What would you do about possible emotional affair starting

[Kivu]

He's got this friend, close friend, and they text all the time. It hasn't progressed into anything physical, and mostly it seems rather harmless. I check his texts occasionally to check up on it. I'm not stupid.

 

However, today's text was a little bit over the line. Just a little. And I'm more than a little worried, I'm shocked and scared and really, really pissed off. I've been trusting him with this relationship because he doesn't have any close friends. I thought it was a shame he hasn't got a male friend, but at least he has a friend.

 

He's got a pattern of blowing hot and cold with me, especially when he gets busy. But he's blowing really cold and hostile with me right now (even though we're still having plenty of sex) and his texting has been picking up, and then this happens.

 

Here's what he said:

 

First he questions her about her relationships. He's always extremely interested to know who she's with and who she's ****ing. Then he references her being such a flirt. Then he says "I like you being a pisshead :P"

 

This may not seem like much but there's all sorts of layers underneath that simple statement. He likes her. He likes her when she's drunk. And, trust me on this, it also means he is thinking of her sexually. Don't ask me why.

 

This is such a bald and open statement of his feelings towards her that it makes me sick to my stomach. This sort of thing is what he should be telling ME.

 

Here are my options, as I see them:

 

1. Forget about this and be sweet towards him. They're not sexually involved and we still are. Keep an eye on the texts to see if anything else develops.

2. Try to get to know her and be her friend. That would bring a lot of this stuff in the open.

3. Confront him - ask him how he feels about her, really. That would mean telling him about reading his texts, which I don't want to do.

 

I can't really think of any other options.

[xxoo]

3. Confront him - ask him how he feels about her, really. That would mean telling him about reading his texts, which I don't want to do..

 

This one.

 

What kind of relationship do you have if you can't trust him, he can't trust you, and you can't communicate with him about your concerns?

[Kivu]

He's going to explode at me if I bring it up like that, and threaten to leave, again.

 

I stopped by her work during lunch (she works at a coffee shop) and smiled at her. Then I emailed my husband to let him know that I saw her.

 

If he reacts the way I think he will, he'll ask me why I stopped by there (for coffee, duh) and then start yelling at me about how I should leave his friends alone. Because apparently it's healthy for spouses to never meet friends.

 

I'll tell him it's a free country and I can say hi to whoever I want.

 

Really interested in knowing how he's going to handle this.

 

The message I want to give him is that yes, I know who this person is and where she works, and I can talk to her whenever I want. I may add her on a social networking site I bet he'll blow a fuse when I say that!

 

Next time he goes out to meet her for a beer I'm going to stop by, as well, just coincidentally.

 

I intend to nip this in the bud.

 

So, has anyone faced this situation? Is this the best way to handle it?

[Kivu]

Last night he didn't even mention that I went to see her.

 

He was also extra sweet to me.

 

It's hard to take him being sweet when I know that he's been texting this other woman every day and saying borderline things. I really, really don't like the way he keeps asking and asking about who she's sleeping with. Why does he care?

[xxoo]

He's explosive, yells at you when you bring up concerns, hostile, and untrustworthy.

 

Kivu, why do you stay with him?

[Cee]

IME, the texts aren't borderline, they are way over the line.

 

When men have asked me on IM or text who I am sleeping with, it is an invitation for cyber sex. It's a classic ice breaking technique. I was completely naive and oblivious to this at first. And I have naively communicated with them, but usually they up the ante. They want specifics & then it's very clear they are after cyber sex. This has happened enough to me that I have learned to block and delete these guys.

 

What your partner is doing is to get her to talk about sex. And his hope is that talk of sex with another will lead to cyber sex among themselves. This is not friend behavior. Not friend behavior at all.

 

I'm sorry that I have to break this to you, but I thought you'd want to know. I understand that this man is your husband, so this is going to be a very long road for you. You need not take my information and accuse him of an EA. But keep this information in your mind because the EA is already underway.

 

Good luck.

[Kivu]

It's honestly not an invitation to cybersex. I know the behaviour you mean and it's not that.

 

She'll say "X hasn't been texting me" and my husband will want to talk about that. Then my husband will say, "So if you're not going out with X, are you then going to go out with Y, since you're available?" And he'll tell me about how his friend has slept around her work, and his tone is both revolted and fascinated.

 

He's had friends like this in the past, before me, and it's usually girls and he will want them to lean on him, confide in him, and he's not romantically interested in them. He's told me that he sees himself as their support. It's always one-sided; he doesn't tell them much about himself or his relationship; he just lets them talk and asks questions. Our relationship started as nothing like that - I was as interested in him as he was in me.

 

The problem in this case is that she'll tell him details like what she's wearing, the guy she's with, and who she wants to ****. And my husband will be supportive and sympathetic...and then tell her he likes her being a pisshead...which is an overture I've never seen before.

 

Hence why I visited her yesterday. And if they go out for beer again I'm dropping by, to hell with it.

 

I'm still with him because I believe in marriage and I believe in him. I'm starting to lose confidence though.

[Linda9999]

The longer you keep this to yourself the harder it's going to be to bring it out in the open. Next time he'll go a little further over the line, and you'll justify to yourself why you can't bring it up to him. Then the next time, then the next, and next thing you know you'll be telling us why you can't confront him about the fact he's sleeping with her.

[robf1971]

The longer you keep this to yourself the harder it's going to be to bring it out in the open. Next time he'll go a little further over the line, and you'll justify to yourself why you can't bring it up to him. Then the next time, then the next, and next thing you know you'll be telling us why you can't confront him about the fact he's sleeping with her.

 

Problem is he's lost all respect for you. Your H knows it's innapropriate but really doesn't care. If you confront her it's gonna make things worse.

 

Your way to deal with this?

 

your line

 

"husband, involving a third person in our relationship is totally disrepectful to me, and I will not live in an open marriage. Cease all contact with her or I will start packing your bags for you"

 

Ohh yes, he will deny and deny, make light of it. If he tries that , just hold up your hand and say firmly but camly

 

"Stop, we both know you're lying"

 

Anything less than a commitment to cutting contact, start packing his stuff up..

 

He is in an Emotional affair and it's only a matter of time before it goes physical. You need to stop it by being strong..

[AmIWrong]

Sounds like the two of you need to have a serious discussion about boundaries. If his interest in another woman's sexlife, or him meeting said woman for a beer, etc...crosses your boundaries, then you need to tell him that. In a healthy relationship, the offending spouse will respect your concerns and ablige...maybe begrudgingly at first.

 

Be prepared to stand with the courage of your convictions because he may use some very judgemental language designed to make you doubt yourself and your suspicions. Just remember, at this point its not about being suspicious or not trusting him. It's about BOUNDARIES. Keep that your focus and don't let him guilt you into thinking anything different.

 

No doubt you know that this is exactly how an affair gets started and that's why your uncomfortable with it. You might think about sharing that insight with him as well. You choose not to be ignorant about infidelity...nothing wrong with that IMO.

 

HTH!

[greengoddess]

Ewww she sounds just gross.

 

Of course he is fascinated by her. He is use to a woman who respects herself not one who just wants to sleep around the office. People are fascinated by the different and abnormal. He probably wonders what she would be like. He probably enjoys the subtle flirting. I don't think he'd go there. i just think he is having a little fun with the slut. Not someone to bring hom to mamma. You know?

 

Don't drop in on them. Just tell him you'd like to come and get to know her. That you need friends in common to hang out with and she sounds um interesting.

[Kivu]

He is a little naive...I don't think he realises that this is how affairs start. He thinks it's perfectly innocent.

 

I did tell him, and he knows full well, that the things they discuss aren't really "friendly". He got angry with me, predictably, and told me that he doesn't think I am in a position to judge him. I told him that I am in the only position to judge him, really, when it comes to his conversation with other women. He also called me a couple of other names.

 

He lied to me about going out with her, too, because he knows I'm not happy about it and he doesn't want to get **** for it.

 

He also spent all afternoon yesterday with her.

 

He's being a bit stupid...I don't think her intentions are innocent. Let me explain:

 

She's in a long distance relationship, and she broke up with him last week. She broke up with him because she suggested that she sleep with other men, since she wants male attention, and he said that he wouldn't blame her if she did, since he can't be there all the time. But apparently they worked things out, because she's going back out with him.

 

She sobs to my husband all the time about how this guy doesn't pay her enough attention and doesn't call often enough. My husband is like, too bad, and then HE pays her attention by going out with her, filling in for the role of her boyfriend. THAT is why this girl is interested in my husband. She wants male attention (has been up front about it!) that she isn't getting from her boyfriend - and it may be entirely platonic, but my husband SHOULD NOT fill in for someone else's boyfriend. He's mine!

 

My husband does this all the time. He's like a surrogate boyfriend for his girl friends who are going through hard times. He sees nothing wrong for it; he thinks he's being a friend and being supportive.

 

We have gone back and forth on this. I point out that his female friends are using him and only want to hang out when their boyfriends are being standoffish. He says that I am maligning his friends and of course they want to hang out with him because he's a nice guy, and they don't have any ulterior motives.

 

Funny - a line of bull**** he gave me last time was because, when me and him first started going out our relationship was long distance, and we are still together. He thinks his friend wants to talk to him about her relationship now because he's had a shared experience. And that's all he sees in it.

 

I cannot seem to make him understand that he's being used :/

[Kivu]

So she's texted him a couple of more times. The last time was on Tuesday. She's been going on and on about this dress she was going to wear for a party they're both going to (I'm not invited -- BIG SURPRISE). This time her text read: "The dress can be worn two ways - pretty or slutty. How do you think I should wear it?"

 

She was building this up for ages, wanting to know how he feels about her, I expect...

 

His text in reply: "I'm sure we would all appreciate slutty but use your judgment."

 

No text from her since then. I'm thinking his reply hurt her feelings, I don't think it was the one she wanted. I'm still MAJORLY PISSED OFF that he would tell her that she should be slutty, even if it's for everyone's benefit...but I also think it was a great line to say he wasn't interested.

 

What do you guys think?

[worlybear]

If he's not already in an affair with her- he's certainly heading that way! The red flags are waving loud and clear!

Confront her not him!!!

Tell her to leave him alone!

I really regret not having confronted my stbx's "woman friend."

She's living with him now.

[Kivu]

I think I will confront her. I just have to choose the right time to do it, and I think it may be tonight, depending on a few things. It may be next week. But it will be soon. I can't let her text my husband these things, and pant after him like a bitch in heat. Extremely disrespectful.

 

But she hasn't texted him since then...and they do text multiple times per day.

 

I think my husband has a serious case of "the grass is greener" and is flirting with her accordingly. If anything more serious happens, like his response is less lukewarm than that (I do know my own husband, and that response was a kind letdown from him) he'll be out on his arse and will soon learn that the grass is not greener.

 

I am still so furious and sick to my stomach that I can hardly concentrate at work and I have cried in the bathroom every day. I don't even want to look at him. How can he keep being friends with this woman?

[Jennifer26]

I wouldn't confront her, I would confront him. Even if you get her to back off, what is to stop him from doing this again in the future with someone else?

 

My husband was having a EA about six years ago with a classmate. It's a really long story, but in the end I knew it had to stop. I went to him and told him I thought the "friendship" was inappropriate, and that I did not want him spending time with her or speaking to her outside of class anymore. Holy hell did he flip out. He told me I was insecure, he said I didn't allow him to have friends, he acted as though I was crazy to even suggest such a thing.

 

I stuck to my guns. I told him her or me. I didn't care if he felt it was appropriate or not, I did not like it and that should be enough. He stopped having contact with her and has never had another EA. He knows my boundaries now and what will happen if he crosses them.

[Kivu]

Yeah, but, he'll leave me.

 

There's a huge backstory to all of this, and this emotional affair stuff is just the start. I could start thread after thread about our relationship and still have more to say.

 

I have confronted him about the things they talk about before, I'm not sure if you read that post - I told him that the subjects they talk about aren't friendly, and I have consistently questioned the sheer amount of time they spend together. I know for a fact that her boyfriend is also telling her much the same things (my husband keeps telling me that the boyfriend is jealous of the amount of time they spend together too) and I keep hoping that with both of us really annoyed about the situation, this will eventually cool down. Or, they'll ****, and then they can have each other.

 

I guess what I really want is some respect from him, some consideration. Some thought. Some concern. And I go to other people and say, "Shouldn't he be treating me better?" and they agree - but it doesn't mean anything to the actual way he treats me.

 

Eh. It's hopeless and I should just give up.

[Kivu]

Honestly - are there any men out there who are faithful? Who don't start running after some women who winks at them when they're in a long term relationship? I've been cheated on over and over and over again, I think there's only a a couple of relationships I've had that I was certain they were faithful to me. All my entire life I've only wanted a man who would put me first in his heart and never let go, and treasure me and show me his love, and that happens at first and then something like THIS!

 

I have no faith left. Where are the good guys who wouldn't hurt me this way? Starting to think they don't exist.

[Lucky_One]

I can't get past a marriage where one partner is asked to a party and the other spouse is not - and the one partner intends to go!!

 

Much less where a married person meets a friend of the opposite sex for drinks at a bar, but their spouse isn't invited.

 

My H and I are very close friends with a couple who own a restaurant with a small bar in our neighborhood. I go there often with friends or with my son if H can't get there, and on occasion, I go with a single male friend of BOTH of ours. And H meets us there when he gets off work.

 

I wouldn't DREAM of 1) having a friend of any sex who wasn't also friends with my H or 2) going to a party where my H wasn't invited or 3) having a H around who called me names when I told him how I as feeling or 4) having sex with any man who was 'cold and hostile' towards me.

 

Kivu, there are so many problems here, the least of which is this girl. Don't go confronting her; she will just tell your H, and he will then turn more against you and towards her, and you will be their common enemy and the person that they need to hide from.

 

Call this jerk out on his behaviorS.

[carhill]

Yeah, but, he'll leave me.

 

Which fear is attached to that statement?

[Kivu]

I get what you guys are saying. I do. I've repeated those very same words to myself, over and over - he insults me, he doesn't care how I feel, why do I stay? Because it actually has gotten better, over time, regardless of how this looks - and because, like I said before, I believe in marriage and will do anything to make this work.

 

My husband met her boyfriend for the first time last night and kept saying, over and over, with a tone of disbelief, what a nice guy he seemed to be. I guess that girl of course only tells him a sob story! And we're all, all four of us, going to have dinner tonight, which is a HUGE step. And I am so weirded out by it and I'm not sure what to do. Make an ally of the boyfriend, I imagine. I wouldn't mind hearing opinions about what to do...

 

That party was a departmental affair having to do with his work, and he wanted to just go talk about his subject for hours with leaders of his field and he didn't want me there to either get bored (which I do, since even though I can stand small doses of the subject, it's so very technical that anyone other than professors or geeks like him will snooze after five minutes) or to wander off and be lonely. So I do understand that.

 

Meeting his friend for a beer - it's a cultural thing here and accepted.

[cj2]

This is a tricky one, speaking with quite recent experience. My now ex girlfriend (of 3 years) started getting friendly with a mutual acqaintance of both of ours over text last September, initially telling me that it was work related (he worked in journalism and she was looking at a career swap). The first red flag went up when she metioned he had text her 50 (yes 50) times in one weekend. They continued to chat over text for the next month, before meeting up for a drink to discuss the career move. She had quite a few guy friends and I trusted her with all of them, but something felt different with this one. The day she was out I sat down and thought about it and pieced together loads of little things that were suddenly out of place over the prior few weeks; she had been a little distant, wasn't sleeping properly, had been hiding her phone from me when texting (previous to that she used to make a point of letting me see whatever she was sending) etc. I did a spot of cleaning round the house and found a couple of empty shopping bags with receipts, she had bought herself some new clothes and underwear a couple of days prior, but had hidden them from me, which was odd as usually any new underwear would immediately get shown to me.

 

When she came home she went to bed for an early night and left her diary out on the side. My gut told me something was wrong so I read it, firstly I found out she had spent two weeks "sharing her favourite sexual fantasies" over email with an ex, then I found there were three weeks of entries talking about how she had "fallen for another guy" who she "couldn't get out of her head".

 

I confronted her over it, asked her who the guy was in her diary, she told me it was the ex. A difficult week followed, then the following weekend she broke up with me, saying we were heading down different paths and that she had some "underlying issues" with me that "had been brushed under the carpet". She moved out a week later, then last month I found out she was in a relationship with the guy I had suspected her of having the EA with all along and had been seeing him just a few weeks after she moved out.

 

So I know where you are coming from. To start with I spent a long time wondering if I did the right thing by confronting her, because in the end it pretty much forced the situation to turn out exactly the way I didn't want it to. People will no doubt read this post and say I'm mad for saying this given how she was behaving, but I confronted her because like you, I thought we had a good relationship on the whole and I loved her and didn't want to lose her. I just wanted to put a stop what was going on as it crossed the boundaries of what I was willing to accept.

 

But now I have reached a point where I think it was the right thing to do. If my ex had owned up to the fact that it was this guy she wrote about in her diary and was willing to cut him out and work on our relationship, then it would have shown we had something worth fighting for. The way it turned out, proves my fears were justified and even if I had left it alone and it hadn't panned out this time, then in all likelyhood it would have happened with someone else further down the road.

 

I think the same is true of your H. You need to confront him over this and to make you boundaries clear. Even if you don't confront him and nothing happens with this women, because she's not willing, then what is going to happen further down the road when he meets one who is?

[Woman In Blue]

He's had friends like this in the past, before me, and it's usually girls and he will want them to lean on him, confide in him, and he's not romantically interested in them. He's told me that he sees himself as their support.

How very altruistic of him. He likes to hear all the dirty details of who she's screwing and who she wants to screw, then he offers up his special "support" - is that his game? And apparently, he's been doing this all his adult life - sticking his nose in women's business (like looking through bedroom windows) and then offering "support." Oh brother.

 

And what a stand up guy - standing "in" for the absent boyfriend by spending the day with her. He's such a freakin LIAR, pretending he's totally innocent and getting mad at you if you even DARE to insinuate otherwise. He rates a 10+ on the creep factor scale.

 

His ass would be SO gone if it were me.

[sammyd]

You either do something now, or he's gone with her. RED FLAGS BIG TIME!!

[Kivu]

Ugh, this weekend. Started out okay. Saturday we went and watched rugby with one of his friends, which was absolutely lovely. Then we went out to dinner with (I'll call her X) and her boyfriend.

 

My husband spent the entire time talking and looking at X. He even moved his chair so he could pay more attention to her. I touched his leg a few times and he looked at me, startled, like he'd forgot I was there. He talked to X - X talked to him and her boyfriend - and her boyfriend talked to everyone there, sometimes addressing a comment to me. Once in a while I would say something but almost everything I said my husband laughed about in a scornful way. (He was looking up lyrics on his phone at one point and I suggested putting in a snippet instead of just searching for the title of the song, and he positively snapped at me.)

 

X of course was not much better. She kept cooing over how her boyfriend and my husband were so! alike! And my husband kept asking her things, telling her she shouldn't live alone, asking her to have coffee, to come to his lab, things like that. Then she brought out her hat, which my husband snatched away and played with, and her boyfriend did as well. Eventually I just stopped talking - I found her absolutely repellent; my husband was acting like a complete ass; and her boyfriend was a good guy, but I swiftly got tired of the X-focus. She was obviously enjoying the hell out of it.

 

Immediately after we left my husband shouted at me for being quiet and not talking, for my body language, and bitched at me about how I keep asking to go out with his friends and then I acted like that. I said, and please if you're still reading this, tell me if I was wrong. I said that I was excluded from the conversation and no one made an effort to include me, not even my husband. I didn't think that I should have interjected and tried to change the conversation to suit me; that really if three members of a group were ignoring the fourth then it was their problem, not mine. He got so angry about this. Said I always blame everyone but myself for my own problems (in this case, shyness).

 

I pointed at him at one point and he twisted my arm around behind my back until it hurt.

 

When we got home he recorded me so he could play it back the next day and let me know how irrational I was. So I said why on earth did you twist my arm, and you haven't even apologised. And why would you start shouting at me as soon as we'd left the restaurant, and why did you ignore me the entire time and focus on X. He refused to play it back yesterday, even though I said that I really would like us both to hear it. I think he's even deleted it.

 

Also at one point he said that he would rather die than be with me anymore since I was such an irrational bitch, and he took his penknife and pressed it against his arm. I just looked at him. Eventually he threw the penknife across the room.

 

He apologised about twisting my arm yesterday, but then spent the entire day telling me that I was such an irrational bitch and I treated him so poorly. And he never ever wanted me to treat him like that again, and he wanted "concrete" steps that I could take to never treat him like that again. And then he said that he twisted my arm because he thought I would hit him. Other than all of that **** he was actually nice to me!

 

So that was my stupid, waste of a weekend. I know he's going to see X today (the coffee thing), and probably fawn all over her as usual. I DO NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO about the situation with X. Clearly he will not hear a word against her, and I didn't try to say a word against her. And clearly, to me, he will not cheat on me with her. But he's also clearly, to me, in the midst of a fairly deep crush, and it hurts me.

 

Also may I say it's not only me that feels that X is not great. Almost none of my husband's friends will hang around with her. X herself said "I know that not many people like me" at dinner and then told us about a co-worker who had told her in her office that no one really liked her very much. X is one of those women who will blame all the other women for being bitches because none of them like her. And men fall for that. I thought my husband was above that but I was wrong.

 

I could really use some advice, I could really use some help. My husband twisting my arm and then trying to cut himself with a penknife bothers me. His close relationship with this woman that I am sure, now, I cannot be friends with, bothers me. His refusal to take responsibility for the way he acts and then telling me it's all my fault, or that I'm wrong about how he acts, bothers me.

 

But I don't want to give up on him. Truly I don't. I really, really, don't.

 

I can threaten him into going to counselling but I don't think I can morally do that. Plus there's no guarantee that counselling is going to change anything. I'm sure he'll just blame the counsellor for being stupid/irrational if the counsellor says he should change something in the way he deals with me. He cannot tolerate anyone (not even his mother, and she says it a lot!) saying that he's wrong about the way he treats me. It just wouldn't work I'm afraid.

 

One good note about the whole ****ty thing - he said, a few times, that it was wrong of him to twist my arm and he apologised and felt bad about it. And he acknowledges that he does treat me like ****. So he is able to apologise, but whether it makes a lick of difference in the way he treats me, I don't know.

 

SO upset, confused, unhappy. Ugh.

 

So now I try to rebuild my relationship with him, one brick at a time, and never ever go out with him and X again. At this point I think, **** it, if he cheats he cheats, and even though he'll probably blame me for making him cheat on me, who the **** cares.