Lindamayes Posted November 13, 2011 Share Posted November 13, 2011 I have just lost one of my best-est friends. No, he did not die—he just got engaged and his soon to be wife who hasn’t even met me or even spoken to me, feels threatened by me (she thinks I am extremely good looking, intelligent and I do not look like a mother of two) cannot stand me and does not want her husband to interact with me in any way. I don’t know whether to be flattered or whether to feel upset that a 26 year old thinks I am competition for her. I am forty, happily married and very devoted to my husband and have two children aged 13 and 10. Why would I want her soon to be husband?! No, thank you!! One is quite enough for me.(wish she would understand that) The thing is my ex-best friend (if there is such a term) was so friendly with my children and my husband too. They all equally adored him. My husband has interacted with him so much. While my friend was a newbie, yet to settle in his job, he had even got his team to work on his CV, all because he was my friend and he meant a lot to me. My ex- best friend used to help so much with my son’s studies too. He used to ask how they fared in exams and was genuinely happy when my son did well. We used to speak almost on a daily basis. I was overjoyed when he had found a girl whom he liked and said he would be getting married. He had invited me with family for the wedding, as had his fiancé. We had made plans of celebrating, as I knew a lot of his friends too who are also my friends now. Then one fine morning I wake up and see that his would-be wife has cut me out from Facebook, as well as my husband. My ex-best-friend soon followed suit..His only explanation as that she felt threatened by me as I did not look like a mother to two kids and I was very intelligent and smart. To me, it made no sense as I am not the kind to have even one jealous bone in my body. I was shocked that someone can even do such an action of completely cutting out her to-be-husband’s close friend..and worse, he without even a second though has followed suit. How can he be so blind? What truly hurts is he has cut me off from even gtalk. He used to wait for me to come online and would ping the moment I logged in. Now it hurts each time I log into Gtalk..and FB. Hers is indeed a very selfish kind of love. Earlier, he wouldn’t have left his work for even half an hour—yet she is pulling him out and so much time he shirks work. Also she hasn’t bothered about how she has made him appear in front of his friends...What she has done is indeed wrong. If she indeed had a problem she should have talked to him about it—not acted this way--and he isn’t even saying what happened and he is going along with her demands. It is now six months and he is married. I guess I am hurting still..but I am indeed thankful for my other friends. The compulsive need to keep feeling bad is gone. Even now I am hurting but very very different from how it was before.Earlier it was like I couldn’t bear the pain..now it is like whatever. I do feel he will come back.I have some hopes..l do want him to. After a while he will realise. I may not even take him back then. How can friendships be cut like this? How can he just give up everything? I do know it affected him deeply too..Why doesn’t he act? ********************************************************************************** Link to post Share on other sites
The Outlaw Posted November 13, 2011 Share Posted November 13, 2011 I've seen situations like this before where friendships fell apart when relationships began to develop. He can act on his own will, but I think he may have possibly feared losing her if he didn't cut his friendship with you. She is indeed very jealous, and controlling to say the least, and if she had any respect for him at all, she'd let him be friends with who he wanted to be friends with. I'm very sorry this has happened to you-I know myself what's it like to lose someone you consider a best friend. But at least, it's like what you said, you have your other friends. But who knows, maybe she'll loosen up a bit and he'll start talking to you again. Good luck 1 Link to post Share on other sites
Lucky_One Posted November 14, 2011 Share Posted November 14, 2011 This has been over 6 months ago that he dropped you? I would venture that the friendship meant more to you than to him, as hurtful as that might be. If you were truly best friends in the conventional sense of the term, then you and your H would have had him and his GF over to the house or socialized with them far before the time that they became engaged. There is a couple that my H and I are very very close to; I have been friends with them both for years, and when I met my BF/now H, they were the first people to meet him and hang out with him. They were at our wedding, and we see each other at least twice a month for dinner. Even my not-so-close friends met my H months/years before we married. Why didn't all of you socialize? Adding - many many married people would be very upset to learn that their spouse's "best friend" was not themselves. I tend to be non-jealous, unless I feel that there is a legit reason to be jealous. And it would definitely bother me if my H said that his best friend was an unmarried woman, and if he spent the day chatting with her on Gchat. *I* am his best friend, and he comes to me (or should be) with his daily stresses, turmoils or joys; we are each other's intimate confidantes, not others, and especially not single people of the opposite sex. Link to post Share on other sites
Author Lindamayes Posted November 14, 2011 Author Share Posted November 14, 2011 This has been over 6 months ago that he dropped you? I would venture that the friendship meant more to you than to him, as hurtful as that might be. If you were truly best friends in the conventional sense of the term, then you and your H would have had him and his GF over to the house or socialized with them far before the time that they became engaged. There is a couple that my H and I are very very close to; I have been friends with them both for years, and when I met my BF/now H, they were the first people to meet him and hang out with him. They were at our wedding, and we see each other at least twice a month for dinner. Even my not-so-close friends met my H months/years before we married. Why didn't all of you socialize? Adding - many many married people would be very upset to learn that their spouse's "best friend" was not themselves. I tend to be non-jealous, unless I feel that there is a legit reason to be jealous. And it would definitely bother me if my H said that his best friend was an unmarried woman, and if he spent the day chatting with her on Gchat. *I* am his best friend, and he comes to me (or should be) with his daily stresses, turmoils or joys; we are each other's intimate confidantes, not others, and especially not single people of the opposite sex. I did invite BOTH of them home..and when I say 'best friend' it naturally means apart from my spouse!! My spouse and I are totally there for each other. We have been married 16 years! We still talk to each other on a daily basis and there are at least 3-4 phone calls when my spouse is away on work even now. This friend who cut me off--he lives in a different city, which is a 2 and a half hour flight from where I live..So our main mode of communication was gtalk and phone calls and we would meet once a year. So of course as soon as he got engaged, I did add his fiance on Facebook and she added my spouse too..we were all set to go for their wedding as a FAMILY (my spouse, myself and two children) THEREFORE, one fine morning, when I wake up and see she has cut me off from FB and I call him and ask him, he says she is jealous that i look too attractive, it sounded so BIZARRE to me that she feels threatened! He met her and they liked each other and they got engaged within 20 days of meeting and then he cuts me off within a month of that!! You are completely correct when you say that the friendship menat more to me than to him. He is now married and good luck to both of them..but a four and a half year old GOOD friendship coming to an ABRUPT end was very very hard to take for a while, especially for no fault of mine! Link to post Share on other sites
Author Lindamayes Posted November 14, 2011 Author Share Posted November 14, 2011 I've seen situations like this before where friendships fell apart when relationships began to develop. He can act on his own will, but I think he may have possibly feared losing her if he didn't cut his friendship with you. She is indeed very jealous, and controlling to say the least, and if she had any respect for him at all, she'd let him be friends with who he wanted to be friends with. I'm very sorry this has happened to you-I know myself what's it like to lose someone you consider a best friend. But at least, it's like what you said, you have your other friends. But who knows, maybe she'll loosen up a bit and he'll start talking to you again. Good luck Thank you so much for your response..Yeah who knows..But then I would have definitely moved on COMPLTETELY..i am sure of that! Link to post Share on other sites
Eeyore79 Posted November 14, 2011 Share Posted November 14, 2011 I've been on both sides of this situation. When my friend got married I was sad to lose our close friendship, but I respected that his wife should now be his closest friend, and that it would be inappropriate for him to share too much emotional intimacy with another woman. On the other hand, I've also experienced the situation where my partner has a female friend who tries to be inappropriately close and contacts him too frequently, despite being married herself. I wouldn't have minded my partner's friend so much if she was friends with us as a couple, and texted/called/emailed both of us equally, and made plans to meet up with both of us. However I found her behavior inappropriate because she made it clear that she was only his friend, and she didn't really like me or want to spend time with us as a couple. That was why I put my foot down and limited his contact with her, because she tried to have an individual friendship with him instead of having a friendship with us both as a couple. The bottom line is that when someone is in a serious relationship, they come as a pair, and you can't be friends with one person without being friends with the other. Someone who isn't a friend of the relationship cannot be a friend of either of the individual people in that relationship. It sounds like you were only talking to your male friend online, and were not being equally friendly towards his wife, hence why she felt like you were "his friend" not "our friend", and asked him to stop contacting you. This is less of an issue when your spouse has a friend of the same sex, but an opposite sex friend has to be very careful to be equally friendly to both people in a relationship to avoid any jealousy or suspicion. Link to post Share on other sites
RiverRunning Posted November 14, 2011 Share Posted November 14, 2011 If I came into a relationship and saw that a man was very close with another woman - talking to her every day, that closely entwined in her life - it would be a red flag and I would be gone regardless of how much older she is than the guy. But that's the entire point here - if I knew about it at the start, I wouldn't stick around to see how it played out. Because while you know your contact with innocent - how often is it that two opposite-sex people are that close and there's NOTHING going on on either side? It's still relatively rare. I can't blame someone for being concerned about that. But how she handled it was entirely wrong. I'd let a guy know why I was leaving and that would be it. To go so far as to get engaged, and to THEN start making her demands, is something else entirely. If it bothered her, she should have left. It sounds like your ex-bestie is whipped. Sadly, a lot of people do this to pacify a controlling girlfriend or wife. It's unfortunate that they shut you out before you had an opportunity to have a one-on-one chat with the new wife to explain the relationship and how happy you are that THOSE two are together. Clearly she needed a sense of security and she wasn't getting it. But we also don't know what their relationship was like. Was he constantly talking about you? For all we know, maybe he was harboring a bit of a crush on you and he was letting it seep out into his relationship...in which case I can't blame her for feeling threatened and wanting the threat gone. Again, I'd dump a guy if that were the case (no sense in going through that crap), but in her case she just decided to see if she could get him to get rid of the competition. Link to post Share on other sites
Lucky_One Posted November 14, 2011 Share Posted November 14, 2011 How did you meet him? Link to post Share on other sites
Author Lindamayes Posted November 15, 2011 Author Share Posted November 15, 2011 (edited) @lucky one : Through a common friend. @ Eeyore: Oh--I did invite BOTH of them home and we had planned so many things together! This friend of mine was friends with my spouse too..And it was very clear from the start that there was no 'exclusive' friendship between him and me which left either of spouses out..That was clearly not on. In fact SHE had invited me for their wedding too and we had exchanged a couple of messages--so it is not that i excluded her. Therefore her actions shocked me. @ River running You absolutely said it! And truly we have never met WITHOUT my spouse and kids..He was as close to my kids and spouse and they genuinely liked him..And I did invite his fiance AND him to my house too! Also had exchanged a couple of messages with her.. I must also add that what hurt me most was his fiance has not even met me! At least if they had met me and spoken to my husband, my children then she would have SEEN for herself how close knit a family we are!! Also his wife is plump bordering on fat..where as I am in top shape (really slim, UK size 8) and I do not look like a mom to two..who knows if all of it added to her insecurity? Edited November 15, 2011 by Lindamayes Link to post Share on other sites
Lucky_One Posted November 16, 2011 Share Posted November 16, 2011 You have four posts on this thread. Twice you have mentioned that his W is fat, and twice you have mentioned your slimness, and three times you have mentioned that you don't look like a mother of two. You seem to be a little preoccupied with these facts, especially when none of them have any bearing on the actual problem, which is that your feelings are hurt that your friend dropped your friendship in favor of his wife. I am curious - is your husband as upset as you are about the loss of this guy as his best friend? Link to post Share on other sites
whichwayisup Posted November 16, 2011 Share Posted November 16, 2011 He loves his soon to be wife and she's asked him to end the friendship with you. Out of love and respect for her, he has CHOSEN (yes chosen) to walk away from you. He is making her number one, his first priority. I get that you're hurt, and it isn't nice to lose a friend, but put yourself in her shoes for a minute. Imagine you and your husband, he having a woman friend and you just didn't feel good about it, made you feel uncomfortable, jealous. Even though there was no reason to, you just didn't like it.. So, you ask your husband if he can walk away.. And he does, out of respect for you. Imagine if he said NO. And continued on the friendship, knowing full well how you felt about it. He would be putting his friend first, above you. THAT is wrong. Respect his decision and focus on your husband. From what you've said though, is it possible you're too involved and emotionally attached to him? More than you care to admit? Maybe his fiance picked up on that vibe and it upset her. Link to post Share on other sites
whichwayisup Posted November 16, 2011 Share Posted November 16, 2011 Something to think about.. Maybe he spoke of you too often, and it made her feel bad. I just read the rest of your thread. Anyway, hate to say it, it's great to have men friends, but a guy shouldn't be your bestfriend when you're married. Your BF should be your husband. Or a woman. Link to post Share on other sites
Sugarkane Posted November 16, 2011 Share Posted November 16, 2011 I can kind of relate. My best friend from high school hit married and had a kid, soon after high school. She soon dropped the WHOLE group of our friends. The guy was far from friendly and no one liked him. She claims he was 28 but he looked twice as old as her. I don't believe he was 28 at all. Anyway everyone tried to continue being her friend. But she dumped everyone. Sad really. I mean what's the point in having a wedding or hens night, if you have no friends? What if she gets divorced one day? Who will she turn too? She won't have anyone. Sad Link to post Share on other sites
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