My Husband is Falling Victim to a Flirt

Visitor's Question from a 41-50 year old Female
My husband,daughter and I have joined a group of people from his work at tailgate parties during football games. We have been doing this for 3 years and only recently have I been noticing another woman and her attentions toward my husband of 18 years. She is 20 yrs younger than us, lives at home with her parents and engaged to a man for 12 years who is the group drunkard.

She has recently been talking a great deal to my husband, sitting in front of him during games, laughing at everything that he says, and paying him exclusive attention at all times. She just talks to me to ask questions about my husband, but nothing beyond that. My husband seems really flattered by this and says that nothing is wrong with the way they act, but he has never done this type thing before. He likes the attention and won't stop it.

He once went to a dinner without me, saying that I'd be bored, even though I attended last year. He says I am being paranoid. It is driving me nuts that she has attached herself to him like this. What can I do to make either this jealousy go away or them cool this behavior?

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RomanceClass.com Advice
Usually I speak out very loudly against jealousy, as it is harmful. But jealousy is of course a very valid emotion in some situations, and this is one of them.

Yes, when you have a partnership, you can also have opposite-sex friends too. The key thing here is that they are FRIENDS - not threats to your main relationship. It sounds like this girl is actively flirting with him and that he is enjoying the flirtation. They aren't friends. They are having fun with sexual tension. And sure, right now they're just flirting. But again, part of being in a solid relationship with a partner is that you don't put it into risk. If you love your wife, you don't go around spending nights at motels with sexy young woman. That is putting yourself into a high risk temptation situations where it is very easy to cheat. It is your job as a responsible husband NOT to end up in that situation - because then at that point it's far too easy to say "well I couldn't help myself!" Sure, because you'd already done 12 other things that were inappropriate to get yourself INTO that situation.

So what if they go out to dinner together - and go to movies together - and are drinking together - and then they hug - and then they kiss. Where was the line crossed? When does he say "Oh oooops I guess THIS went a little too far".

Again, I'm all for males having female friends. But this really does NOT seem like a friendship situation any more, when he is deliberately excluding you. It is that he is flattered by and likes the attention, and you being present would interfere with that. That is really the key problem here.

I doubt he'll listen to it from you - he'll find a way to make it out that you're being unreasonable - because he wants to keep doing it. I highly recommend getting him to therapy - say that it's to help with your jealousy. And then let the therapist tell your husband that the situation is just wrong.

-- from Lisa
One of Your Friendly Advisors at RomanceClass.com

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Confront her Guy
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