Is it cheating to have a conference husband?

[Anonymous]

Watch 'Same Time Next Year' with Alan Alda.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No of course not. All of the Debbie Downers in here are being ridiculous. Men and women are capable of being friends even when there is some attraction involved. And like you said, you don't know what his marriage us like. It may be fantastic and something he'd never risk in a million years by sleeping with you.

LOL. If he had a fantastic marriage that he wasn't willing to risk, he wouldn't have a consistent flirting partner for faraway conferences. That's not what happily married men do, and the fact that you don't realize that fills in the details about your home situation more than anything else you could say.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you have to ask, the answer is yes. I would not be OK with my partner having "boozy, flirty" dinners with someone of the opposite sex. I also would not be OK with the fact that they look forward to it like a lovestruck schoolgirl. Lastly I would not be OK that you "like having this little secret." You are not being a good spouse. At all.

+1

OP, your post truly is a plea for someone here to tell you that since you're already nearly there, of course it's OK to go ahead and sleep with this man.

The fact that you're turning to a board full of total strangers to validate your desire to have sex with him is truly sad.

Like PP says -- if you have to ask if it's cheating, then you already know it's cheating.

You are on the very edge of turning a fantasy into a sordid reality that could wreck your marriage. What you're doing already, without sex, is quite capable of wrecking your marriage as an emotional affair (and wrecking the man's marriage as well).

You need to stop going wherever he will be. If your work absolutely demands that you and only you must attend these particular conferences, then you need to change your job or take your husband with you to these events -- if they're really all that essential. But if you truly value your marriage you will suck it up and either say you can't attend these things or you'll leave the job. Period. Don't use "I have to go to these conferences for work!" as your validation either.

You have a chance here to dodge the bullet and re-invest in your marriage. You seem to have no problems with your husband (that you mention), only a crush on this other man and easy opportunities to see him again and again in consequence-free settings. Take yourself out of those settings or you're choosing to put him ahead of your marriage. If you have kids: You're putting that flirty young-again feeling ahead of your kids. Please stop seeking validation for an affair and make the effort to stop seeing him, ever again, and stop the communications in between, no matter how innocuous they seem. YOU know they are not innocuous in your own mind. Stop it.

I know all that sounds harsh and it's meant to be; however, I get where you're coming from more than I"m going to discuss here. That's why I hope you'll stop yourself before you do something you cannot ever undo. It may seem harmless but it will eat you over time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The "boozy, flirty" out of town dinner is a hugely slippery slope.

This. As long as you go home and bang your husband silly, it's not cheating.

[Anonymous]

One of your coworkers at the conference is going to see all this and tell your husband, who will likely not believe you when you say it was all innocent, and then the whole thing will blow up in ways you cannot control. Not cool.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No of course not. All of the Debbie Downers in here are being ridiculous. Men and women are capable of being friends even when there is some attraction involved. And like you said, you don't know what his marriage us like. It may be fantastic and something he'd never risk in a million years by sleeping with you.

LOL. If he had a fantastic marriage that he wasn't willing to risk, he wouldn't have a consistent flirting partner for faraway conferences. That's not what happily married men do, and the fact that you don't realize that fills in the details about your home situation more than anything else you could say.

+1000

[Anonymous]

To get to your original question op, what you're doing now is kind of bad and would likely upset your husband if he knew but sleeping with the guy takes it to a whole new level and makes it much less likely that you could save your marriage if your DH found out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do the add your spouse test - if adding DH to any of the scenarios you're asking about would make things awkward, then it's prob not a scenario you should be engaging in.

I like this. And I agree with it.

OP here. Wow, a lot of new comments while I was sleeping (with DH!) and at morning yoga.

I don't agree with the comments that it is cheating when a wife does things she doesn't tell DH about, or she wouldn't do if DH were present. I say things with my sisters and my girlfriends that I wouldn't say in front of DH, and some things I don't tell him about because they're none of his business and I think I'm entitled to some inner life of my own. A few months ago I had jury duty, and they let us out early. I had a few hours to myself and realized my job and DH assumed I was stuck in the courthouse and unreachable. I went to a bar and drank a glass of wine while I finished the book I brought for jury duty, went to a museum, and then went home at the end of the day. DH asked me how jury duty was, and I said it was the usual day, not mentioning my free afternoon. Was that cheating?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a work conference I attend every year, and it is usually in a resort location. A few years ago in New Orleans, I went out to lunch with a friend, who brought along a guy she worked with, and we hit it off. Had a lot in common, knew a lot of the same people. My friend had to catch a flight, and it turned out this guy and I were both on a later flight, so the two of us spent a few hours walking through the French Quarter. If this afternoon had happened when I was in my twenties and single, it would have been one of the best first dates I ever had. Alas, we are both married and middle aged. My marriage is fine. It's not great, but it's fine. I don't really know how his is.

We have minimal contact outside of this conference - a few how ya doing emails during the year. But every annual conference since then, the two of us meet up again and spend our workdays together at the meetings, and have carved some time out from our work obligations so the two of us can go out for boozy, flirty dinner at a nice restaurant, after which each of us goes back to our separate hotel rooms. My husband has no knowledge that this other guy exists. I don't feel like I'm being dishonest, it's just that I don't think I've crossed any lines, it would be more awkward to bring it up, and I kind of like having this little secret.

I'm not cheating on my husband, am I? And if I am, why am I going back to my hotel room alone - if I'm already cheating, how much worse would it be to spend a discreet night together? I think we've established our ability to keep this thing we have to one week a year and apart from our real lives.

Next conference is in Vegas next month.

Two tests for determination:

1) Are anyone's genitals getting wet?
2) Would you tell your husband about this person?

If the answer to 1) is "yes" or 2) is "no" then your DH would regard this as cheating.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do the add your spouse test - if adding DH to any of the scenarios you're asking about would make things awkward, then it's prob not a scenario you should be engaging in.

I like this. And I agree with it.

OP here. Wow, a lot of new comments while I was sleeping (with DH!) and at morning yoga.

I don't agree with the comments that it is cheating when a wife does things she doesn't tell DH about, or she wouldn't do if DH were present. I say things with my sisters and my girlfriends that I wouldn't say in front of DH, and some things I don't tell him about because they're none of his business and I think I'm entitled to some inner life of my own. A few months ago I had jury duty, and they let us out early. I had a few hours to myself and realized my job and DH assumed I was stuck in the courthouse and unreachable. I went to a bar and drank a glass of wine while I finished the book I brought for jury duty, went to a museum, and then went home at the end of the day. DH asked me how jury duty was, and I said it was the usual day, not mentioning my free afternoon. Was that cheating?

No, but you clearly lied by omission. The more you post, the more obvious it becomes that you're playing by a sense of ethics that don't involve honesty. So go ahead and see your second husband; have sex with him! Do what you want, because nothing matters but what feels good.

For anyone else who isn't as deluded as the OP but is seriously considering following her foolish path, do note that the people who make the kinds of decisions the OP is making are the ones who contribute to high divorce and infidelity rates. If you avoid doing nonsense like this and marry someone else who avoids nonsense like this, it's actually quite easy to stay happily married.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Calling someone who is not your husband your "husband" is certainly a sign of a big problem.

Exactly. You sleep with your husband and it is pretty clear OP wants to have sex with this guy. Who organizes trips and boozy dinners while happily married? People who want to cheat. Who calls another man a "conference husband?"

+1000

OP here. I used the term "conference husband" the same way people say they have a work wife or work husband - your friend and ally in the office who you get along with, have lunch with, etc. I don't think of this guy as a husband. Also, nobody is organizing any trips around this. It's a work trip we both happen to make every year. I made it before I met this guy, and will make it as long as I have this job whether the guy is still going or not. I do look forward to seeing him though and would be disappointed if either of us stopped going for whatever reason.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One of your coworkers at the conference is going to see all this and tell your husband, who will likely not believe you when you say it was all innocent, and then the whole thing will blow up in ways you cannot control. Not cool.

I'm not worried about this. Very few coworkers there, none who even know DH, and even if they did, what are they going to report? "I saw your wife at a restaurant with a man! And they were ... laughing!"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To get to your original question op, what you're doing now is kind of bad and would likely upset your husband if he knew but sleeping with the guy takes it to a whole new level and makes it much less likely that you could save your marriage if your DH found out.

Thank you for a sane response. I know. I'm not going to sleep with him. I threw that out as more of a rhetorical question for the people who I knew would say I was a horrible cheater just for having a secret friendship with a guy I saw once a year and wasn't even sleeping with.

[Anonymous]

In my mind you have not cheated yet but it sounds like you are totally ready for it to happen. You will regret it the rest of your life and you cannot undo it. Do not do any flirty, boozy dinners in Vegas with a man who is not your husband. There is no other option for socializing at a conference in Vegas? If you are looking for trouble you will find it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To get to your original question op, what you're doing now is kind of bad and would likely upset your husband if he knew but sleeping with the guy takes it to a whole new level and makes it much less likely that you could save your marriage if your DH found out.

Thank you for a sane response. I know. I'm not going to sleep with him. I threw that out as more of a rhetorical question for the people who I knew would say I was a horrible cheater just for having a secret friendship with a guy I saw once a year and wasn't even sleeping with.

You're already cheating, and you're clearly delusional. Nearly every poster is saying the same thing, no matter how many times you try to parse responses.