Jealous wife?

[Charli!]

Ok... so I have a bunch of friends I mostly speak to online, and we meet up 3 times a year and go camping. We just went this easter weekend and it was awesome! Apart from my friends wife asked if i was sleeping with her husband.. and got very offended when i laughed because I thought she was joking...

So she had been following me around all weekend, everytime i came out of the bathroom she was hovering- I just made small talk and went back to our campsite. She also asked me about 3 times when I was getting married (my answer every time was- I'm not. I have a guy I am committed to- but we're buying a house, not getting married as i we can only afford to do one, and i'd rather have somewhere to live then a nice day with a party. Saying this she went on about how cheaply you can get married at the registry office). Then on the last day as I was going to leave she asked if i was sleeping with her husband, i kind of giggled as it didn't seem serious (i don't think i've been alone in a room with him in 10 years), and she got offended and started saying how she deserved to know the truth.. i denied the accusation, then bolted and left having no clue how to react.

So now i don't know what to do. I have no idea at all how she came to that conclusion. I am not a flirty person, I gave her husband a hug when i arrived, but then i hugged everyone who was there. I was not alone with him the whole weekend (infact she was there the whole weekend, the only time we went out i went with her!), I've never made romantic motions to her husband in the decade I have known them both. I also have a committed other half, buying a house with him is a pretty bit commitment! I really, honestly cannot think of a single thing I have done to offend her. I think she is threatened because i am a bit like 'one of the lads'- i hold conversations about car mechanics and computers that she can't keep up with. And I think she is threatened because i am confident (I have no problem with going to foreign countries for 6 months on my own- she always says how she would like to do things like this but is too afraid to do anything alone).

I don't know if i should email her to try and explain that i am most definitely not sleeping with her husband, never will, etc. If I should ask our mutual friend (but i get the feeling that other people who know about this might laugh at her), or just mark her off as a crazy person. Problem is i talk to her husband almost every day- he's one of my best friends! I went to their wedding! I go stay at their house a few times a year! And now I feel I can't do any of that, and i have no idea what i have done wrong. I feel bad that she spend the entire weekend worrying about this- what a way to ruin your holiday! But again I have no idea what I did!

[Mathmo]

Oh dear ... maybe something not at all to do with you put the idea into her head (e.g., a friend of hers has just found out that her husband has been cheating on her with his "female best friend") and so your friend's wife is super-sensitive and a bit paranoid? Not that knowing why would necessarily help ...

Can you mention this to your friend himself, or do you think that would make it worse? Maybe if he reassured her that would help, or perhaps there's something he's done that's fuelling some of this (e.g. always saying "Charli likes ___" "Charli says that ___" which can be innocent but can sound awfully suspicious) that he could change.

What an awkward situation

[LunchBox]

I'm so sorry that you have to deal with someone so threatened by you. I would send that email to her although I don't always make the best decisions regarding these kinds of situations. I hope things get cleared up and that lady regrets making a problem out of nothing.

[Butterfly North]

Eeeeeep. How weird. As mathmo says, there could be all sorts of things that have put this into her head, none of which you are remotely responsible for.

That said I think it's worth planning for the worst case scenario here, and that is roughly that she is extremely emotionally unstable/unpredictable. Have you told your partner about this? If not it might be worth doing it before she does. I also think it probably would be worth telling your friend something about what has happened because otherwise you could have a situation where she tries to get him to shut you out, or she tries to get your other friends to do the same, etc. I'm not saying this to try to panic you, and maybe she isn't all that malicious, but I'm just saying it's possible.

One thing you could try is asking him to discuss it with her. Something along the lines of 'I don't want to say any more than this but over the course of the weekend your wife has made it clear she believes some pretty strange things about me. I think you should talk to her about it.' That way if she refuses to discuss it with him at least you've given her the opportunity to do so in her own words.

[Sonic#]

She sounds somewhat insecure. That insecurity could be her overworrying, or she could have found something out that makes her particularly wary. Or perhaps something else. I don't know which.

Ideally you would be able to leave this between them. However, you're involved, so is your friend, and you probably don't want to lose him. If I were you, I might talk to the mutual friend in confidence, just to find out if they know whether anything is up. Otherwise, I'm not sure that e-mailing the person that made the accusation will make anything better; if I did that, I'd make it into a message asking if she is alright, restating your confusion at the accusation and your concern for *her*. That would help her open up if she's worried about a particular thing, unless she's so anxious that this makes her more wary. Otherwise, you could talk to the best friend, but that's somewhat conflicted. You'll likely find out a lot, and he can address her concerns, but his wife might resent the fact that you could tell her husband but not her.

So it's tough, but I hope y'all can find a way to work things out. I say y'all because the burden isn't just on you - don't be too hard on yourself for spending time with the husband or possibly missing signs of inappropriateness.

[Mathmo]

I like BN's suggestion here:

Something along the lines of 'I don't want to say any more than this but over the course of the weekend your wife has made it clear she believes some pretty strange things about me. I think you should talk to her about it.' That way if she refuses to discuss it with him at least you've given her the opportunity to do so in her own words.

because not saying any more than that at least means that it can't be construed as you saying to your friend "ha ha, your wife thinks we're sleeping together, isn't that crazy?" (if she thinks that you and he had this big conversation all about it and all about her, that's probably going to make her more insecure ...).

Thinking about it, I would try to avoid email (unless you already email with her regularly but I'm guessing that's not the case) because it's so easy for tone to be misconstrued or words to be misinterpreted. But if that is the only option, I think sticking to things that you're happy to be repeated / don't think can be misinterpreted would be good, like Sonic suggests. "I'm really confused, I don't understand, I don't know where this idea came from" rather than "you must be crazy to think that, how could you say such a thing, of course we've never had sex" (especially as she might discuss an email from you with her friends/mother/etc, and things might sound quite different from their POV as they might not know you).

[Charli!]

I have told my partner- I wasn't sure how he would react actually (as he doesn't come camping with us- he has done in the past but not recently), he laughed and thought the whole thing was hilarious- described my friend as 'not exactly a ladies man' and didn't mention anything more about it.

I think I will ask the mutual friend first (who is much more friendly with the wife than me), as I trust her to be more diplomatic! She also spends quite a bit of time with the pair of them, and might let me know if my friend is doing the 'Charli says this' type thing.

Will let you know how I go on.

[drunken dragon]

Yikes! Good luck with all of that. I hope she snaps out of her jealous stupor or something.

[rowan]

Gah, that sucks. It's probably nothing you've done. Beware though, once someone gets something like that into their head, they will see "evidence" of it everywhere. Like, your bolting after denying it (or just the denial itself). After all, if you were you would totally deny it! Just like that! (...yes, the logic does not exist)

I'm sorry. I hope you don't lose your friend over this.

[monk]

I skimmed the thread so maybe this is repeated advice but I would try to become closer friends with the woman if you can. Her insecurity about you and her husband would lessen I think if she knew you better. The fact you "hold conversations about car mechanics and computers that she can't keep up with" could easily make whatever insecurity she has grow especially if she's excluded from these conversations.

[Charli!]

I broached the subject with the mutual friend (who is very good friends with the wife), who assured me to not worry about it. Apparently wife has asked her husband and the mutual friend about it multiple times- both have denied I'm any competition, that I wouldn't do anything like that, and the mutual friend is aghast that the wife seriously asked me about it. Apparently this has been going on for a while (the last time i saw them was september! thats an awfully long time to stewing about such a thing).

So, I definitely didn't do anything! Other than just be me! I really couldn't think of a single thing i had done, but was worried I'd somehow done something. I will take Monks suggestion for the future and try and be more friendly with her, just I have absolutely nothing in common! Cars and computers and building kilns and the like are what i spend most of my time doing! I will try and find something to try to have a conversation about... crafts maybe?

Thanks for all your help! I now feel daft that I spent 24 hours worrying, but kind of relieved that I was human and cared enough about her to worry (that should mean something right?). (And I'm glad I'm not her, even if that negates the compassion I just mentioned!)

[rowan]

Don't feel daft for worrying over it! Anyone with any ounce of sense or compassion would worry.

[Ama]

Well, personally, if I thought she wasn't just mentally unbalanced, I would invite her for out for a cup of coffee and try and figure out how she got it into her head that you're sleeping with him... but that's a pretty high risk approach.