A topic I've not really seen covered much except for those truly toxic friends of WS: How do we as BS realistically think about, handle, and treat friends of the WS who somewhat knew about what was going on, but did not intervene; looked the other way, didn't even negatively comment?
My wife has two good friends that obviously I know also. Early after DDay, it came to light that they'd been told or aware of the emotional attachment and/or kissing that had occurred. Neither did anything about it. In fact, my wife ashamedly admitted that looking back, at one point she had introduced one of her gf's to the OM and now can see it has she was somewhat "parading her new bf" to this friend.
Enraged, I considered them to be 'enemies of the marriage', and told my WW they were not welcome in our lives ever again, and were they to come to my home, I would throw them all out. NC to the one who was told about the kissing; limited interaction to the other (she lives several states away anyway) - phone calls/emails/fb ok, but no visits.
Fast forward 14 weeks, trying to R, remorseful wife doing all she can, and this topic comes up. Stepping back and looking at it, I'm not sure I am being fair here as I went through some scorched earth over-the-top taking control... she's entitled to have friends, and to cut off ties to people she grew up with, known for decades is over the top. How have you BS dealt with these people in your lives?
I know I'll not allow my WW to head out for drinks or overnight visits with these people... but I feel may have taken it too far. yet I'll be damned if I will be fooled again, nor will I welcome any enabler in my life, even if I were to ever to mystically somehow regain that trust in my WW...
I have a similar dilemma. My WW had at least 2 friends who knew some, but not all, about her activities.
I have made my feelings known that they enabled the relationship and aren't friends of the M.
She knows that I despise these 2 and has limited, but not eliminated, contact with them. In fact, we have a major family event coming up in the next 3 months that normally they'd be invited to, but I have demanded they not.
In the end, I realize that it just doesn't matter. My W cheated because she wanted to. It was 100% her decision. The friends are secondary. Most likely, they couldn't have talked her out of it if they tried.
Our W's are responsible, not them. Controlling who they are friends with only generate future resentment.
These 2 were not new friends, they've been good cloxse freiend for years, one since childhood. They didn't push my wife into it by any stretch, but I just feel like there's a 'morals' question that they at least turned the other cheek while it went on.
The longer term friend told her she needing to stop answering this guys texts and messages, and be rid of him... yet when she was in a bar with my wife, and her husband saw my wife in too close a proximity to be 'just friendly' with OM, when her husband went to do/say something about it, she sent him away. So on the one hand, she enabled, but on the other, she was against it and said so... I know she's a good person, and was not told of the beginnings of PA, but was in my interpretation a good wingman on that one particular night, and I resent it. To her credit, she did object in other conversations...
The other friend, who was outright told in their discussions that there'd been kissing, did not react with any horror or suggestions it needed to stop. So I resent this, too.
This mexican neighbor's saying I kind of share. Trouble is, I'm trying to figure out if these two women are really problems here, or I'm overly hypersensitive about it.
I think I'm just going to talk with each of them and explain exactly how I feel and perhaps have them explain themselves... kind of airing dirty laundry, but hey why not.
Anyway you or she want to spin it, they were and are now toxic to your marriage.
I put it into these terms to my wife about "those other" people (people with knowledge of her affair). Think of it as you are a recovering alcoholic. You have these friends that allow you to drink when you are around them. They know that you a recovering alcoholic and that you should't be drinking and the problems it can cause you. They allow it to occur anyway. What kind of friends are those?
Real friends would not allow such behavior. They may not tell the significant other of these actions, but at the same time they have a moral obligation to atleast uninvolve (word? lol) themselves of such behavior. If not then their total character comes into question. These people are not accepted into our lives any more.
Anyway you or she want to spin it, they were and are now toxic to your marriage.
I put it into these terms to my wife about "those other" people (people with knowledge of her affair). Think of it as you are a recovering alcoholic. You have these friends that allow you to drink when you are around them. They know that you a recovering alcoholic and that you should't be drinking and the problems it can cause you. They allow it to occur anyway. What kind of friends are those?
Real friends would not allow such behavior. They may not tell the significant other of these actions, but at the same time they have a moral obligation to atleast uninvolve (word? lol) themselves of such behavior. If not then their total character comes into question. These people are not accepted into our lives any more.
I hear you. This is where I started, and have remained.
What I wonder is if calling them out on it could really be sort of like the epiphany my WW has experienced (supposedly at least). I doubt either of them realized the extent of the A emotionally fopr my wife, and how their failure to at least even challenge it in real terms in my mind helped to enable it.
Or is that passing blame? Because I do not blame them. And I haver to really look in the mirror and ask, "What would I do?" I know now what I'd do, but not sure what I'd have done prior to this experience if a close married buddy suggested an EA, talked of kissing, or was extra-friendly sitting close in a bar...
I just want them limited, because they've proven a capability I won't accept. If nothing else, it will explain the severe tension should we ever be in the same room again...and/or why I never will be in the same room again.
My opinion is that confrontation, mentioning of the A or any kind of reasoning with these people on the affair will have no effect. They are who they are. Just get on with your life without them. I just hope you can get your wife to see this.
And I like that quote by Morituri. Show NOTHING do NOTHING to these people. Move on with your lives, without them.
In another thread, some of the female members like Catherine602, commented on how many women are envious and jealous of what other women have that they will pretend to be friends but will do everything in their power to sabotage their marriages. They are like Iago in Othello, completely without a conscience.
Im just going to post a perspective... A thought process, however flawed it may be.
I think a few things that I keep in mind here.
One, and maybe the most important. Giving just a tiny benefit of the doubt based on something I know for a fact...
BS's are internally tormented and need to feel jusitified. They spend an incredible amount of energy and time rebuilding and justifying their actions to themselves. They build a fantasy world and must live in the (however twisted) scenario that they have built that allows them to cheat.
That in mind, you have no real idea what these people are being told. Yeah, I guess you'd like to believe and it's easier to picture the WS having heart to hearts with these friends and these friends betraying you and endorsing the affair or at least not opposing it... that obviously easier becuase you get to spread the blame across a few other parties and not squarely where it belongs...
I don't want to get way off subject because it's easy for me too... the gist is...
You can count on the fact that these friends never had the whole picture and the picture that was painted for them by your WS (needing *support* for his/her actions) was skewed something fierce... If and what they actually knew is debatable but what I can say for sure is that your WS played the "poor me" card bigtime and painted the picture to them with all the colors they painted it with in themselves...
Two, keeping in mind that the picture they saw was likely littered with justifications, minimizing, blame shifting against you, and was just all around twisted and skewed to get *support* for WS... You don't know what was said to them (your WS) in opposition of the affair, or if not in opposition at least not "in support" of the decision your WS was making 100% on thier own.... and these are friends. You know, friends "thick & thin" they are going to try to be supportive of your WS who obviously is also in a tough spot and is absolutely lobbying for *support* if not for the affair then at least for themselves because in most cases that internal "moral compass" is going haywire...
Im just saying, and obviously all of this comes in degrees and all friends are different... there are ABSOLUTELY the toxic ones... the ones which must be eliminated/removed with extreme pregidous... and then there are the others... you have to judge for yourself... but looking through the "scortched earth" "angry black" glasses we look through at times being the betrayed spouse isn't always how the world really is or looks through other people's glasses... especially when those glasses were put on them by your wayward spouse...
If a WW had friends who enabled the affair they are enemies of the marriage. They will likely do so again. They may just get more clever about it and the next affair can be kept a secret longer.
Anyway, I think one has to make a judgement call as to what the role was in all of this. A wife who chooses to keep toxic friends is not worth keeping in my opinion.
In another thread, some of the female members like Catherine602, commented on how many women are envious and jealous of what other women have that they will pretend to be friends but will do everything in their power to sabotage their marriages. They are like Iago in Othello, completely without a conscience.
This is exactly what the OW did to me. Sidling up to me, pretending to be my bff so that those late night "card games"(sex in a raunchy motel) with "friends and family" (toys) didn't look so suspicious
My WW had one friend who knew about her affair. As a matter of fact my wife would often times text or call this friend after talking with the OM. This happened a lot. It was all in the phone/text records.
Anyway, this friend was not really encouraging the affair, but she damn sure wasn't trying to offer my wife good advice. And she damn sure would have kept it a secret from me for life.
My wife and I have had several conversations about this so called friend. We both agree that it is ok to be nice to this lady, let the kids play and so forth. But this lady will never again be really close to my wife. There will be no conversations to this lady about our relationship......no girl talk in other words.
She is not welcome to have any knowlege of our marrige and she will not be involved in our lives very much at all.
While not a direct threat or enemy of our marrige, she is surely not a friend of it. But is hasn't been too much of an issue, because as soon as I found out this lady backed way out of our lives at her own choosing. Although I have never said it to her....she knows that what she did was wrong and that I will never trust her around my wife again. She's smart enough to have figured that out on her own. I just smile and talk normal to her....no issues.
Interesting my WW has 2 sisters and a close gf. One sister was totally against it and told her off. The other sister did say some things at the beginning I think but didn't my wife mad at her. So she started to support it, she is not married and I couldn't tell u the last time she had a boy friend. Her close friend is married and has a son around my sons age. The friend always wants to act like family hugs and kisses with me. She is also a reason that my ww said she was unhappy with me because of something this friend said about me which was a total twisting of the truth. After I found out about the EA / PA? I don't act like family with her and last time she tried that kiss and hug stuff I gave her the cold shoulder and I'm the a hole. Anyway I thanked her sister that supported the marriage and made sure to tell her other sister to remind my wife when they r out together if she is txting him to pack her stuff and get out of the house. I got an apology from the sister and we are ok, it is my wife sister. Its my wife decision to do what she did. Posted via Mobile Device
i had to choose between my husband {baby daddy then} and a toxic friend.
husband won. this so called friend just interjected her way into my realtionship, and i should have seen it from a mile away...
she was my friend from high school {h & i were only 17/18} and i thought i knew her. we hung out at the mall and she had been over to my apt many times.
but, she started saying things like dont you want to be free, an indepandant and dont i want to smash the pedestal i am put up on..???
after my guy walked away and said i should choose, she actually said to me.."i bettcha you down off that f'ing pedestal now huh b!tch.."
she wasnt even mean about it just really like..flipant and dismissive of the statement. i guess luckly for me i wasnt booted off yet, just down a few notches..
i told her no, and she got mad, said uggg, and how stupid we both were, then she hung-up on me..
sometimes, these twisted people come into our lives, and we get close, and then they start making their move, and we give in to a little mis-treatment, and a little abuse, and it is just a little everyday that adds up, like a drop of water.
before you know youre over your head and drowning...they say i got the life raft, just come out with me to the club or this bar, you dont have to talk to anybody....and a lot of guilt trips, about how you spend all your free time with your guy/chick..
we never hang out anymore....you owe me..even if they are in a relationship themselves...you as the friend to the toxic friend are their b!tch...
its almost like brain washing, when you give up all your worldy possessions they drop you like a bad habit. some new chump takes your place..this is the best out come, otherwise, the old saying misery loves company, the now the new tag team duo is ready to go out and spread misery and pain...
no one can make you see the light, you have to want to cut the friend ship and go no contact..or lose everything and hope they cut you lose and/or you SO takes you back and what you did is not unforgiveable.
Dealing with WW's friends 
