Dear Therapist: My Husband Used to Queer Out with His Best Friend, and I Hate It

Referring to it as a "mistake" is harsh and the whole post comes off as homophobic but I wouldn't want my husband living next door to a former lover he's still close to either.

Sorry, toots. You lost me at "Queer Out".

I don’t know why the cartoon makes the story more comical. She needs to decide now to accept this reality or move on. If she can’t she needs to divorce. There is no in between. This shit will continue to eat at her for years until she ruins the relationship and cheats on him. Many straight women can’t accept their male partners being bisexual or having slept with men. She needs to decide now if she is one of those women. All that matters is how he makes her feel now and if he is faithful of course. Let go or move on. Perhaps even consider if he would let her experiment in the lady pond to release some frustration.

R1 Nothing about this post comes across as homophobic. People need to get real. When you perceive your partner as one way and learn a truth about them that can be devastating.

R2 lol that shit made me laugh out loud actually. I wonder where this couple is from.

The husband is gayer than some DLers.

Peek not through a keyhole, lest ye be vexed, bitch.

The husband is probably still fucking the friend.

They are still banging darlin

Why is she imagining the boyfriend is made of weed though?

The wife committed a massive invasion of her husband's privacy and has paid the price. The husband was incredibly forbearing about this intrusion into his past. Despite the default reaction here. there is literally zero evidence the gay relationship has continued - the hidden letters etc would presumably show it , if this was still happening. He needs to dump her, as she can't be trusted and is clearly messed up on this issue.

Dear fucking Abby stroked the wife’s feeling far too much. This was 12 years prior to the relationship with her!

Plus…”my husband’s family’s property.” What is this about? Like Ray Krebs living on the Ewing property? Or Jett Rink living on the Benedict’s land? Or just Kato Kaelin?

“I cried and was in shock. I spoke with my husband, and he said that after his divorce from his wife of two decades, he was hurt. He didn’t want a woman but wanted a companion. I found out that he spoke with several men during that time frame—about four years—until he fought to overcome his feelings. He made his best friend move out of his house, but the friend still lives next door to us, on my husband’s family’s property. I have to be reminded every day of what went on between them. They had sex when they were together, and now when I look at the two of them, that’s all I can envision.

R8 it is weird that the guy decided to move next door. I think it would make her more comfortable if the best friend moved. The husband should recommend it.

Here we are the two of us together Taking this crazy chance to be all alone We both know that we should not be together 'Cause if they found out It could mess up, both our happy homes

I hate to think about us all meeting up together As soon as I looked at you it would show on my face Then they'll know that we've been loving each other They can never no, oh no, we can't leave a trace

Secret Lovers that's what we are, we shouldn't be together But we can't let it go, oh no, cause we love each other so

Sittin at home I do nothing all day But think about you and hope that your ok Hoping you'll call before anyone gets home I'll wait anxiously, alone by the phone How could something so wrong be so right I wish we didn't have to keep our love out of sight

Living two lives just ain't easy at all But we gotta hang on and after fall Secret lovers that's what we are Trying so hard to hide the way we feel Cause we both belong to someone else But we can't let it go, cause what we feel is oh so real So real

You and me, are we fair Is this cruel, or do we care Can they tell what's in our minds Maybe they've had secret love all of the time In the middle of makin love we notice the time We both get nervous cause it's way after nine Even though we hate it, we know it's time that we go We gotta be careful, so that no one will know

Secret lovers, that's what we are Trying so hard to hide the way we feel 'Cause we both belong to someone else But we can't let it go 'Cause what we feel is oh so real

Part time lovers 🎶

She doesn’t like it when the man goes up into the man!

"stash some papers" my ass!

She was snooping and has nobody to blame but herself.

It doesn't matter whether the person is a dude or woman.

There are several issues with the situation:

- the husband lied by omission. While you aren't obligated to share every detail of your past life, you have to share any material information that would impact whether your current partner would walk away or continue with the relationship. For many people, this would be a dealbreaker so falls under the need to disclose rubric.

- the the husband has the former lover living next door and frequently interacts. Again, if your hanging out with a former lover, your partner, you need to disclose that past relationship to your current partner, so they can decide whether they want to continue to relationship.

- the notion that "it's in the past." No, the clock doesn't start until the wife became aware. It's a fresh situation to the wife because she was not informed about it. She just found out, so for her, it's not in the past. It's very recent.

- the "invasion" of privacy. While digging through someone's private papers is a violation of privacy, if the situation occurred as stated, then finding the original note as purely accidental. Once you have a reason, "probable cause" as it were, the notion of "violation of privacy" in such situations no longer exists. You have forfeited your right to privacy on this matter by lying (or lying by omission).

"Well, honey, this is exactly why I didn't tell you."

I may be way off here, but there is a whiff of "It's none of your business. That's why I didn't tell you." Also a BIG whiff of, yes, the real problem is that it was another guy.

Did he tell her about his adolescent rumblings with the boy next door?

Is she bothered by all his ex-girlfriends?

It was y9ears and years ago. Geezuz.

I think the therapist gave her way too much leeway, and way too many blah-blah-blah pseudo psychological excuses. She should have cut to the chase about it being another guy rather than a woman.

Though he needs to come clean about whether they're still fucking and whether it was a phase - it happens - or if he is bisexual.

These aren't arrested development teenagers that need to erase anything from the past that is threatening.. The best friend was there first. He'll still be there when she implodes. I'm not sure I'd ask him to move. They have bigger problems than where he lives.

Obviously something bothers me about this that I'm having a hard time expressing. And I'm not projecting. I've never been in this situation, which may invalidate my opinions.

If I found out my husband used to once be lovers with the Green Man living next door, I'd be freaked too.

And let's say one of his ex-girlfriends became his best friend. It happens.

Does he excise the friend so the wife feels better? What is she really threatened by?

[quote]the husband lied by omission. While you aren't obligated to share every detail of your past life, you have to share any material information that would impact whether your current partner would walk away or continue with the relationship. For many people, this would be a dealbreaker so falls under the need to disclose rubric.

I disagree. I fault the husband for some bad choices. The friend should move away. But what purpose would dragging her into it serve?

[quote] the "invasion" of privacy. While digging through someone's private papers is a violation of privacy, if the situation occurred as stated,

That is one huge fucking "if"

Girl, I haven't been so shocked since I found out my husband of 30 years was fucking John Cheever.

R17 I couldn’t wait for someone to come in and say that. Love you.

R18 upon reading your post I quickly decided you were probably an hysterical Frau but you are actually right, especially with the living next door. If this was some hot woman who was also his best friend you would expect that he would tell his wife they once date led and/or fucked around. You are 100% right my dear. He did lie by omission. You are a women right?

No one “accidentally” stumbles on papers in a file drawer, any more than they “accidentally” scroll through a partner’s text messages. This only happens when you already suspect your partner. That means that her husband probably has an ongoing relationship with the friend that she wasn’t told about. If it had been a long-dead thing, she wouldn’t have had any reason to look in the first place.

It’s not the dishonesty that bothers her; it’s that she thinks of her husband as a faggot now.

Women snoop. Big surprise.

They should stay together and work it out, and the boyfriend should move out and go away to make that process easier.

Lisa Lampanelli used to say a guy who was divorced as a coin-flip as a dating prospect. Women might respect the fact that he was capable of going all the way with a woman, or they might see him as damaged and wonder why he got divorced. And then they worry about having to deal with the ex-wife drama.

She said it's a big relief if the ex is deceased. You can say "I'm single, but don't worry. The cunt is dead!"

[quote][R18] upon reading your post I quickly decided you were probably an hysterical Frau but you are actually right, especially with the living next door. If this was some hot woman who was also his best friend you would expect that he would tell his wife they once date led and/or fucked around. You are 100% right my dear. He did lie by omission. You are a women right?

Not a woman. A very, very longtime DLer - I was here during the original run of dialing the phone with a pencil and participated in that thread.

The Amal Clooney story.

If the sexes were reversed, it would bother me.

R27 Some of you have been so damaged by the awfulness of homophobia that you can’t understand the complexities and layers of love and a relationship.

R34: Love can be complex and multi-layered, but this Frau is not. She’s ready to blow up her marriage because her husband was briefly bisexual. Reading what she wrote, it’s hard not to see that she wants this to feel like a betrayal, because she thinks it’s gross.

R35 I don’t necessarily think we can conclude that. It is duplicitous as fuck to have your best friend of several years live next to you whom you not only used to fuck, but also we’re in a romantic relationship. Why would he never reveal this. The gross factor may be his dishonesty.

Someone needs to move.

I recommend that it be her.

The sooner the better.

Hopefully the husband gives his wife HIV and an assortment of other STI’s.

Been wronged, have you, R38?

R18 That is some criteria. I'm not sure if anyone would be married if all of that was checked off the list prior to nuptials.

Torn between two lovers, feeling like a fool

Loving both of you is breaking all the rules

Torn between two lovers, feeling like a fool

Loving you both is breaking all the rules

One of the reasons I HATE DL these days is if the gay best friend had written this on here it would be post after post about he is an EST and the whole thing is fake.

Nobody can believe that fucked up things happen and everyone is always convinced it’s a fake EST

If this story from the Atlantic IS true (and it seems unlikely) it's certainly odd. Why is the ex boyfriend living next door on the husband's property? That seems to me like it's not over. If it were truly over, husband wouldn't want him so close.

If it is true, she didn't find out about it by accident, I don't buy that for a minute, either. She snooped; he omitted a huge part of his life.

It's probably over for this marriage.

I don’t see the problem.

I agree with R18 about the husband and friend lying by omission. That's a huge deal to hide from your spouse, considering he lives next door and he's still the best friend. They purposefully hid it for years even after the point of marriage. The fact that they hid it and stayed close would make me wonder if they were having an affair behind her back.

The wife's disgust is also sus with how obsessively she imagines them fucking. Would she focus on the fucking part the same if it were a woman next door, or would it be more about the fact he lied?

I don't know if it's a trope or not, but I see and read plenty of exposition about women having a big(ger) problem with boyfriends or husbands cheating with a man; they say, if it was a woman with whom they were cheating, at least they could compete with another woman.

In any case, if the Atlantic story is true, there are so many things wrong with the situation and with the two of them, I don't think they'll survive as a couple. Reminds me of - was it Redbook Magazine? - the column "Can this Marriage be Saved?"

No.

Doing some math using the years the wife mentions in her story, the husband is AT LEAST 52 and the woman is likely a similar age.

I don’t know what dream world she’s living in but a 50 year-old woman with a child needs to shut up and get over it when she gets a chance at a second husband who moves her and her kid into his house. Single middle-aged women are a dime a dozen and thus she needs to be a little more accepting unless she wants to single and house-less again.

Unless she can grown a fat 7 incher with some low hangers, she's doomed.

R47 Jesus, Tony. Give her a good smack across the mouth, why don't you?

We need pics of the husband and his paramour to make an informed decision.

It sounds like they all live on a piece of land - farmers, rural types, whatever - and the gay buddy lives across the road. It's probably not exactly "next door" in the urban or suburban sense, but he's nearby.

Husband probably brought the pork pie onto his land to be generous. Maybe his bottom buddy needed a place to live.

R51 That is highly speculative. Nobody uses the term next door for someone who lives down the road or across the street.

R52

They would if they wanted to amp up the pity.

Traces of homophobia aside, let's flip the question. Would YOU be okay with it if your husband had been romantic with the woman next door-- love letters, fucking, everything-- and still stayed friendly? That he was bi all along without telling you?

I can't say I wouldn't be mindfucked if years into marriage I found out had a secret romance with his current bff and also hid his sexuality. If you want to make a life together, you can't hide part of your identity.

I was about to point that out r47 in fact, I would take it one step further and speculate that she knew all along, didn't want to ditch the meal ticket and is trying to manuver the whole thing to her advantage.

R54 I can only speak for myself, but I wouldn't feel threatened. Besides, having some side snatch would put on the illusion of straight masculinity so highly prized in these parts.

Queer Out, Sister!

R41 I once had that single on a K-Tel compilation album!

R55 I'd personally be most threatened by the feeling I don't know my own husband. And it feels strange to think about, but I think I could wind up jealous of a woman if he seemed close enough to her. Or if she overstepped on purpose

R58 We never truly know our spouse. We rarely come to a point where we know ourselves.

Middle-aged women have an especially hard time accepting this, because it acknowledges that there is something they will never be able to claim, control, or change. This is especially true with divorcees who need their second marriage to last.

If she wouldn’t have snooped, none of this would be an issue. She stuck her snout into some ancient business and rooted it around and found out some things she didn’t like. Why do people feel entitled to know every singe thing about every person in their life. Every single thing. Let sleeping dogs lie. Don’t beg for everything and then be surprised when you find information you want to unlearn.

I'm glad Tom Cotton's wife is speaking out

Get over it, cunt.

"That explains his exclusive preference for anal sex. I just wish he'd let me be the one being penetrated!"

Just another bi man who thinks it's okay to hide his orientation from his woman, because if he was honest she might end the relationship, or change the terms of to something he'd find inconvenient.

You actually see this shit it discussions of "bi erasure", bi men saying they *have* to lie to women, because women are biphobic and if they were honest they'd never get any pussy!

One of my oldest friends was always bisexual/mostly hetero-romantic. He was married to a woman for almost 20 years, and recently got divorced. He found that now, in his late 40s, once he told women that he was bisexual, that was the end of the conversation/relationship. He is now in a romantic relationship with a man, so at least he isn't lying about who he is to have a relationship, but I can see why some would.

She's clearly a homophobe. "His past mistake."

Um, no, he meant to suck some dick and there's nothing wrong with that.

She's obviously insecure. If she doesn't like it, maybe it's better off if she leaves before she "gets ideas" and starts causing other people problems.

[quote]I don't know if it's a trope or not, but I see and read plenty of exposition about women having a big(ger) problem with boyfriends or husbands cheating with a man; they say, if it was a woman with whom they were cheating, at least they could compete with another woman.

r46 Speaking from a lesbian perspective, I think the fear with these women is that their man is actually 100% a closeted gay man and only using her for a cover. They believe that he has zero attraction to women and, by extension, them. Therefore, there is no hope to "save the relationship" because he's not interested in women in the first place.

One issue within lesbian relationships is that many "bisexual" women are indeed just "on vacation" in Lesville; usually after "being done with men." I believe Nip/Tuck had this exact storyline with Julia and Olivia. The fear is that she's actually straight and just a fauxbian using your relationship to "find herself." This is why I don't date bi women. Too many games. So, if the genders were 2 women and 1 man in this scenario and I was the wife finding out my wife, whom I assumed was a lesbian because she didn't tell me her guy friend was actually a past lover, I'd probably be filing for a divorce.

The fear that their husbands may be gay is an obsession with straight women.

Setting aside the trust/invasion of privacy issues for a moment, if I found out that the "best friend" living nextdoor on my husband's family's property (awkward as doesn't marriage mean that it's [italic]her[/italic] family's property?) was his former lover that he had neglected to include in his history of relationships, I'd question it too, particularly if (in my case since I'm a man in a marriage to a man) the former lover were a woman. However, I could understand more then as undisclosed bisexuality in a relationship is a particular minefield. I'd have to hear the husbands reason(s) for not disclosing the relationship as well as take a long, hard look at their current relationship.

But we cannot set aside the trust issues especially given that this marriage is new when they're supposed to be building trust, not undermining it. I'm willing to give the wife a bit of a pass for looking in the husband's private papers given what she found, but if they decide to work on the relationship and remain, she has work to do to make amends for snooping rather than confronting hubby with the initial eye-catching document(?) and asking for an explanation (which of course pales in comparison to the husband's lack of disclosure).

This is a mature couple dealing with merging two adult lives complete with a whole panoply of unknowns, so the question boils down to whether or not the wife can accept that her new husband has lead a full life including sexual relations with multiple partners of both genders, or not. I'd advise her to think about that with perhaps the suggestion that she make a one-time offer to let hubby come clean on everything without judgment or threat, and then make her decision. If he's hidden this, there's probably more coming, so she'd better wake up and open her eyes so that she's not blindsided again. It's too bad he didn't disclose and/or she didn't discover this before they married, but it's not like marriages are cast in stone. But the time to deal with this is now, and not later.

Total phobe. Out of her husband's extensive history of dating, sex, and marriage she singles out the man to obsess over. It's a little weird that the ex lives next door, but given that the relationship was obviously downgraded to a friendship a decade ago, she just needs to get over it.

It all got very complicated when hubby and his friend started the successful tequila business together.

R70, you’re assuming that the husband is telling the truth. He may not be. That’s the chance you take when you withhold information about yourself. If it comes to light later, the other person might question your overall credibility.

Oh, Cheesus Christ, another “I had no idea my man was bi or gay” frau fart.

And what r26 said. When one looks for dirt, usually it’s found.

I have no desire to snoop at my man’s phone or computer. If it ever comes to that, I’m outta there, both for his sake and mine.

The husband is stupid. If he really wanted to leave his past relationship in the past, he should have destroyed the evidence.

The wife was nosy. She sounds like a bitch and probably wears the pants in that relationship.

"Total phobe. Out of her husband's extensive history of dating, sex, and marriage she singles out the man to obsess over."

Welllll... of all the husband's past relationships, this guy is the one he has living in the guest house. Anyone who entered what they believed to be a monogamous relationship would be startled to find that the person living next door on family property was an ex-lover, an ex-lover who had maintained at least a social intimacy and physical proximity.

I don't think there's a lot of hope for a relationship where one partner is a jealous snoop, and the other keeps an ex within fuckbudy distance.

Women always think they have to trap a man.

Hmm.. was the writer of this letter the former first lady of Canada?????

It is beyond her comprehension to understand this. But I have a few people that I have hooked up with that turned into non-FWB friends. I don't think it is that uncommon considering the low barriers to sex with other men compared to sex with women.

I could completely believe that the relationship with the neighbor was now platonic. I would try and dump the snooping bitch. But if there wasn't a sufficient pre-nup that might be a problem. The dude has some property.

If he is serious about going forward with her, then he should get the friend to move. If she is trying to cash out on my dude, he should move the friend back into the house and rent out the other residence.

R78, her perspective, by definition, can’t be that of a gay man. She’s trapped in the acrimonious world of heterosexuality, a place full of fear, misunderstanding, and scary power imbalances. (Yes, I’ve dealt with a few divorce cases in my day). In that context, no potential omission or slip-up by a partner can simply be a mistake. No, it’s a dreaded red flag 🚩, a sign that the person you’ve married isn’t who you thought they were, but instead may be a demon from hell who’s plotting to kill you.

I agree completely r79. I was commenting on the reality, not the perception.

Whatever happens, she brought it on herself.

Hmmm, what about the best friend though? Would you really want to beta-orbit the guy you were dating and writing love-letters to over a decade ago, still living on his family's property and obviously unable to move on? That's if they're not still fucking. If they are, would you really want to be the kept sidepiece while your lover finds himself new wives and families for public consumption?

C'mon man, move out and get on with your own life!

GURL..they're STILL fucking.

[quote]Dear Therapist: My Husband Used to Queer Out with His Best Friend, and I Hate It

Dear Patient, Pix or it didn't happen.

(And if you want a second opinion, you're fat too.)

Bros just like to queer out now and again. Bitch needs to move along.

[quote]beta-orbit

Clearly the gay guy has the power because the bi one can't "quit him". Maybe the bi guy is "beta-orbiting" him.

And neither one of them are wolves.

[quote]Dear Therapist: My Husband Used to Queer Out with His Best Friend

So let me help you reframe this.

A man who knows how to please your husband sexually lives next door...

Just think about what an amazing resource he could be to help you improve YOUR performance in the bedroom.