

It's difficult to say because you mention feeling like this could have been born from your own insecurities. None of us were there to say whether the feeling was down to you or them.

I have a friend who is terribly insecure and she does regularly make up scenarios in her head about her partner that we (her friends) have to talk her down from. If she told me her partner was flirting with one of her friends I'd probably not automatically believe it. I'm sure she believes it but I wouldn't judge the friend and partner straight away as I know she has a tendency to let these things spiral due to her own past issues.

On the flip side I have another friend and I regularly third wheel with her and her H. Our kids are close and my own husband is away a lot. We've had all sorts of days out / weekends away together and even the occasional one where she's been ill/one of the kids has been and she's wanted to stay home but her DH has still come with me and the other kids. Nothing has, nor would anything, ever happen and she would never think that. It's all entirely innocent and friendly.

If you do genuinely feel that there was a line crossed between them though then perhaps suggest as another poster did that DH offers to take all the kids / she does and vice versa next time. Or speak to your husband about how you're feeling. He is your husband after all.

I would gently suggest that even if there is some sort of attraction, it doesn’t mean they will actually act on it. It’s a little bit more dangerous when they are socially close but theres a difference between love and attraction. Also people get a little frisson of excitement from being attracted to and thinking they may be attractive to someone. You may have experienced this yourself OP, but there is a difference between letting that experience happen and actually going for it. It does sound like your husband heard you before and acted whilst preserving the friendship etc.

I really enjoy talking to one friend because we talk about stuff my husband isn’t really interested in. Our conversation tend to be quite animated and Dh just lets us get on with it. DH has definitely given him the odd glare etc but there is zero danger of me wandering off or doing anything so he’s never felt the need to say anything. Also he would never interfere in my relationships, I think he takes the view that I’m here because I want to be, not because he’s watching me. I’d feel really stressed out though if he let his anxiety become something I need to do something about by altering my behaviour. Honestly I’d find it suffocating. I think you have to decide whether you trust him or not. Also I really enjoy talking to my friend but I still prefer my husbands company to anyone else’s. It would be hard to detect perhaps because I don’t look as enthusiastic talking to my own DH but I genuinely prefer him to everyone else. So just because they look a particular way doesn’t necessarily mean anything.

I’m not sure that some of this mate guarding behaviour doesn’t actually do the opposite of whats intended. The other woman looks more relaxed and chill and you start appearing to be controlling.

I totally get it. I was the friend once in this situation - you don’t even realise you have a spark with someone and suddenly it’s there and you realise you almost ignored the friend in favour of her DH. Really, if your friend is aware or your DH is, either or both should be putting miles and miles and miles of distance between each other. It sounds like they are unaware or aware but tempted. I’m really sorry. It’s entirely salvageable. You do need to talk to your DH and say non-accusingly “I can see how your eyes sparkle/your fingers drum the table when you are talking to her, you will need to take some steps to make me feel safe about this trip” and see what he suggests, practically, not just accusations or declarations. Like he can stay in a different hotel or travel up with a different family. And you should just see your friend 1-2-1 for a while, if that. The friendship will recover once the danger moment has passed.

Do you trust him?

I have to say that the moment I had to tell my husband off for being too enthusiastically keen on one of my female friends is the day I'd be throwing him out and I'd be cutting her off too. They were clearly having an affair, planning to have an affair or musing about the said affair. It is incredibly disloyal to make such a parade of it in front of you. The least people can do is have affairs with people not known and liked by their spouses and make every effort not to get found out.

If I did forgive him enough not to kick him out the door with my pointy toed suede boots, there is no way that he would be "going away for a weekend" with her either. Propinquity is a thing to be avoided in such cases. In fact, a condition of my "forgiveness" would be we broke off all contact with the pair. Where is her husband in this? Is he blind? I have got to say though that I would be utterly repulsed if my husband didn't have the wit to realise that this was not appropriate in the circumstances because he would know he was on very thin ice indeed.

My father had a very jaundiced view of human behaviour - he usually assumed the worst and was almost often proved right. Leopards very rarely change their spots. Some do when they really fall for somebody and value them enough to stop their past ways because they really don't want to mess this one up. I think though that your husband is a cheat and he hasn't had that come to Damascus moment.

Realistically - if they were going to get up to anything, it doesn’t have to be at this weekend so even if you went, it doesn’t mean they that all would be okay. You can’t physically be with him all the time. But ultimately, rightly or wrongly, you have a trust issue with your DH and that needs addressing.

They aren’t doing anything wrong. I have a male friend that I can talk to for hours non stop. We never seem to run out of things to talk about. There is no attraction. We just get on very well. There is nothing wrong with being friends of the opposite sex

This is a tough one.

I also would spot the signs a mile off with my DH, it's a stupid gooey smile he does. It's usually at me but occasionally I've seen it go another direction. I can hardly give out to him for smiling but I wouldn't like if it was reciprocated and a lot of time was being spent together.

Are you all still friends?

Are the kids friends and is it likely there will be more of these events?

Does the other DH know about all this OP? Or did he get pissed off feeling a gooseberry and went to find a different fruit bowl?

I would cut the friendship as she stopped being your friend a year ago when she was getting too close with your husband. Move the activity as well and stop facilitating them. You know what you are seeing and it isn’t right.
it will tell you everything you need to know if you do these two things and yet the pair may try keep up content f or take it under ground. This is simply horrible for you.

Except you don’t ignore his partner I hope?
OP is listening to her gut, and her senses are telling her to. You need a stern word with your husband before he goes. And cool off your friendship with the couple, she’s no friend to your marriage.

It’s not about you though. Stop minimising what the op is saying.

I’d actually be pissed off that they both thought this was a good idea after what you had to say to them both.

We spend way too much time ignoring our instincts, yours picked something up and you acted on it. Now a situation has arisen that is seemingly innocent and your instincts are screaming ‘er wtf’ yet your needing to over look them because ‘the kids are there’ or it’s ’for the kids’…

In a long marriage you have to take the rough with the smooth. There will be times when you both feel sparky with other people - but you don’t need to open the door for it and exit the room.

Say your not feeling it. You go too, or he takes both kids or she does and then swoops next time.

You also have to think about how you will feel whilst they are there and when they get back - EVEN if it was purely platonic. The suspicion won’t go and the rot will set in.

I’d also back off a little with the from the friendship.

As a side note - I recently met my partners best mates ‘other friendship group’ . It was basically a group of couples that were shagging each other behind each others back. People are just human and do really shitty things

I think the fact your H is happy to plan to go to this activity and spend so much time with this woman despite knowing that you have already had to talk to him about his obvious attraction for her is actually worrying.
I think you need a straight speaking conversation with him.

I think you both should be cooling your friendship with this couple because if there is a spark between your H and this woman it's not going to go away and contact between them will potentially grow into something. inappropriate.

With all due respect - I stopped reading after the first sentence. (Eventually did read for curiosity, regardless).
People like you need to get it through your head that your unfortunate personal experience will not form a general rule that is true for everyone in the world.
You are only the center of your own world, not anyone else's. Here, let me give you an example. Well, your friend’s ex husband and another friend were too comfortable and sure enough there was an affair. You didn't feel comfortable with an old boss, and behold, convicted for fraud. Congratulations, you have a special gift that you just see these in the starts. If I may quote your lines back at you - what bullshit. I am very comfortable and have good fun in the presence of my wife's friends (her childhood friends, as well as close work friends), they are very cool people, and 1-2 of them are even attractive - I KNOW, the horror. And you know what? Not ever would I consider cheating on my wife with them, not once would I be tempted, not fighting it off. I know plenty of managers and bosses myself - an old boss of mine I alway had a bad feeling about, and it was nothing, he was just not a people person, but did everything by the books.

See the problem by being so callous about your own experiences? They are yours, and there will be countless others who experienced something else. So, please, take those mighty intuition skills that never lie and use it for good - Go, win the lottery or some game show. How awesome must it be that you never once get it wrong - Jesus, I can't even finish with that joke, that's so embarrassingly flippant to consider. "My intuitions are NEVER wrong". Wow. To be this full of ourself and believe your own feelings to just 100% be unquestionable. That is rather special. In short: I am saying these feelings are purely feelings that are not based on facts, for everyone, me, OP, and even for you.

From what you say i think there is attraction between them and the friendship needs to be cooled rapidly.
And feeling like an outsider when the three of you meet up is enough. Your DH needs to prioritise your feelings and if he doesn’t, it’s a bigger issue

Why are you on this thread @exhaustDAD? You have been hectoring and belittling the OP from the off, and are now trying to antagonise other posters?

I just find it mind-boggling when people treat simple gut feelings and headcanons as truth and facts, fascinating to read about.

OP has every right foto feel her feelings, everyone does, talking about it in length with her husband is truly the key to helping the situation, but she should recognise where these uneasy feelings stem from. Insecurity. And that is an advice.

She wrote here for advice - and she also got plenty of intangible and simply untrue witchcraft-level nonsense as well. I say, why doesn't she just dump the husband based on her gut feeling without anything happening behind her back? Or put a tracker and a hidden microphone on the husband so she can monitor him everywhere he goes, that would be healthy too.

I’ve never met her. We are workmates.

Just because you don’t understand the difference between feelings and instincts doesn’t make you right.

It's their kids hobby. Her H hasn't gone out of his way to organise a weekend together with OPs friend, their kids are both going to be there and it could have just as easily been OP who was going but this time she has other plans. Should OPs kids have to stop doing their hobby because their mum has a hunch that their dad might like another parent who takes her kid there a bit too much?

@exhaustDAD
Why are you so determined to gaslight her? And sneer at her and call it insecurity? She’s never felt uneasy at any other point in her marriage so it’s very likely she’s onto something.
I suspect that you just don’t have much emotional intelligence or intuition based on your posts? I can understand why that would make you be so nastily, and repeatedly, confused and dismissive about her feelings.

Because treating either of those things as facts and truth makes you right. One is worse for that purpose as the other when it comes to OP's issue. Instinct is something you develop based on patterns over time, and we are not talking about the husband being a serial cheater and now OP is attuned to his behaviour...

We all have them, by the way, feelings and instincts, and they are just that, something our own mind creates, NOT reality in the physical world. No cosmic power sends you warnings about your evil evil partner cheating on you.