Need Some Advice - Wife had lunch with ex co worker

3am

This is how my wife's affair started, with exactly the same mate garding fail on my part. Tell her straight not to see him again

604Hubby

Thanks for your advice everyone. I made sure she knows how I felt about the whole thing and I never want that to happen again. she apologized that what she did made me upset. She said she would have never done it knowing my reaction. My wife was very upset that I doubted her. she really feels that I should trust her more. She said she felt pressured to go because she never knows when she will need a new job. The thing is we are both engineers in the oil and gas industry which is currently at an all time low and they are laying people off everywhere so we both feel this lack of job security. I did not take that excuse as valid and I told her that lunch was not about work. I also told her it is out of her character to be pressured by anyone to do anything unless it's out of responsibility. She could not explain why she felt pressured to go her only explanation was the job opportunity stuff. She said she did not feel any advances from the other person during the lunch and she would have walked away otherwise. It'san aggravating   conversation to have because she feels that I did not trust her and I feel that she was out of character and suspicious. In hindsight, like most peoples advice I should have straight up told her not to go because the other person only wants in her pants. 

The only thing to do now is move on and learn from mistakes made. which is tell her straight up and trust her more. 

Thanks for for all your great input. It really help me out perspective on this whole thing.

PhoenixDown

If job security is in question for both of you, staying in touch with previous supervisors and employees is a valid reason to go to lunch, IMO. Look at the big picture: is this a regular thing, or just a "keep in touch" sort of thing? 

Could it have been fishing on the guys part? Maybe. But it sounds like she handled it fine.

She has a job, you can't keep her locked in a box. There's mate guarding, and then there's being unrealistic. 

If he asks her out for lunch again soon or starts texting her often, then be wary. 

Katt

604Hubby said:

 My wife was very upset that I doubted her. she really feels that I should trust her more. She said she felt pressured to go because she never knows when she will need a new job. The thing is we are both engineers in the oil and gas industry which is currently at an all time low and they are laying people off everywhere so we both feel this lack of job security.
 I did not take that excuse as valid

This actually strikes me as a very good reason to stay friendly with past coworkers who might be able to help her find a job if God forbid something should happen to her current one.

and I told her that lunch was not about work.

She wouldn't necessarily have known that before the lunch AND still keeping friendly with a former boss when your current industry is in peril seems prudent.

I also told her it is out of her character to be pressured by anyone to do anything unless it's out of responsibility. She could not explain why she felt pressured to go her only explanation was the job opportunity stuff.

I would honestly feel somewhat obligated if a former supervisor wanted to meet up and you never know if they might have s good heads up on a job opportunity.  It seems a reasonable explanation to me provided your wife doesn't have a history of shady behavior.


The only thing to do now is move on and learn from mistakes made. which is tell her straight up and trust her more. 

Yep!

SignorePillolaRossa

if he didn't bring up the specific topic of career related networking during the lunchtime chat, IMO, that is all the proof you need that his intentions had nothing to do with a legitimate professional lunch meeting ... after a few minutes of  pleasantries about family and friends-in-common from the old days, he should've said clearly something like " well, i asked you to lunch because i am wanting to compare notes about the current state of job prospects in our field .... i'd like to hear what you are assessing and i'd be happy to share my assessments, ...... "

and the more i think about it, if he was truly legit, he would've said that right out front in the invitation in order to be completely upfront and dispel any suspicion ... absent that in his invitation, i find it poor self mate guarding for her not to have asked him in response to his initial contact, 'why do you want to get together?' ... and anything less than an specific professional purpose shouldve triggered a deflection

its even easier to analyse after the fact given that seemingly nothing work-related was even discussed during a 45 minute chat

Katt

I don't doubt that the guy may have been fishing, I just don't see any reason to doubt that OP's wife is being honest here.  

SignorePillolaRossa

indeed, she was honest, OP missed the chance to alpha up and mateguard decisively ... i think we already established that ... he needs to let it go and vow to do better next time ... i think he'll do fine from this learning experience

i just think there is too much residual hamster on this thread about the professional networking angle ... 

PhoenixDown

I think you like to use the term "hamster" for people who disagree with you. 

604Hubby

Signore and Katt really great inputs. Katt thanks for putting things in perspective. Signore your first comment was bang on and so are your follow ups. I did feel she could have handled it better by asking what the lunch was for. I know this guy was fishing he is a guy after all. My wife is a gorgeous woman she turns heads everywhere we go, this is not wife goggles talk either. If it's a lunch about work it he should have been straight up about it. The "let's catch up" is a classic fishing move. 

Signore you put into words something I couldn't quite put my mind to. She should have asked up front what it was for - anything less than business should have TRIGGERED a deflection. Awesome

Thanks again everyone I think we have exhausted the matter. 

Ben

"I felt pissed because if she did not want to go then why would she? the only conclusion

is that she wanted to go but she told me she did not want to. "

Alternate conclusion:  she did not want to go (or didn't feel strongly either way).  Maybe she already had a suspicion that this guy was fishing, maybe she didn't, but after you told her

"there is no such thing as a man and a woman being just friends and hanging out alone and she agreed"

she definitely had it in her head.  So now, whether it was actually the case or not, she is under the impression that some other dude is trying to into her pants, and she knows that you are also under the same impression, and then you tell her to go anyway.

So even if she went into this conversation with the best of intentions, now at some level she's pissed off at you because you basically just told her that you don't care if some asshole tries to get into her pants.  And she's thinking, "Well fuck you, maybe I will go let this other male sniff around at my crotch and we'll just see how far he gets."

She was going to you to get the warm fuzzies of knowing that her Alpha male mate is looking out for her.

Terps4Life

I feel a strange vibe here too.  Just coming off an EA a few months ago after finding out about a few lunches and just the two of them lunches I had to put them quickly down along with emails and stuff. I am with you @604Hubby my wife would not do anything to jeopardize our family or what we have, but I was quite pissed myself for sometime when I found out all that happened.  There was never a PA involved, but I still wonder if I had not caught things when I did what would have happened.   I say mate guarding here is a good thing...IMHO.  I know for a fact that if I met with another female for lunch and a cute one at that, she would not be happy and would be very uncomfortable.  Although she says she would be fine with it, but I know she would not be. 

OneEyedDrunk

I was in the same situation about a year ago. My wife was asked to go. She didn't mention it to me,and I found some back and forth e-mails on LinkedIn from this former coworker. I didn't mention it to my wife as she would know I was snooping. I just monitored things. It turns out she cancelled with the coworker at the last minute. It's kinda funny how she did it. She called me to see where I was at (I work all over the city), and I was able to get away to take her to lunch. 

I saw the e-mail that afternoon apologizing for having to cancel. Her justification was she had some meeting that ran late. In reality she was having lunch with me, and doing a minor make out session before going back to work. 

Its touch man. I believe given the way your wife handled things, that she was aware of the need to talk to you about it before hand. I have since had the talk with my wife about lunch meetings, boundaries, etc. 

themacnut

SignorePillolaRossa said:

 i find it poor self mate guarding for her not to have asked him in response to his initial contact, 'why do you want to get together?' ... and anything less than an specific professional purpose shouldve triggered a deflection

Sadly, people are often not as good at mate-guarding themselves as they should be, especially when there may be some attraction to the other person. And mate-guarding someone else is often a delicate situation, especially for men, who will be accused of excessive controlling jealously by others, especially their own wives, at the drop of a hat. Sometimes those accusations will have some basis in truth as well.

So a man has to balance his own feelings and gut instincts about the (possible mate-guarding) situation with what he knows of his wife's character and past behavior, and make the call. Sometimes it will be the right call, sometimes not. A man who's been too beta in the past is especially likely to make the wrong call, since he may not have even known he needed to mate-guard every now and then. Or had any good idea how to do so.

So ladies, don't be too hard on 604Hubby - like many men in his position, he's just learning this stuff and won't automatically know the right move to make. That's why he was here asking questions, after all.

Katt

Ape said:

No contact with exes unless kids are involved.  That's a really simple rule.  

This situation wasn't an "ex" it was a former supervisor (ex-coworker).