Hi all,
I'm generally not an insecure or jealous person, but I'm certainly frustrated by how much I've been feeling that way lately, and I need another's view on my situation. (tl;dr below!)
I've been with my husband 10 years, and we've been married since 2012. In 2008, I caught him in two online emotional affairs (and sought support here!) and since forgiven him and moved on, and although I want to say it's forgotten, I've never quite been able to do so.
Since then, I like to think that we've had a pretty good life. We've worked together to help him drop a lot of excess weight, and he started a new job a year ago. He's a good guy. He wants everyone around him to be happy, and more specifically, happy with him, and I think this is where my issues begin.
He's made several female friends at work, and opposite gender friendships have never really been a problem for me despite his EAs. He has many female friends that he met pre-me and pre-marriage that he sees fairly regularly in groups or alone. I suspect the difference and the trouble I'm having is that these work friends are post me and post marriage. They have only every known him as a married man, but these three women don't seem to have any concept of boundaries, even though they all have significant others.
It began with heavy, and I mean NONSTOP Facebook messaging and texting, in group chats and alone. Having been neglected for online chatting before, but wishing to trust him and his friendships based on our past, I asked him to please cut back so it didn't interfere with our personal time. I'm happy to say the frequency has lessened, although my sense of unease (jealously? insecurity?) has not, and each one of them has given been a different cause for it.
Woman A:
He has described her as 'another me' in that we have the same tastes and personality and that he has never had such great and close friend as her. He can tell her anything, feels so comfortable with her, and on and on and on. She obviously feels as close because she had no problem calling my husband at 3am to discuss her relationship problems. I only discovered this because I went to the kitchen for some water and discovered him whispering into the phone under a sofa cushion, and that was the reason he volunteered. Again wishing to trust him, I left it at that.
As a birthday gift, she gave him tickets to a sports event for them to go by themselves. Admittedly I don't have a problem when a guy friend did this for him, but I don't really see many accepted examples of a woman going on a 'date' with a married man. This did make me very uncomfortable, and was expressed to him, and he offered not to go. I swallowed my unease, not wishing to be a jealous spouse, and let it happen. The whole time I was wondering why he couldn't be bothered to send me a text to say how it was going or anything when he can't stop himself from texting others when we're together. (Jealousy again?)
They are going on a business trip together for 4 days, and that itself doesn't bother me. Husband planned to go for a small solo road trip afterwards for the weekend to check out some baseball stadiums, and she tried to invite herself to the road trip. That was my limit, and that I put a hard stop to, and I was bewildered that he would even bother to ask me if it was ok to do the trip with her. That she has no concept of boundaries is established already, but him? Yikes.
Throughout these incidences, over and over again on a smaller scale I would discover or am told at the last minute that they made plans together to have lunch or go to the mall or see movies together which has overall just added to my paranoia. To be fair to him, I work shifts, and I'm not always around evenings and weekends, but the need to hide things from me or tell me last minute seems kind of sketchy.
Woman B:
This one overtly has a crush on him and likes to physically be around and close to him, as noted by his other colleagues. As with A, she is comfortable going to my husband about her relationship problems which then he feels he should solve, because of his need to be a good guy that everyone likes.
Woman C:
Also is having issues with her boyfriend, and with some suicidal tendencies layered on. She is definitely dependent on my husband for help with her problems, and he even told me he was 'on-call' for her some evenings because she was having a particularly bad day.
But....I am his wife. I frankly don't care about whatever problems they have, and I don't appreciate being put on hold while he deals with other women's issues that have nothing to do with him. Why do they even think they can be dependant like that on a married man? Probably because he let them think it's okay.
I've told him I felt lonely and neglected and there's been a little improvement, but I still feel lonely and neglected much of the time. It's like when he's at home, his body is here but his mind is elsewhere. I definitely don't appreciate the solo time he spends with Woman A doing things he should be doing with me but never seems to find the inclination to.
It's funny. This seems to be a bigger issue when I write it out than when I was just thinking about it in my head. I've talked to him about how I feel about opposite sex friends and boundaries, but I don't really think he understands. He swears over and over again it's just friendship. That in turn makes me wonder at myself - am I too suspicious? Should I trust him more? Is it even my place to say who can or can't be friends with? He says if it really bothers me that much he will cut them out, but am I scared of being resented if I did ask for that?
What do you think? Am I just being insecure and jealous? Do I trust my gut, which tells me I am right, but at the same time makes me doubt myself? How do I proceed?
tl;dr - husband has close friendships with female friends at work that edge on inappropriate. I want to trust him and think I'm being jealous and insecure, but gut feelings being what they are, I don't know what I should do.
I'm generally not an insecure or jealous person, but I'm certainly frustrated by how much I've been feeling that way lately, and I need another's view on my situation. (tl;dr below!)
I've been with my husband 10 years, and we've been married since 2012. In 2008, I caught him in two online emotional affairs (and sought support here!) and since forgiven him and moved on, and although I want to say it's forgotten, I've never quite been able to do so.
Since then, I like to think that we've had a pretty good life. We've worked together to help him drop a lot of excess weight, and he started a new job a year ago. He's a good guy. He wants everyone around him to be happy, and more specifically, happy with him, and I think this is where my issues begin.
He's made several female friends at work, and opposite gender friendships have never really been a problem for me despite his EAs. He has many female friends that he met pre-me and pre-marriage that he sees fairly regularly in groups or alone. I suspect the difference and the trouble I'm having is that these work friends are post me and post marriage. They have only every known him as a married man, but these three women don't seem to have any concept of boundaries, even though they all have significant others.
It began with heavy, and I mean NONSTOP Facebook messaging and texting, in group chats and alone. Having been neglected for online chatting before, but wishing to trust him and his friendships based on our past, I asked him to please cut back so it didn't interfere with our personal time. I'm happy to say the frequency has lessened, although my sense of unease (jealously? insecurity?) has not, and each one of them has given been a different cause for it.
Woman A:
He has described her as 'another me' in that we have the same tastes and personality and that he has never had such great and close friend as her. He can tell her anything, feels so comfortable with her, and on and on and on. She obviously feels as close because she had no problem calling my husband at 3am to discuss her relationship problems. I only discovered this because I went to the kitchen for some water and discovered him whispering into the phone under a sofa cushion, and that was the reason he volunteered. Again wishing to trust him, I left it at that.
As a birthday gift, she gave him tickets to a sports event for them to go by themselves. Admittedly I don't have a problem when a guy friend did this for him, but I don't really see many accepted examples of a woman going on a 'date' with a married man. This did make me very uncomfortable, and was expressed to him, and he offered not to go. I swallowed my unease, not wishing to be a jealous spouse, and let it happen. The whole time I was wondering why he couldn't be bothered to send me a text to say how it was going or anything when he can't stop himself from texting others when we're together. (Jealousy again?)
They are going on a business trip together for 4 days, and that itself doesn't bother me. Husband planned to go for a small solo road trip afterwards for the weekend to check out some baseball stadiums, and she tried to invite herself to the road trip. That was my limit, and that I put a hard stop to, and I was bewildered that he would even bother to ask me if it was ok to do the trip with her. That she has no concept of boundaries is established already, but him? Yikes.
Throughout these incidences, over and over again on a smaller scale I would discover or am told at the last minute that they made plans together to have lunch or go to the mall or see movies together which has overall just added to my paranoia. To be fair to him, I work shifts, and I'm not always around evenings and weekends, but the need to hide things from me or tell me last minute seems kind of sketchy.
Woman B:
This one overtly has a crush on him and likes to physically be around and close to him, as noted by his other colleagues. As with A, she is comfortable going to my husband about her relationship problems which then he feels he should solve, because of his need to be a good guy that everyone likes.
Woman C:
Also is having issues with her boyfriend, and with some suicidal tendencies layered on. She is definitely dependent on my husband for help with her problems, and he even told me he was 'on-call' for her some evenings because she was having a particularly bad day.
But....I am his wife. I frankly don't care about whatever problems they have, and I don't appreciate being put on hold while he deals with other women's issues that have nothing to do with him. Why do they even think they can be dependant like that on a married man? Probably because he let them think it's okay.
I've told him I felt lonely and neglected and there's been a little improvement, but I still feel lonely and neglected much of the time. It's like when he's at home, his body is here but his mind is elsewhere. I definitely don't appreciate the solo time he spends with Woman A doing things he should be doing with me but never seems to find the inclination to.
It's funny. This seems to be a bigger issue when I write it out than when I was just thinking about it in my head. I've talked to him about how I feel about opposite sex friends and boundaries, but I don't really think he understands. He swears over and over again it's just friendship. That in turn makes me wonder at myself - am I too suspicious? Should I trust him more? Is it even my place to say who can or can't be friends with? He says if it really bothers me that much he will cut them out, but am I scared of being resented if I did ask for that?
What do you think? Am I just being insecure and jealous? Do I trust my gut, which tells me I am right, but at the same time makes me doubt myself? How do I proceed?
tl;dr - husband has close friendships with female friends at work that edge on inappropriate. I want to trust him and think I'm being jealous and insecure, but gut feelings being what they are, I don't know what I should do.