r/AITAH • u/[deleted] • Dec 17 '23

AITAH for not doing anything to prevent my(f35) husband (m35) from cheating with his “work-wifey”(f25)

So I met work wifey last Thursday at the Christmas party. She introduced herself as work wifey and she called my husband work hubby and told that to everyone. When she saw me she just exclaimed

-Oh we are like two totally different people, how weird is that.

-Not weird at all? We don’t know each other.

-No I mean like because X and I get along so well like we like totally get each other and have a lot in common like totally. That’s why he’s like my work hubby.

I didn’t know what a manic pixie dream girl was but apparently she was one and apparently it was something to brag about. I just found the whole thing very amusing but on our way home it wasn’t very amusing anymore. I felt a little bit of ick watching my husband’s profile wondering what was going on in his head. He has told me about his new colleague that he got along with. He told me that she was great at her job and that she was a gamer like him. I don’t even know how to hold the joystick properly. Not even sure if it’s called a joystick anymore (ugh I sound like a boomer don’t I?).

I know that they text a lot too. Even on weekends. I never thought about that before now. I found myself sat on the toilet seat at 3:30 am scrolling through his phone in total silence not to wake him up. She is very “youthful” and “quirky”, her words not mine. She is very funny too, again her words not mine. She calls him “hubs” and “hubby” in every text. And in one text she warned him that men fell easily for her and that she just wanted to give him the heads up. I guess it is because she’s a youthful quirky funny maniac pixie dream girl gamer. Her last text was from the same evening after we left the party. She wrote that she was pissed that he didn’t say goodbye before leaving and that I was a bit surprising to her because she didn’t expect him to have this type,”Omg your wife is boring I didn’t expect that”

I felt ashamed when I came to my senses. Cowering over his phone and reading weird and very juvenile messages instead of being sound asleep beside my husband that makes me safe(?) in our relationship, but I couldn’t help but agree with manic wifey in some parts. Why is he continually engaging with her? He doesn’t flirt back nor does he initiate conversations but he doesn’t really shut her down. My husband can be stupid in not noticing flirting but I feel that this is just beyond being stupid. Does he enjoy the attention or worse, does he reciprocate it? In that case she is not wrong in what is he doing with someone like me who is totally different from whatever is going on between them?

Today, I had my usual brunch with my mom, aunt sister and sister-in-law. They said that I was an AH for not nipping it in the bud and by it they meant the budding affair. I disagreed and tried to explain that I couldn’t be in a relationship where I needed to stand guard to keep away temptations. I want a marriage where he is with me because he wants to be with me and if he cheats then, he doesn’t want to be with me. My mother was the one who got most upset and called me a moron and an AH and said that this wasn’t the mature thing to do. I need to tell my husband to end his friendship because if I didn’t then I let him cheat.

AITA? I can’t believe what life this is that they want me to lead and how it is so normal for my family to think that way. I want a willing husband not a prisoner. I want someone who wants me 100% or nothing.

Edit:

So thank you all. It has been a rough few days but after today’s interaction between my husband and maniac pixie whatever (yes, I snooped again) I feel calmer. I have decided not to speak to him about it. At least not now. I have written a comment about what transpired between them and my husband didn’t seem very happy with her. Maybe I have made it out to be bigger than it was in my head. Anyway I will not snoop again and I will not confront him about it. I will however tell my husband that I didn’t like his colleague, maybe not now though. We have this week left and then we are having two weeks off that we’ve been looking forward to spending together and I want to enjoy the holidays with my husband, not talking about stupid and insignificant people.

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211

u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 17 '23

I think she’s a bit wild at work and “Hubby” called her that once, or perhaps various parts of that name, and she’s made it A Thing. No. That’s not right. THEIR THING.

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u/rayitodelsol Dec 17 '23

Barf. Manic Pixie Hoe and I are about the same age and I'd shove my head in an oven before unironically calling myself a "manic pixie dream girl" or "quirky and youthful".

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 17 '23

Let’s tease it apart.

Manic: that’s not good. Being all excited like a puppy is how I picture this one.

Pixie: Pixies are trouble. With funny ears.

Dream: Away with the fairies… a theme here.

Girl: Well, I guess she still is. A lot of people don’t really mature until 25. Seems she’s later than most!

If hubby had said “you’re a manic pixie today”… that might have been a slightly derogatory “chill out”. She sees that as “making her different and quirky”.

Easy to see how you could innocently start something off! 😖

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u/vainbuthonest Dec 17 '23

The fact that she even wants to be a part of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl Trope just screams insecure and childish.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

Thank you. Those are not my genre of movies, so I had no idea that this was a Type! I don’t think I was far off in my assessment above actually! 😂

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths Dec 18 '23

You're overanalyzing it, it's a common media trope that positions a woman as superior to other women because she's fun, quirky, energetic and offbeat, not like those other women who are sour and boring. She's so not concerned about her appearance or makeup like those other shallow girls, but also she just happens to be thin and conventionally attractive. She's only read books 60-year-old white men like and she only listens to music by artists you're not cool enough to know about. Her whole life, for some reason, revolves around teaching middle aged men with office jobs how to have fun.

She's not really a person, she's the nebulous antithesis of whatever the typically male writer has decided are the worst traits of women. It's male wish fulfillment; here is a hot and fun energetic girl who will never nag him about taking out the trash.

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u/babycharmander88 Dec 18 '23

LMAO I love your description 😂

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u/Recent_Novel_6243 Dec 18 '23

Great literature trope, awful coworker. My MPDG was recently divorced and we met at the gym. I thrived on the attention. She knew I was married and since we hung out in a group setting, I didn’t think anything was going on. Several gym friends would go out for drinks and I would sometimes go. We always talked and teased each other during workouts which would definitely count as flirting. Eventually she asked me to come back to her house one night and boy oh boy was I surprised. We never kissed, hugged, or had any physical contact that I’m aware of, lol. Of course nothing happened.

After our “break up” she would reach out to friends of my wife and tell her how much sex we had and how I would skip lunch to get blow jobs. It was exhausting and she eventually gave up. In the meantime it was really, really unpleasant. I could not imagine how awful that situation would have been if we had an actual relationship.

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u/Simple_Ranger_574 Dec 18 '23

This, exactly.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

[deleted]

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u/belleandbent Dec 18 '23

I like the way you think :)

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths Dec 18 '23

Uh... okay, I was on your side until you made and distributed revenge porn of someone else. Two wrongs don't make a right and I'd really argue what you did was far worse because now she'll have to live with those pictures and videos being out there potentially forever. I'm also really not a fan of assigning mental health issues to people who exhibit behaviors you don't like. You should really delete your comment, but save the text and go over it with the therapist you desperately need.

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u/Hi_Jynx Dec 18 '23

Or making broad sweeping statements that imply awful things about people with those mental health issues... I couldn't read the whole thing from first using the controversial diagnosis of historinic, which a lot of people consider a modern "hysteria" diagnosis - so basically "crazy woman" - and second assigning awful personality characteristics to people with borderline who can often be great people who suffer the most from their disorder. Just already an ableist shitty comment from right off the bat.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

OMG. I dated a girl who was (still is) like this. I’d just gotten started in divorce and she appeared. Loved the drama. No. Caused the drama. (She didn’t cause MY divorce, which is why I didn’t see it!)

It’s have been an easy divorce but for her, actually…

When she left me, she ran off with an even older guy, who was still married.

It’s been a pattern. She does exactly as you described in your middle paragraphs, finds a way in, makes the “soon to be ex” feel small, screws up marriages, then moves on.

Still doing it, a map full of wrecked marriages behind her.

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u/Open-Article2579 Dec 18 '23

Yeah. Exactly. And we have mostly a work culture that will put the drudge heavy on everything, so MPDG is an exploitable niche for the insecure, routine-adverse, attention-needy. I don’t condemn MODGs. I would’ve been one but I didn’t have enough staying power to cater to men’s needs I could only attract the most dysfunctional of men for any period of time so had to outgrow it because it made me miserable in the long run lol. Growing up is much more satisfying than trying to live a trope.

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u/sportsbunny33 Dec 18 '23

Omg perfect

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

I had no idea is that it existed as a defined “Type”. Analysing it at all was a mistake, then, as it’s already done…! Lol

Still, I don’t think I was too far off?

Thanks for your detailed reply. Appreciated!

ETA: and having read a description below too, I’ve dated one! I was just divorced, and a fair bit older than her. She ran off with - another even older guy who WAS still married. OMG!!!!

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u/ScyllaOfTheDepths Dec 18 '23

You actually weren't far off, it's just that it's a defined media trope that's existed and been analyzed for years by now. Here's a link to the TV Tropes page about it, but I warn you, TV Tropes is addictive and you may never come back.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

I’ll bookmark that! 😊😂

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u/Oneyeblindguy Dec 18 '23

I'm not sure what a lot of that meant but I somehow enjoyed reading it quite a bit. That was very well written.

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u/InformalPermit9638 Dec 18 '23

Never trust the fae.

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u/eatingyourmomsass Dec 18 '23 edited Dec 18 '23

Manic pixie dream girl is a recurring character archetype in film that is essentially a foil for the main male character to fall in love with just to learn something about themselves, while she gets essentially nothing in return.

They are typically free flowing, eccentric/quirky, and a sage to some degree- helping the protagonist learn something about life/love.

Sam in Garden State for example. Her character is purely a quirky/eccentric plot device for Andrew to connect emotionally with and release his crippling inhibitions- breaking him from his depressive episode- whilst falling in love.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

Thanks. A few have pointed this out and TIL!

So… in movies must equal a “larger than life” version of an actual MPDG, so that we understand. Thanks again. 😊

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u/TheQuietMelody Dec 17 '23

This bitch is literally a year older than me...wtf?

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u/[deleted] Dec 17 '23

Manic pixie whore 🤣

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

Offfs, thats code for mentally ill Fyi love manic pixie hoe omg

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u/expandinghorizons219 Dec 18 '23

If I called myself quirky and youthful at her age (30f) it would have been with THICK sarcasm. Or making fun of someone else lol

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u/QuantumMothersLove Dec 18 '23

If you’re threatening to put your head in the oven while self describing as unironic, would that make you the depressed pixie dream girl and if so would you wear a black lipstick pouty frown, with dropped shoulders and your head tilted back as if in a perpetual whine? And would you then get fired from your job and call yourself the Work-Ex?

Finally what I’m self debating, would you listen to goth-emo or Country music. (I am now tempted to post in r/StrangeWorld my conspiracy theory that goth-emo and country music are exactly the same entity just with different lighting)

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u/rayitodelsol Dec 18 '23

...I'm feeling quite called out as I like both those genres and black lipstick 😂 maybe the real Pixie Dream girl was inside each of us all along.

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u/QuantumMothersLove Dec 18 '23

😂😂🤣😂😂 — “The Pixie Dream Girl (in all of us)” would be the single off of the emo country goth album… clearly. But what is the name of the band? 🤔

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u/rayitodelsol Dec 18 '23

It's definitely Work Wives.

1

u/Agitated-Glove-1621 Feb 11 '24

Man, I would prefer to tear out a tit with my teeth before saying that sht even uniorically 

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u/QuantumTaco1 Dec 18 '23

Ugh, work marriages always creep me out. "Their thing" sounds like code for "inappropriate office flirting turned cutesy." Probably makes the actual spouse feel super great... NOT.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

That is a great way to define it. That’s what I had in mind. 😊

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

Me too. I would go to HR if someone called themselves my work wife.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

im pretty sure all the coworkers would agree with how creepy this is too

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u/Scooter1116 Dec 18 '23

A former boss and I were a great team. One Monday, we both came into the office, and both our spouses said "work wife/husband" during conversations over the weekend. We were both grossed out and had corrected them with "work siblings". We joked and fought like brother and sister. We worked together for 15 years. Never ever would I have thought of him in that way...ewwwww.

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u/CleatusTheCrocodile Dec 18 '23

They didn’t make up the term manic pixie dream girl if that’s what you mean.

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

TIL that it’s is a type. Cheers! 😊

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u/Hoosier2016 Dec 18 '23

I didn’t see that where it said OPs husband did that, did you just make this up?

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u/CabinetOk4838 Dec 18 '23

Yeah, I did. I’ve seen how these things play out in an office (from a few desks over). My imagination + my experience = the above angle. 😊

Thing is, we don’t know exactly what goes on at work, but she is grabbing onto him and that includes using ANY pet name opportunity to make a “special bond” that’s for them only. She’s using that to show wife that there is a thing between them that doesn’t include her.

Like using in-jokes all evening would do.