My friend's husband thinks I have a crush on her.

January 1, 2012 3:21 PM

My friend's husband thinks I have a crush on her. What do I do?

I'm a married man who is close friends with a married woman. She and I have very similar interests that our spouses aren't into, so we spend a lot of time hanging out. One or the other of our spouses are often involved in the hangouts, but more often it is just the two of us. We have tried to maintain some semblance of propriety by always being in public situations and in groups of mutual friends, but recently it has come to our attention through a third-party that her husband thinks I have a thing for her, and that my wife feels the same about the both of us. I love her husband, and consider him a friend, though not a very close one. What do you think we should do?

posted by anonymous to Human Relations (27 answers total)

"Third-party", eh? Have you talked to your wife? That's the first thing you should. If she feels uncomfortable with your friendship, adjust it accordingly.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 3:24 PM on January 1, 2012 [13 favorites]

my wife feels the same about the both of us.

You sort of buried the lede here. This is not about your friend's husband, this is about a potential real problem in your own marriage. This is something you should talk to your wife about, figure out what her comfort level is with the whole thing and whether there is a way to work this out to both of your mutual satisfactions. I am a paired up woman who is friends with a lot of paired-up men [sometimes friends with the couple, sometimes just the guy] and my approach is always that I need to not have just a semblance of propriety but actually need to make the situation okay for pretty much everyone [unless I think they're being really weird and overreacting, but this is the extreme exception and not the norm.] My job is to make my relationships with other people non-problematic for my partner and for my friends' partner. If I can't do that for whatever reason, the priority is my relationship. It's possible, though unlikely, that my partner is being totally unreasonable for no reason, but the bulk of the time, I think it's my problem to solve.

So, if I were you I'd bring this up with your wife, ask her honestly how she feels, tell her that you care about how she feels about this and ask what would make her more comfortable if this situation isn't okay with her. Often a little more communication and openness can really solve a lot of "someone feels ootchy" situations. Under no circumstances should you and your friend approach this as a problem that the two of you solve together, except possibly to make sure your "make my partner okay with this" strategies match. That's acting couple-y and won't help. At some level all you can do is say how you feel and make sure your actions are speaking as loud as your words. If you trust and respect your wife and don't think she's doing some power play situation, you should work to resolve this with her and let your friend worry about her husband and their situation.
posted by jessamyn at 3:29 PM on January 1, 2012 [45 favorites]

Each of you should talk with your own spouses, to ensure that each of your marriages is on track. If everyone feels secure and happy in his or her own marriage, the friendship shouldn't be an issue. If the marriages are insecure, that's something that each of you needs to fix with your own spouse. So, let her deal with her husband and his feelings. You need to talk with your wife to find out how she feels and figure out how you can set her mind at ease and let her know that she's the most important woman in your life.
posted by decathecting at 3:32 PM on January 1, 2012 [4 favorites]

I'm hopping aboard the good old "talk to your spouse" train here, too (I take a lot of trips on this particular train, it seems.)

This is actually a pretty easy one, I suspect, to solve: either it's actually not an issue and the third party is overreacting/meddling/etc., or there is an issue which you and your spouse need to work together on. I bet that the worst case scenario is your spouse feeling somehow neglected by you, actually: like decathecting says, this is probably a problem only if your marriage has its own issues. In that case you might want to spend another AskMe question on fixing them.

And you should let your female friend handle things with her husband on her own terms, though you can feel free to tell her to do what I just told you to do, if you like. It's important to note that at this stage, this is in no way between you and her husband.

You might want to look into exactly how this third party came to this conclusion, by the way. It's mildly concerning to me if it turns out your spouse does have an issue, but you found out second-hand. Communication is, you know, really a big deal in marriages.

Lastly, please be sure you really don't have a thing for this woman. My great-uncle left his wife when they were both in their 70s after a multi-year situation pretty much exactly like this. The decision to keep doing the Thing Which Interests Me with the Woman Who Isn't My Wife at the expense of his own relationship wasn't deliberate until it was irreversible, and it stank for everyone that it happened that way. In my opinion, the only honorable thing to do in that scenario is cut ties, or at the very least upgrade that "appearance of propriety" thing to "we only go out as two full couples, and really limit ourselves in lots of ways just in case."
posted by SMPA at 3:45 PM on January 1, 2012 [5 favorites]

Talk to your wife. She's the only one that counts here.
posted by Ironmouth at 3:51 PM on January 1, 2012 [6 favorites]

You sort of buried the lede here. This is not about your friend's husband, this is about a potential real problem in your own marriage.

I totally agree with this. Both your spouse and your friend's spouse think/fear/suspect that something's going on between you two. Coupled with your statement "We have tried to maintain some semblance of propriety," it makes me think if your wife and her husband are picking up on some vibe between the two of you that you yourself don't quite realize (or want to admit) is there. (And I say this as someone who is coupled and has lots of friends of the opposite sex, some of whom are coupled and some of whom are single, so this is not coming from an OMG MEN AND WOMEN CAN NEVER BE PLATONIC FRIENDS place.)

There's only one thing you need to to right now, and that is to have a genuinely open, honest conversation with your wife (which means listening at least as much, if not more, than you talk).
posted by scody at 3:52 PM on January 1, 2012 [12 favorites]

but recently it has come to our attention through a third-party that her husband thinks I have a thing for her, and that my wife feels the same about the both of us.

How is that a third party knows how your wife and her husband feels, but neither of you do? And why would they tell the both of you? Something smells fishy on the third party front.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:56 PM on January 1, 2012 [4 favorites]

Mod note: From the OP:

The third party had nothing to do with my wife. I found out her feelings on the matter through a different person.

posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:30 PM on January 1, 2012

A different person? There are way too many third-parties involved in this issue. You need to stop talking to other people (including your friend) and talk to your wife!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 4:33 PM on January 1, 2012 [36 favorites]

You need to TALK TO THE HUSBAND and TALK TO YOUR WIFE. Remember "whisper down the lane"? When a message goes through people, it gets altered -- intentionally or unintentionally. You need to talk directly to the people involved and say that so-and-so told you such-and-such, and you want to sort it out. If you approach both people frankly, you can find out how they really think. You should also tell your female friend so she can do the same. Once you find out how they really feel, you can take the appropriate action to address the situation -- if there is even a situation. A lot of times rumors are not true. And if it is, you are taking action to prevent strife in your marriage and hers.
posted by DoubleLune at 4:44 PM on January 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, were I in your situation, I'd say something like this: "Hey wife, I heard from third party/different person that you think me and whatshername have a thing going on, is that true? You know you can talk to me about these things right?"

I would not be asking random strangers on the internet how me and my female friend should handle this situation. That just sounds odd and feeds into the few that you two have something going on. Spouse gets priority, period.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 4:46 PM on January 1, 2012 [10 favorites]

What you should do is stop talking to all these other people and talk to your wife, and your friend should talk to her husband. There is no "we" whatsoever. There's a difference between being jealous of time your partner spends away from you and with another person, and having a real fear that there's something going on - you need to figure out which one it is and adjust accordingly.
posted by sm1tten at 5:29 PM on January 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

You haven't actually said that your relationship is simply platonic, although that might not mean anything. You said that you are keeping it "appropriate," but if someone else were to use the words that you just did, I'd be wondering: first, why didn't you come right out and say where the boundaries of your "close friendship" lie, including emotional closeness; but also, I'd wonder what numerous other people are possibly seeing that you are not. I'm not accusing you of anything at all (really), but here's a hard question: are there an emotional lines being crossed between the two of you that are appearing inappropriate to others? Because these lines do exist, I think. I'm guessing no in your case, and if not, you are going to have bring this variable into any conversations that you have with your wife, as I guarantee that this is always going to be in the back of her mind. That is, even if you insist that you don't have a "thing" for your friend, she may be wondering if there's emotionally intimacy being established that goes a bit beyond the normal friend-friend thing that may, even unintentionally to you at this moment, lead to deeper and more inappropriate things in the future. You need to address the concerns at that level, I think.
posted by SpacemanStix at 5:48 PM on January 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

And just to clarify, when I said "platonic" above, I didn't mean to imply that you might have a physical relationship, only whether there were any emotional lines being crossed that would make something more than a simple friend-to-friend relationship, and thus raise some of the concerns that are heading your direction.
posted by SpacemanStix at 5:53 PM on January 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Ummm - do you have a crush on her? It is quite ok to have a crush on someone - but also very dangerous. Reading your question it seems like there is very high crush potential here - are you sure you're being honest with yourself?
posted by YukonQuirm at 6:12 PM on January 1, 2012 [2 favorites]

I'm a married dude who has maintained a number of friendships with females over the years, mainly due to my interests (music, which is maybe 60-65% a female pursuit, especially in the amateur ranks) and the fact that when I was a cyclist, I was too slow to ride with the alpha males and always seemed to wind up in the pack with the alpha females. :-)

My bits of advice, in no particular order.

1) communication with all parties, including yourself. Your spouse is #1, but I'm not in the camp that says "she's the only one who matters." I don't want to be a source of anxiety in someone else's marriage, fairly or unfairly. As a matter of fact, I just won't. I had a friend once who I noticed was lying to her husband - she didn't want him to know if we did something together. I quit doing things with her because I would have looked very guilty if he had found out, even though we had ZERO sexual attraction to each other. And, having ignored warning signs once that I was developing an unhealthy attachment to a female friend once, discovered that I need to be really brutally honest with myself and if I see that happening again, DISTANCE MYSELF until I'm really totally positive it's cooled off. That situation did NOT result in an affair, but frankly it could have. And as it turned out, it caused some major hurt feelings.

1.5) I believe that men and women can be friends, but the term "platonic crush," while it has a certain usage to identify a relationship in which people have not actually started rubbing wet, naked bits on each other, but care a lot about each other in some heated emotional way, is frankly and simply the first stage of approaching a romantic relationship when one or both parties have reasons (like a marriage) to deny it's happening. If you're fantasizing about, dreaming about, day-dreaming about, and/or doing a lot of confiding in each other, complaining just a little bit about your spouse to them, etc., etc., this is where you're heading. Period. Unresolved sexual tension is a dramatic device in sit-coms and romantic comedies, and sometimes cop shows. In real life, nature abhors a vacuum, and the situation will resolve toward sex, violence, or both.

2) men and women can be friends, but let's face it, the rules are different. I can go places and do things with another guy and not raise eyebrows. My association with women in any way other than a totally group setting is going to cause some people to talk. Handled correctly, it will be minimal and limited to those idiots in your life that are always stirring shit up. I don't worry about those people. Handled incorrectly, everyone in your social set will start seeing it as kind of a running joke. Unless you enjoy deflecting rumors all the time, things have to be done differently. The main thing I do differently is I just don't allow myself to be alone with them very often. Yeah, this is the 21st century, but it's still a fact that lunch with a friend of mine who happens to be female doesn't seem to cause problems if it's once a month, say, but does if it's once a week. I personally feel that helps with point 1.5, but YMMV.

Your question was worded such that it sounds like all the "info" is coming through 3rd parties (aka - gossip). But the clarification indicates more than one tongue is waggling. Nthing - all 4 of you need to talk - perhaps not all in the same room, but each person needs to assure their spouse that things really are innocent, and if need be, you talk to her husband. And if anyone is anything less than completely cool about this, it's time to put on the brakes. In the long run, it will make for a much better relationship with your friend too. Trust me on that.
posted by randomkeystrike at 6:24 PM on January 1, 2012 [19 favorites]

Too many people, too much drama, too little adultness. Man up and talk to your wife, and take things from there.
posted by Forktine at 6:35 PM on January 1, 2012 [4 favorites]

So here's the thing: neither your marriage nor your friend's marriage is working properly if you're each finding out that your spouse has major concerns through third parties.

Maybe you guys need to replace some of your hanging-out-together time with double-dating time for a bit. Yes, this will cut into your OMG SPECIAL HOBBIES THAT THE TWO OF YOU SHARE time, but that seems like a reasonable compromise to head off this emergency.
posted by Sidhedevil at 6:37 PM on January 1, 2012 [4 favorites]

once you talk to your wife, make sure to respect her and your marriage enough to not repeat the conversation to your friend. i agree that this issue needs to handled by you individually and not as a "we."

full disclosure, this is sort of how i moved from my previous relationship to my marriage. safe guarding the friendship above the relationship absolutely hurried the end of the relationship.
posted by nadawi at 6:45 PM on January 1, 2012 [3 favorites]

but recently it has come to our attention through a third-party that her husband thinks I have a thing for her, and that my wife feels the same about the both of us.

This third party sounds like a gossip and should mind their own business. And are your spouses actually harboring concerns, or did they just make a crack about your friendship as a jokey aside?

The fact that it's commonplace to sexualize every male-female friendship strikes me as one of the creepier aspects of our current culture. Tell the gossips to consider your friend to be like a cousin to you, if they need help understanding how you could possibly have common interests with a woman beyond sexual attraction.
posted by desuetude at 7:47 PM on January 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

This is conspicuously absent, but I think you should first figure out whether you do have a crush on her. If you do, stop hanging out with her. If you don't, you each should separately talk with your respective spouses.
posted by J. Wilson at 8:21 PM on January 1, 2012 [2 favorites]

Too many people, too much drama, too little adultness. Man up and talk to your wife, and take things from there.

To expand on this: I have female friends. Some of them are cute and flirty, and when I go out for drinks with them people sometimes think I am cheating on my wife.Once in a while, some well-meaning person will actually tell my wife that I am running around on her and that she should dump my cheating ass. Because I have no secrets and discuss everything with her, she knows to just laugh when she hears about this; I'm no more cheating than I am robbing a bank.

In other words, what matters is not what people are gossiping about -- it takes very, very little "evidence" to make people start talking. What matters is how you are communicating with your wife, and how she feels about it (and simultaneously, how your friend is communicating with her husband, etc). If your wife is good with things, then other people can go fuck themselves.

But if your wife is having to hear about things for the first time through other people, or you are hearing about her feelings via someone else, then that's capital-B bad, and you need to shape up and do your part to have an adult relationship. Leave the gossip for high school and movies like Dangerous Liasons.
posted by Forktine at 8:40 PM on January 1, 2012 [6 favorites]

There's something about your wording that makes your friendship sound a little not-strictly-platonic. Stories that begin "We have tried to maintain some semblance of propriety" and "recently it has come to our attention through a third-party" often end up with "one thing just led to another and we somehow wound up in bed together." I'm not saying that's how your particular story will go, but there's that same sort of "well, we tried but it just happened" tone.

Regardless of the nature of this friendship, it's going to go a lot better if you're open and honest and believe you're in control of the situation. If you talk, act, or even feel like you have something to hide, or like you're at risk of being swept up in drama, people will sense it.
posted by Metroid Baby at 9:09 PM on January 1, 2012 [8 favorites]

What jumps out at me (as a married woman who has close male friends) is that nowhere in your question do you state that you do NOT have a crush on this woman. I don't mean that this means you sekritly DO have a crush on her, but perhaps your actions in real life also do not clearly convey that there is no romantic or sexual attraction going on. You need to talk to your wife, it is weird that you are finding her feelings out third hand. It is always a good idea to periodically check in with your spouse about the state of the union, especially as regards activities outside the marriage (I have a serious hobby which takes up a lot of my time, and I regularly check in with my husband about how he feels about it and whether he feels neglected because of it).

Talk to your wife, your friend needs to talk to her husband, and be open and honest!
posted by biscotti at 7:34 AM on January 2, 2012 [2 favorites]

Mod note: From the OP:

"We talked about things, and decided it would be for the best if the friendship ended. We've spoken with our spouses about it and everything is going to work out. There was definitely a mutual attraction, but it was never acted upon. Thanks for the advice."

posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:06 PM on January 2, 2012 [3 favorites]

Good for you. Mutual attractions not-acted-on are fine, but constantly jockeying around to get as close to the line as you "appropriately" can is toxic -- because you're trying to get away with something, and that's just not cool. You sound like a good person who may have dodged an unfortunate bullet through sense and judgment.
posted by KathrynT at 12:18 PM on January 2, 2012 [1 favorite]

Mod note: folks I assume you mean well, but getting into a "is this a good thing or not" area is probably not a good idea at this point, thanks.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:17 PM on January 3, 2012