Help! husband dislikes riding buddy

[Mr. Bloom]

Even the best relationships are not immune to this issue.

In a perfect world, with perfect people, this would not be a problem.

BUT, the world is NOT perfect and people are fallible too.

To take a "get over it" perspective with a spouse is naive and disrepectful.

In a relationship - whether married or not - when one suffers, both suffer. When that suffering (or pain, or confusion, or whatever) comes from one inside the relationship, then everyone is hurt.

When one spouse has an issue with third party relationships, it's my belief that it's not out of distrust of their spouse nearly as much as it is distrust of the third party.

No one wakes up one day saying "I'm going to compromise my relationship today". The compromises occur in little baby steps until suddenly "the leap" is not too far at all. I've seen it time and time again in my friends, and it pains me everytime.

I'm glad that there is a happy ending and that you shared your story with us.

[teigyr]

Even the best relationships are not immune to this issue.

In a perfect world, with perfect people, this would not be a problem.

BUT, the world is NOT perfect and people are fallible too.

To take a "get over it" perspective with a spouse is naive and disrepectful.

In a relationship - whether married or not - when one suffers, both suffer. When that suffering (or pain, or confusion, or whatever) comes from one inside the relationship, then everyone is hurt.

When one spouse has an issue with third party relationships, it's my belief that it's not out of distrust of their spouse nearly as much as it is distrust of the third party.

No one wakes up one day saying "I'm going to compromise my relationship today". The compromises occur in little baby steps until suddenly "the leap" is not too far at all. I've seen it time and time again in my friends, and it pains me everytime.

I'm glad that there is a happy ending and that you shared your story with us.

I was thinking and thinking about this and was debating to myself for a while (I'm sure if strangers saw inside my mind they'd think I'm insane!) but I don't think we're so different here.

I can't think of anyone in a good relationship who would have a "get over it" attitude. I guess the feeling I got from the original post was that he (the husband) was being unreasonable. In my limited scope of relationships, we discuss. There are no edicts or judgments, but then again we mostly think alike. If he thinks someone is creepy, I tend to too. Also in any of my dealings with anyone, opposite sex or not, my DH is invited to go along. He is the most important person in my life but that's not to say we don't both have friends. Some are even of the opposite sex persuasion but I guess we're both ok with that.

Yes, if one person suffers, both do. I guess I've seen unreasonable jealousy though and I tend to look at life through that angle. Control solves nothing but thoughtful discussion and decision making does. I've seen unfounded jealousy destroy more than one relationship and no matter how truthful and open the person is, the mate or spouse still has doubts. There can be paranoia and control issues and I don't believe someone should closet themselves due to the insecurities of the person they are involved with.

If there is a problem with the third party, the trust (unless you think the third party is an axe murderer or something) resides with the spouse. I trust my spouse implicitly. I might be naive or silly though.

Maybe I seemed dead-set on not siding with the spouse but I'm in a relationship (now) where we talk about this stuff and we are pretty much in agreement about most things. Betrayal goes way beyond traditional "cheating" and both of us share what's going on in our lives with each other, not other people. A cycling partner would be a cycling partner and nothing else. I would trust my husband with any female friend of his (along with my female friends) and he has met all my male friends. I guess we both know we are the most important people in each others lives so there's really no threat.

I think for those people who have bad things happen by baby steps (and that is a good description), they need to think more critically about their lives. If I ever had any kind of "close" feeling to someone I'd start wondering why and I would try to fix any problems before they got worse. Then again, I tend to over-analyze, I guess.

And I am also glad that there is a happy resolution. I think there was a combination of things going on but it is good that both sides moved toward a middle ground.

There. Internal debate done