Wife can't let a friendship with female colleague go

LegacyUser

Ill try and keep this short and would appreciate any advice on this matter,My wife and i run a business together which consists of 3 retail outlets

A woman started working for us a couple of years ago,and predominately with me in the last 18 months,in the last year myself and this woman got on really well,we would have a similar sense of humour and we generally just clicked personality wise,she is also extremely good at her job and in my view, turned the business around in this particular shop as it was struggling when she arrived

As time went by,I gave her full control of the business as she knew what she was doing better than me,and I rewarded her by giving her pay rises and gifts for xmas and birthdays etc as i valued her as a good employee and wanted to hold on to her,even though i was very fond of her as an employee,i never overstepped those boundaries and was never attracted to her in a sexual way,but i did enjoy her company and would spend more time with her in this shop as i got on well with her,and i started to neglect the other two shops as my wife and her sisters where looking after the other two

Roll on to 2 months ago,and this woman(lets call her Mary) had a row with another employee,because her work ethic was not up to her standard,so the other employee who was giving out to, went back to my wife and told her that myself and Mary was having an affair

Of course all hell broke out,and my wife started doing a lot of shouting and screaming as she always had a jealous streak about Mary,but i always put her at ease when she did say something,thing is i never told her about any gifts i bought her,nor did i tell her about her about Mary joining the same gym as me(she went at totally different times than me)because of the jealous nature she had of her,but after a lot of digging she found receipts and messages containing her joining the gym

She then concluded that, there was something going on with us,not sexual but emotionally,and cannot get it out of her head,for the past two months now,every day there is screaming matches at each other over it,she is constantly looking for reasons to find more information about me and Mary,and is rallying all her friends and family against me

My whole life has being turned upside down because of this,as its day in day out of knocking me down and down,and i am on the brink of a nervous breakdown,as has my wife(ive never seen her like this and would have never gave her reason to),I know im in the wrong and have apologised so many times and asked her for her forgiveness and move on,but she just cant leave it behind her and move on

Mary still works for us,and even though she rang my wife to explain that nothing was or had being going on(in a two hour call)my wife wont believe a word from her, and cant stand her,and cant even bear to work anymore because she doesn't want to confront her in any way

As i said any advice would be appreciated as to how myself and my wife can get back to our nice life we had before all this,we have started counselling,but it doesn't seem to be helping

Merkin

You say you didn't overstep the boundaries but you very clearly did given that you not only gifted this woman birthday presents but the clandestine nature of these too. It sounds like there was an intimacy there without the sex. I'd continue with counselling, explore what's lacking in your marriage that precipitated the need for this kind of friendship and I'd also endeavour to sever all ties with Mary so if that means not having any involvement with the third retail outlet then so be it, send another manager in your place.

Another day

Sorry for your troubles. Unfortunately I imagine it is not an easy one to sort out. However there are a number of things you could try.

1. Take a step back from that shop. Find someone impartial that can take over your role there.
2. Change gym.
3. Discuss with your wife what you need to do to prove yourself to her. What will put her mind at ease.
4. Find out why your wife is insecure in your relationship.
5. Do not let Mary go as in fire her. You will end up in court for unfair dismissal.
6. Have you approached the disgruntled employee? If you haven't done anything wrong she has made a serious allegation to your wife and caused major problems within your relationship and should be repremanded for this at the very least. The employee should also provide you and your wife with her reasons for making such assumptions.

Work relationships so often end up with problems like these. But also your wife should know you well enough to know the type of man you are. I take it your wofe has no close male friends so doesnt realise that men and women can be friends without it being anything more. Also stop the gifts! A bonus in recognition of work done is sufficient.

pookie82

A few things:

You've made the situation pretty damning for yourself by buying her secret birthday and Christmas gifts, I don't care how good an employee she is, you don't overstep this line as an employer unless EVERY member of staff is getting the same bonus/gift. Otherwise it's clear special treatment and whether you like it or not, an indication of a "special" bond, platonic or not, that you have with another woman.

You've also admitted to spending the majority of your time in her shop and neglecting the others; again, this doesn't help your case. Can I ask in a nice way ... what were you thinking?! Did you honestly believe this was all above board? I suspect not, because you hid the presents.

You say that's because your wife was jealous of her anyway, I'm not surprised. It's a vicious circle, the old "oh the wife gets jealous so I hide everything because nothing's going on" but now that your omissions/lies have come to the fore you're making yourself look guiltier than you even are. That's the situation you've put YOURSELF in.

Don't fire this girl - as someone mentioned, she could have you for unfair dismissal.

But for the love of god stop spending all your time in her shop. In fact, designate that to someone else and steer clear of her until the heat dies down if you want to save your marriage. Put yourself in your wife's shoes and imagine how embarrassed, upset and betrayed she feels right now. It's hard, with the facts in front of her (facts she had to DIG for herself), to believe absolutely nothing untoward went on. Successful relationships are based on trust but by omitting all the facts yourself in the first place you've made her question that trust and she can't fathom how far you've gone now in breaking it. Throw a scorned, rumour-bearing employee into the mix and her head must be spinning.

In terms of the employee who told your wife this ... it's easy for you to assume she just fabricated it to get back at Mary. Have you thought about the fact that perhaps yourself and Mary were acting in a manner which led the other staff to believe you were having an affair? You're spending all your time there, have this "great" rapport, and perhaps the gifts haven't gone unnoticed by colleagues.

You've been really foolish, and I know you know that, but you need to give you wife a lot of time and a lot of patience and hope she wants to forgive it, because I'm not sure I would.

Colser

Op if I was your wife I wouldnt believe a word of your story.Im not saying you are lying but just that as a woman I really wouldnt believe that nothing was going on and the thing about the presents is laughable imo.You went out on your own to buy birthday and Christmas presents for another woman because she was such a good employee..really?
You both joined the same gym but were never there at the same time?
You spent most of your time at that shop because you had the same sense of humour but there was no attraction?

Sorry now OP but I fail to see how you cannot see why your wife is acting like she is and my opinion is that if this is to get sorted it will take a lot more time for your wife to even begin to calm down.

I think you need to see your wife as human rather than jealous in relation to how she is reacting to this and I also find the wording in the thread title to be again painting your wife as the one in the wrong here.

As for advise on what you can do all I can say is tell her the truth as she will keep asking questions and dont do anything behind her back with that woman again.

pookie82

Colser wrote: »

I also find the wording in the thread title to be again painting your wife as the one in the wrong here.

I meant to add this in my post, OP - your thread title made me think that perhaps your wife was wound up about a perfectly innocent, here-and-there interaction with a female colleague.

This goes WAY beyond that.

You have to take ownership of all YOU did to paint this situation in a really bad light, and stop labeling her as some jealous, high maintenance wife.

lifeandtimes

walter black wrote: »

Ill try and keep this short and would appreciate any advice on this matter,My wife and i run a business together which consists of 3 retail outlets

A woman started working for us a couple of years ago,and predominately with me in the last 18 months,in the last year myself and this woman got on really well,we would have a similar sense of humour and we generally just clicked personality wise,she is also extremely good at her job and in my view, turned the business around in this particular shop as it was struggling when she arrived

As time went by,I gave her full control of the business as she knew what she was doing better than me,and I rewarded her by giving her pay rises and gifts for xmas and birthdays etc as i valued her as a good employee and wanted to hold on to her,even though i was very fond of her as an employee,i never overstepped those boundaries and was never attracted to her in a sexual way,but i did enjoy her company and would spend more time with her in this shop as i got on well with her,and i started to neglect the other two shops as my wife and her sisters where looking after the other two

Roll on to 2 months ago,and this woman(lets call her Mary) had a row with another employee,because her work ethic was not up to her standard,so the other employee who was giving out to, went back to my wife and told her that myself and Mary was having an affair

Of course all hell broke out,and my wife started doing a lot of shouting and screaming as she always had a jealous streak about Mary,but i always put her at ease when she did say something,thing is i never told her about any gifts i bought her,nor did i tell her about her about Mary joining the same gym as me(she went at totally different times than me)because of the jealous nature she had of her,but after a lot of digging she found receipts and messages containing her joining the gym

She then concluded that, there was something going on with us,not sexual but emotionally,and cannot get it out of her head,for the past two months now,every day there is screaming matches at each other over it,she is constantly looking for reasons to find more information about me and Mary,and is rallying all her friends and family against me

My whole life has being turned upside down because of this,as its day in day out of knocking me down and down,and i am on the brink of a nervous breakdown,as has my wife(ive never seen her like this and would have never gave her reason to),I know im in the wrong and have apologised so many times and asked her for her forgiveness and move on,but she just cant leave it behind her and move on

Mary still works for us,and even though she rang my wife to explain that nothing was or had being going on(in a two hour call)my wife wont believe a word from her, and cant stand her,and cant even bear to work anymore because she doesn't want to confront her in any way

As i said any advice would be appreciated as to how myself and my wife can get back to our nice life we had before all this,we have started counselling,but it doesn't seem to be helping

THe two parts in bold are what stick out for me.

You bought her presents as she was good employee, fair enough these can be seen as incentives or bonus for good work, regardless of if another employee didnt get them, especially if she was the top performer of all employees, the only problem is you hid these from your wife. If you two are in business together would she not need to know that you are rewarding mary for all the good and hard work she has done? This looks like you were trying to impress this woman with gifts regardless of her performance(from your wifes point of view)

part two, how did you wife do digging and find messages and receipts that mary joined the same gym as you? Do you mean she went looknig through your things and found your recipets and messages on your phone etc confirming you two are going to the same place? First off she shouldnt be "digging" but shes has found something and put 2 and 2 together and go 75. The reason i say 75 instead of 100 is because you are still at fault, you have knowingly or unknowingly been having an emotional affair, all be it not a very intense one as you have not said you and mary talk every day by message and meet up outside of work for coffee etc but still enough to have cause of concern.

I would talk to your wife, tell her you did not mean anything by it, in your stupidity you wanted to reward this woman and priase her good work, you did not want to tell your wife due to prenotions of jealously with this woman however you can see that in hindsight that was wrong and you should have been more upfront, ask your wife what she feels you need to do to work on your relationship, stay away from the shop for the time being and work on your relationship with your wife, reprimand the employee who make accusations against you and your employee and try to move forward

zl1whqvjs75cdy

You're in trouble here op. I can clearly see where your wife is coming from. If the situation was reversed how would you feel?

Honestly, and I mean total honesty, is the only option open now. Tell her what is in the op and by apologetic. Try and avoid accusing her of being unreasonable. That won't go well. Be totally apologetic and accept that it is totally your fault. Best of luck with it.

JaMarcusHustle

Have to agree with the others OP, put yourself in your wife's shoes. What if you suddenly found out she was spending a lot of time with another man, buying him Christmas and birthday presents and he joined her gym? And then someone told you they were having an affair?

Its easy to see why she thinks you're lying. And if your turning on her in your arguments the way you are here, then that's even more damning because that's what cheaters do. Hell, I read your post and I'm not sure I believe you either.

Either way, what's done is done. Your wife will come round. Give her time and space. She feels betrayed and is probably embarrassed.

Have to ask, why did not tell your wife about buying this girl presents. Did you know it would upset her? And you still did it anyway?

mapaca

I think your wife's reaction is perfectly understandable. From the outside it certainly looks like you were having an affair. Hiding things from her didn't help your case. It's no wonder she has a hard time believing you. Plus your whole workforce have probably been gossiping about it. She is betrayed, hurt and humiliated in front of her family and staff. You have a lot of work to do to fix this.

amdublin

The other posters make valid points. And I do wonder was there something else going on.

But taking you at your word there was not. Plus most importantly you want to fix this. I am surprised the counselling is not helping. Are you both engaging in it fully? How often are you going? I would think you will need weekly sessions until this is resolved.

LegacyUser

OP here,thanks for all the advice here,ok first of all as some people have pointed out,there has being nothing going on with Mary in any way sexual,but if im honest with myself,there has being an emotional attraction,BTW Mary is married with four children

As for the disgruntled employee,she has now left and has apologised for making the accusation,i have also stepped back from this particular shop and only go there when i really need to,and spend as little time as possible there

I have being reassuring my wife that i made a idiot of myself and this will never ever happen again,as i learned a lesson by getting to close to an employee,but even though she comes around when i do reassure her,a few hours later,something else will pop into her head and we are back at square one,and she wants out of our relationship,and then we start with a very loud and nasty argument,this situation has being repeating itself now for the last few months every day, and its wearing bout of us out,we are both consumed by it now and if it keeps up, not only will our business suffer,it will take a toll on our health

meeeeh

OP, for someone who has three shops your actions were very foolish. You should probably attend a course on employment laws and employee relations because your actions were incredibly stupid and were clearly and unfairly favouring one employee regardless of the gender.

As for the relationship with your wife I agree that getting someone else to manage that shop would be good idea. Stay away from her , keep your head down and maybe you will be able to weather the storm.

dixiefly

I agree with most people on here.

This is a drastic suggestion but I wonder could you allow Mary to buy ye guys out of the shop that she is managing. This would facilitate a cessation of contact and possible redemption of your marriage.

discus

Put the foot down OP, don't start grovelling, you haven't done anything wrong.

meeeeh wrote: »

OP, for someone who has three shops your actions were very foolish. You should probably attend a course on employment laws and employee relations because your actions were incredibly stupid and were clearly and unfairly favouring one employee regardless of the gender.

He was rewarding a particularly effective worker. It happens in tons of employments - retail, finance, corporate commercial, military the works. It's not favouring, she is literally turning around the shop by running it effectively... thereby increasing profit. You don't keep people like that without suitable reward.

As for the relationship with your wife I agree that getting someone else to manage that shop would be good idea. Stay away from her , keep your head down and maybe you will be able to weather the storm.

Correct.

discus

dixiefly wrote: »

I agree with most people on here.

This is a drastic suggestion but I wonder could you allow Mary to buy ye guys out of the shop that she is managing. This would facilitate a cessation of contact and possible redemption of your marriage.

NO!
OP, do not sell a successful business concern and livelihood just because your wife can't deal with your management style. Your wife may still leave you (she obviously doesn't trust you not to cheat, or trust you to tell the truth) and you will be left with nothing.

OneOfThem

Sounds like you're being too spineless tbh. Months this has been going on? Months of your wife starting a nasty row every single day? Months? Genuinely? Tell her she needs to drop it. Now. Permanently. Or it'd be best if you two part ways. Enough is enough for crying out loud. She's not a child. She shouldn't get to act like one. What other choice do you have? Let months become years? Same sh1te? Fvck that. That's no kind of life.

Colser

OneOfThem wrote: »

Sounds like you're being too spineless tbh. Months this has been going on? Months of your wife starting a nasty row every single day? Months? Genuinely? Tell her she needs to drop it. Now. Permanently. Or it'd be best if you two part ways. Enough is enough for crying out loud. She's not a child. She shouldn't get to act like one. What other choice do you have? Let months become years? Same sh1te? Fvck that. That's no kind of life.

Im shocked OneOfThem as I usually agree with you:pac: How do you think his wife should have reacted? Do you not think the OP is way out of line here? I think this will get much worse before it ever gets better. I cant think of one woman I know who would buy his story (not saying its not true).

discus

Put it like this, if the genders were reversed people would be telling OP to get out before the abusive, controlling husband ends up doing something worse than shouting at OP every day.

His wife doesn't trust him, and she starts full on rows everyday. That's abuse, particularly because OP hasn't had an affair. She wants to believe him, otherwise she would have walked by now. Time for OP to bring some leadership into this relationship and either end the discourse or end the relationship.

Colser

discus wrote: »

Put it like this, if the genders were reversed people would be telling OP to get out before the abusive, controlling husband ends up doing something worse than shouting at OP every day.

His wife doesn't trust him, and she starts full on rows everyday. That's abuse, particularly because OP hasn't had an affair. She wants to believe him, otherwise she would have walked by now. Time for OP to bring some leadership into this relationship and either end the discourse or end the relationship.

How is she abusive and controlling? Shes extremely hurt I imagine. Yes shes shouting but he was hanging out with another woman and buying her presents giving her pay rises "as friends" ,does he think his wife was going to roll over and let this slide.

arayess

Colser wrote: »

How is she abusive and controlling? Shes extremely hurt I imagine. Yes shes shouting but he was hanging out with another woman and buying her presents giving her pay rises "as friends" ,does he think his wife was going to roll over and let this slide.

the wife should be begging to apologise for believing some disgruntled employee over her own husband and the person who turned their business around , presumably making her (the wife) richer.

the wife is bang out of order, she will know herself that the employee is somebody with a grudge. The OP did nothing wrong

discus

Colser wrote: »

How is she abusive and controlling? Shes extremely hurt I imagine. Yes shes shouting but he was hanging out with another woman and buying her presents giving her pay rises "as friends" ,does he think his wife was going to roll over and let this slide.

Pay rises because she's an effective manager and is increasing stats across the board. Have none of you here ever come across this phenomenon of performance-related bonus? A few presents to keep profits increasing is good in my books. Abusive and controlling? She is starting fights with him every day. He's nearly in tears. 2 months of psychological abuse and bullying in his own home ffs

My boss gave me two months paid leave as a present for my hard work. Hope his wife never finds out.

Colser

I wouldnt advise him to tell his wife that it was a performance related bonus tbh.

discus

OP has nothing to hide. What shall he say otherwise? Concoct a lie?

Colser

So why did he hide the presents and bonus from his wife? Oh yea sure shes the jealous type.Whats the significance of the gym? Why did his wife find messages relating to the gym if they were never there together.What has that got to do with running a shop?

Carlos Orange

discus wrote: »

Put it like this, if the genders were reversed people would be telling OP to get out before the abusive, controlling husband ends up doing something worse than shouting at OP every day.

Some people would defiantly react differently if the genders were flipped but if the OP knew he was married to the jealous controlling type he should have taken more care to have everything above board and in the open instead of hiding stuff away. Much better to have a small argument earlier than a gigantic one latter.

Penny Tration

discus wrote: »

OP has nothing to hide. What shall he say otherwise? Concoct a lie?

He does though! He hid the gifts, the raises, the fact she joined his gym, all the extra time he spent with her...

And I'd imagine he's hiding the part where he said he's attracted to her!


He may not have done something wrong in your eyes, but his actions have made it look like he's done something wrong.

If it was purely business, he wouldn't have hidden it all, he could have asked his wife's opinion on getting Mary a gift, or let the wife be the one to do it.

He's said he is attracted to her. So no, his actions weren't entirely innocent, hence the hiding.


However, op, you can't let daily screaming matches happen over this. Your wife, while hurt, is completely wrong to do this daily! Whatever you have or haven't done, she has no right to scream at you every single day. That is, as has been pointed out, abusive behaviour.

If nothing has changed in two months, it's time to decide to either put it behind you both and deal with it together, or separate.
Stay away from Mary, you shouldn't be hanging about someone you're attracted to while you're married.

DukeOfTheSharp

OP, I'd hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it really does seem like your wife is obsessively jealous for no reason, so much so that I doubt she ever trusted you to begin with, and this has just 'confirmed' her delusional narrative.
Think about it like this: had your wife not been like this, would you have fallen into this 'emotional affair' at all? It seems like the root cause is her, and your reactions - while really, really stupid (I'm sorry, but come on, nothing to hide means being honest regardless, you don't need to prove yourself) - are in response to her personality. I think her screaming and shouting and acting up like she does is totally unfair, counselling isn't helping her because she doesn't want it to. I think you need to sit down and have a frank, honest discussion with her: tell her that you're done apologising, that you know you made a mistake, but that her reactions are completely overblown. Inform her that her attitude is completely unacceptable and her mistrust is totally off, but that if she keeps this up, you're done. Tell her that either the two of you work at counselling or she leaves, because at this point those are your only two options. This is a mess but she's the cause at the end of the day, I'm not defending your actions, but this is complicated and ridiculous, nobody can live like that.

strandroad

You were giving Mary personal presents (what you give a valued employee is a bonus or a raise, not birthday gifts!), you neglected other sites so that you can keep meeting her, you hid it all from your wife who also seems to be your business partner - if you think you do not have an emotional interest in Mary you are deluding yourself. Even if you did not consummate it.

Counselling is your best option so stick to it but unless you admit your emotional interest in her to yourself counselling will not work. In the course of counselling your wife needs to learn to control how she handles it but you need to recognise your fault and fix it, otherwise there's no point...

Also, rethink your business practices. Such personal interest in an employee is unprofessional at best, and if she was not willing it could land you in trouble.

meeeeh

discus wrote: »

He was rewarding a particularly effective worker. It happens in tons of employments - retail, finance, corporate commercial, military the works. It's not favouring, she is literally turning around the shop by running it effectively... thereby increasing profit. You don't keep people like that without suitable reward.
t.

If you want to give a reward you give a bonus not a birthday present. Especially when there are other employees who don't get birthday or Christmas presents. My parents ran family business and so do my partner and I so I have plenty of experience with employment issues. There are two rules you should stick to, don't employ relatives (outside immediate family) or friends and have the same rules for everyone. It saves you a lot of agro.

There are advantages of family business but major disadvantage is that personal life can heavily influenced running of the business. A solicitor friend of mine was telling me about divorce case she had. Husband and wife had such an acrimonious divorce that they both ended up going to the police reporting the other one for different tax frauds. In the end they both faced prison. It is an extreme case but it can get very messy when businesses life is intertwined with private. Of course this doesn't help OP because he already learned the hard lesson. Trust is subjective and even if the other party is told lies, there is no way how they can know what is true, if there was completely secrete although non sexual side to the relationship with employee.

OP you might also try with counselling because daily shouting matches are leading to complete break up. If it goes on for too long you might forget about original reason and still end up hating each other. Also a bit of a break for one of you away from the other one might not be bad.

Flippyfloppy

Op I certainly think your thread title is completely misleading of the situation, and representative of your own state of mind regarding this issue.
'Wife can't let go of friendship with female colleague' is completely inaccurate.

'Wife cannot comes to terms with my lies and covering up of secret gifts & liaisons with female colleague' is apt, and I think if you start understanding this as the problem, and stop minimising what happened you *might* get somewhere toward rebuilding your relationship.