Me and my wife are happily married for 10 years and having a twins 4 years before. This incident happened 8 years ago, when my wife and her cousin visited the home town for a temple function
they reconnected with this guy who is their old friend ( a distinct relative also), this person had an interest on my wife before marriage and my wife rejected. Now this person is married and having one kid.
when they reconnected my wife's cousin used to do conference calls along with this person and my wife. My wife asked me is it ok to talk. i said yes it is fine but just maintain a boundary. So she wont attend all the calls from them.
Attended some conference calls for 5 to 15 min and drop the call saying my husband don't like me in phone too much. this happens weekly once or twice for 2 month. they also had a watsapp group, in that they had friendly chat between them, mostly between wife's cousin and that person. My wife reply was very less.
but when i was going through the messages they are not flirty messages, there i saw my wife saying very positive about our relationship and her cousin also agreed to that saying they are the best couples. but that person has addressed my wife's cousin and my wife occasionally as honey and dear. but both of them ignored and not asked them to stop calling like that.
when i checked this with my wife she said that person calls everyone as honey/dear even her sisters and other cousin.it is habitual for him so she found no meaning in that and she is not bothered to correct that. thats why she ignored. i asked her to stop talking to him. My wife told she already stopped talking
with him as he tried to make personal calls as she did not like it. that time the wats group also not active so she exited from the group and blocked his number.
Recently we came to know that one of the relative girl got into affair with this person and this person got divorced due to that
1. Does words like honey can be used in friendly way. i have many freinds in other gender i never used honey even though i used 'dear' occassionaly. As he used this word with my wife, Does this
make my wife less pure than other women's. is this cheating ?
2. I cant come in to terms with the fact my wife talked to a person who is a womanizer. does this affect my wife's reputation in the society. they never met in person other than this temple function reconnect.
Ans: Dear Anonymous,
What is cheating and what is not is purely based on the Book of Rules that each of us have within us; it comes from the way we have been raised on a diet of 'right' and 'wrong' AND from our own experiences.
While validating whether a particular rule works well or not, just put in into context and see it.
- Does that rule keep you away from actually seeing things more openly?
- Does that rule keep you occupied with small things that hold no value?
I guess, you must think of it: is this really cheating? When your wife says that she has stopped talking to him, what makes you still obsess over it?
Also, her rule book says that 'honey' and 'dear' might not be a big thing...Plus, how can she control what another person says...yes, she could have objected and she didn't but not that she played on it.
See, the second doubts have crept in, the mind goes all over the place...even if there are no flirty messages, you will still find something problematic to confirm that what you were thinking in the first place.
So, maybe you need to look within to understand if there are jealousies and insecurities within you and that is what is occupying your mind. If Yes, then address this; speak with your wife and it's fine to tell her that you feel hurt and that you don't like it. When you are frank, a lot of things get sorted out...she may very well understand your point of view...and on your part, as you have said: she used to reply less and not respond much to him...
Do you want unnecessary thoughts drive a wedge in your marriage? Speak it out and things fall in place...
All the best!
Anu Krishna
Mind Coach|NLP Trainer|Author
Drop in: www.unfear.io
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