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Miller238
member
Poll re:secrets
Miller238
member
If one of your best girlfriends told you a secret about herself and made you promise you wouldn't tell your husband (actually if she said "if you tell him, i will write you out of my life and never talk to you again"), would you tell him anyway?
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Re: Poll re:secrets
I think it depends... if it had something to do with something he might somehow be connected to (like friend cheated on her husband with one of DH's friends) probably not.
But, if it were something that DH would never, ever potentially be involved in a conversation about (like, friend is trying to get pregnant even though her husband doesn't want anymore kids yet and DH hasn't ever met friend or her husband)... then maybe
Hannah
This is one of those questions where the answer demands more information.
Why is she specifically mentioning the husband? Would husband really care about the secret? And would she ever really find out if you told him?
I tell my husband almost everything, but there are things about my friends that he would never care to know, and would forget 2 seconds after I told him. So unless the secret concerned him in some way, I would probably not tell him, unless I needed his advice/input on how to deal with said secret.
I think it's really important to keep secrets, as long as someone else isn't being hurt by them.
Tyler Anthony arrived on 9.21.09
The Chronicles of Justin and Tyler
It would damage her marriage. Put it that way.
If my husband was friends with her husband or we spent time together as couples, no, I probably wouldn't tell him. I wouldn't want him to have to choose between keeping my confidence or telling a friend something he ought to know about his marriage. Well, I guess if it had changed my opinion of my friend enough that I no longer wanted to spend time together as couples, then I might.
If she was primarily my friend and DH didn't spend a lot of time with her or know her husband that well, I would. My DH would never let anyone know he knew in that situation.
Either way, it's a crappy position for her to put you in. I would have a hard time keeping a secret from my husband, especially if it was something that was weighing heavily on my mind.
Photo by Melissa Nicole Photography
Honestly, my husband wouldn't leak a secret...no matter what. So in general I COULD tell him anything and it wouldn't matter. But in this case, if the secret would just give him a negative view of her I don't see the point in telling him. If you are having trouble deciding on how to deal with the secret, if it's bothering you, then I think it reasonable to want to talk to him about it. Eek, that's a tough one.
This is pretty much how I feel about it, too. Chances are, if it's something that can be viewed negatively by him, I likely feel the same way.
Tyler Anthony arrived on 9.21.09
The Chronicles of Justin and Tyler
I would definitely tell my husband. I literally cannot keep a secret from him but he is a vault so it works out nicely. He is also very non-judgemental and I cant really think of a time that he has negatively viewed one of my friends based on something I told him. Usually he says that there is probably some other side to the story that we dont know about....which is often true. In this situation, if it was something like-- say she cheated on her husband or was having a lesbian affair or something (haha random I know but you said it would negatively impact their marriage) I would definitely tell DH. It would put me in a moral position and chances are if DH would look down on this friend after learning it, I probably would be thinking the same thing and wouldnt be super concerned about maintaining a friendship with someone that 1. put me in that position and 2. was doing something I was really morally against.
Hmm writing this makes me sound like a craptastic friend which I promise I am not but I guess I am assuming worst case scenario kind of thing if there is that much secrecy surrounding it.
I ran in to this recently. And to be honest, it was the fact that she was cheating on her husband with her boss. My DH is not particularly close with either of them but he was never that fond of said friend either. i didn't tell him for a while knowing that it would make him not like her even more. I also thought that maybe this "fling" would be short lived so I wouldn't really "need" to tell him. Well, it wasn't so I told him and yes, he dislikes her even more but I understand why. I am still friends with her but she knows where I stand on the whole situation.
ITA.
I agree 100%.
Way too hard to answer without having all the deets so here are my *GENERAL* rules of thumb. Of course some situations require adjustment to the rules of thumb.
1. I give the side eye to anyone who *specifically* asks me to keep a secret from my spouse.
2. I believe people's privacy and confidences are important and should be respected. So as long as the secret is not something that would create a division or rift between DH and I then I will keep it.
3. If the secret were legal in nature, or I had reason to suspect someone was in danger, or it was morally complex enough that I needed to problem-solve through what I needed to do with the information or if I had to figure out if I had a moral or legal obligation to follow up with the information I might use DH as a sounding board although I would be more likely to call a fellow psychologist who is an unknown third party from the original secret teller.
4. I *generally* assume things said to me in one-on-one conversations are done so in confidence with the expectation that I not disclose that information to anyone else.
Interesting situation. I do not keep secrets from my husband but I do believe in keeping a best friends private life private. I do not feel like I have to tell DH everything my girlfriends say if it does not pertain to us directly. He could care less about the gossip really.
Also, does this change your thinking of her?
Same as above. If it was that she bought a pair of jeans that her H doesn't know about - something my H wouldn't care about & something that I don't care that much about either in truth - I probably wouldn't tell him.
But something big - life altering, marriage-damaging big - I don't think I could promise to keep it from my H. We just don't keep things from each other that way. I'm not sure I would run home and tell him "did you hear...!" in a gossipy way, but if it was that big, it would probably be on my mind. If it's bothering me - my H is the one I turn to to help me walk through things, get different perspective. I would need to talk to him about it and I would tell.
I have to say, though, I wouldn't be too worried about it damaging my H's opinion of her. If she's asking me to keep things from my H - she should be more worried about damaging my opinion of her. If she were cheating on her H or something like that - I couldn't support her. That's not something an adult does, IMO.
Been there, done that.
I've spilled the beans on 2 secrets to my DH about friends and he kinda already knew that they were those types of people, like they had it in them already, so it didn't really change his mind about them.
Like some of the pp's, he is my other half and keeps my own mind in check too. I agree that their secrets altered what I thought about them even more than what DH did too.
That said, my DH is the Ft. Knox of keeping secrets and would never spill to anyone.
ITA.
Yes