I am surprised your husband didn’t take offense at this comment. I am assuming that the children in question are yours and hubby’s not step kids, and since they are half his flesh and blood he didn’t get a little put out at that comment.
I suppose Ms Prisspot with no manners keeps her kids locked in the house so they never play in the grass or dirt so they always look pristine? Kids will be kids. They get dirty. They wear out clothes and shoes. Thinking otherwise is unreasonable. Let them play for crying out loud. Let them get dirty. They are only children once and only for a very short time. Who cares if they aren’t winning the best dressed in school?
As for your spouse, let me ask you a question. If the shoe was on the other foot, taking all emotional response out, because remember you wouldn’t have been present during the original conversation. If your husband told you that a guy at work said such and such and all of you were really good friends, would you react as your husband and continue to speak with the guy or turn a cold shoulder?
My husband’s co-worker got really rude to me one day, to the point where I did not want him over to our house EVER again. My husband and the co-worker are almost best of friends, so I had no problem with hubby going over to co-workers house, I just didn’t want to put up with the smart ass anymore. They respected my wish not to be around the guy and after a year has gone by and the guy in question maturing a little bit, he has started coming over again.
Sorry you are having to deal with such a rude person. Just think of how miserable her life must be if she has to spend so much time worrying about what other people’s kids look like. Someone who obviously has too high an opinion of herself for sure.
Nope. I’m the same way. Sure, I agree that it needn’t be WW III, and the husband shouldn’t need to solicit an apology, but it’s still very odd that he is unwilling to try to see her side of things or care if his family was insulted.
I am also disturbed by the predominance of “bitchy wives”, e.g. Debra Romano, in our pop culture, but I don’t think the backlash should be “Eh-unless I’m in physical danger, don’t sweat supporting me, OK?”
That doesn’t sound healthy to me.
I also fully agree that it was, in fact, a nasty comment. Slob, defined by dictionary.com as “a person regarded as slovenly, crude, or obnoxious” is nothing if not an extreme insult in my book, especially, as mentioned, kids by nature are going to get dirty, especially if they’re at all happy and busy. That’s really the only flavor they come in, especially in the younger years.
Anyone who lives a life where that type of comment would be no big deal is light-years removed from my world.
Then again, I’m in the very polite South, where there’s no doubt that although such things would NEVER be said to someone’s face, they may certainly be uttered behind closed doors.
Forget to mention-I’m also wondering a bit about your husband’s motives. From where I’m sitting, it’s human nature to be a little put out if your family is insulted, and if he’s already stated that he doesn’t agree with her statement, what’s his motive? Simply believing that he has no dog in the fight as he says, or is it something more passive-aggressive? Is there any reason he’d take childish enjoyment in pissing you off?
Consider how he’d behave towards her if she said he was always a slob too. If he’d still be blowing sunshine up her a*s, well then fine, that’s just his nature. If it would give him pause, though, maybe he needs to consider why he only cares about his image and not yours.
(Not that I’m saying your hubby’s not a perfectly wonderful guy, outside of this incident!)
I don’t see how he doesn’t feel insulted too. She might as well have said to HIM “you are the kind of disgusting person who would marry a total slob who doesn’t take proper care of your children.” It’s a direct insult to HIM TOO!
If this happened to my wife, she wouldn’t have to tell me to stop being friends with the woman. More likely, she’d have to stop me from marching over to the woman’s house and giving her a piece of my mind.
Insulting a friend AND her children IN FRONT OF her children is way, way over the line. If I had a friend who did that to a total stranger in front of me I’d be bothered by it and would have to reconsider my friendship. It’s obnoxious behaviour.
But we do have to be careful making sweeping judgements here, because we don’t know the OP’s personal situation. Perhaps the comment was made in jest, and we’re not getting that sense. Perhaps her and her husband have been fighting, or she’s been controlling about his friends before, and he resents being told what to do. No offense, but we don’t know you or your family situation.
But it it came down exactly as you said, and there are no other extenuating circumstances, then I think your husband is out of line for maintaining the friendship. And you shouldn’t have had to ask him to stop. He should have figured that out on his own.
Not to be conspiratorial here, but is it possible that she and your husband are flirting? That would explain her hostility to you and your husband’s indifference to the offense. Please don’t get paranoid over this, but it would make the pieces fit together a bit better…
Well, I’m glad someone finally said it, because that’s the thought that’s been running through my mind the whole thread. Of course, I was married to a philanderer who would regularly tell me about people saying mean things about me behind my back (about my clothes, my hair, my weight). When I would ask him why he didn’t stand up for me, he would shrug and say it wasn’t his problem. What he meant was that he agreed with them, and valued them and their attention more than he valued me. And if I had wised up sooner, I would have realized that his attention towards other women wasn’t just politeness or neighborliness…he was hoping to get some.
I think the “icily polite” tack was the one he should have taken, at least for the first few times you two ran across her. For him to stop and talk to her while you walked on smacks of high-school break-up behavior. Unless he had a real pressing, official reason to speak to her, he should have taken your arm, given her a short, quick nod of acknowledgement and walked on. Even if he felt “hey, not my fight” he could have just given her a regretful shrug and passed by. But to stop and chat makes me wonder who the topic of conversation was after you’d gotten 20 feet away. It gave her a sense of power and even more superiority over you…“see, even dragonboy wasn’t upset with me, so he must agree that she’s a slob and a poor mother. He likes me better…nyah, nyah, nyah!”
That woman insulted not just your husband’s children, but his wife! He should have been every bit as hurt and dismayed as you were, and I would expect him to act accordingly. I don’t think it’s even a matter of you expecting him to snub someone else on your sayso, which would be questionable. She took it upon herself to publicly announce that his children were not presentable, nor was his wife. How would he react if she said that directly to him? Would she expect him to be chitty-chatty with her after that? I would think not.
Telling someone they and their family looks like a “slob” is someone who does not respect you, whether there’s any truth in it or not. And I know I would not want to associate with someone who would be so unkind and hurtful to my spouse.
Perhaps this obvious fact has just gone over his head. Do you have a mutual friend who might casually mention to him that it’s a real shame that Lady B has taken to talking so hurtfully about his family, when he and his beloved wife have always been so friendly towards her? Sounds like he needs the insult to be re-directly back at him in order for it to register.
a. If you drop a friend because they called you a slob, you’re a bit too uptight.
b. If you then insist that your husband drop this person as a friend, you’re too controlling.
Granted, he should’ve acknowledged your feelings. But if you presented it to him the way you did here (“That bitch insulted me, you will not be her friend anymore!”), I can’t blame him for his response.
I think that the dissenters here are focusing too much on the ‘You’re not the boss of me!’ angle. Look, it’s silly to say at once that he should naturally want to back her up if he loves her, and at the same time blame her for getting mad when he won’t.
I would back up my wife. Because I love her, respect her, and want her to be happy. Understanding that my continued socializing with her ‘enemy’ in front of her would cause her distress, I don’t think I could do it. Because I LOVE her. Causing her pain is a big no-no when it can be avoided easily. If I felt differently, I’d not be married to her. Nor would I expect her to remain married to me for long.
If you don’t respect the feelings of your spouse, this is BAD. If you are married to the sort of person whose feelings you feel free to disregard regularly (i.e. you think your wife is a crazy bitch), you’re both better off going your separate ways. Or else you have a much different definition of marriage than I do.
I’m also very suspicious of the importance of his relationship with this woman. Who is she to him when you are not around? Sounds fishy to me.
You all do realize that dragongirl’s relationship with this guy has been discussed in other threads, right? I’m too lazy to link but he’s not the most supportive type o’ guy. She can’t even tell him what she likes in bed because he’ll “feel bad”. He already “knows” what feels good to her, he’ll be damned if she says anything otherwise. He won’t stand up for her when his sisters insult her, he wants to stay “neutral”. This is really no different. I get the impression he doesn’t really care about her, her feelings don’t matter, in general.
He’s the “man”, and she should just be quiet and not give him any grief about how he lives his life. It’s not just this particular thread, she’s asked for advice several times recently. Now, I don’t know how they live day to day but something’s just not kosher, IMHO. I am not trying to blow this one incident out of proportion, btw. This is not his fight, true, but there is definately a general lack of a husband being supportive of his wife in this marriage. Those are his children, the woman insulted his family. He doesn’t care in any way, shape, or form? If he and the woman speak so candidly to each other, why wouldn’t he at least try to explain this to his wife as something these two people do and it’s no big deal? I’m not seeing much effort on his part but again, I’m only going off of the OP’s info.
It seems to me, this couple doesn’t really know each other the way they should. I try to make a point of talking to my prospective suitors to find out if we are mostly compatible. I’m weird that way.
Hmmm…based on Sanguine Spider’s post, I’m even more inclined to stand by my last post as well as echo kittenblue’s comments.
If that’s really the type of guy he is, sounds like he very well could have spoken to her for so long just to demean dragongirl.
In that case, I suppose asking him to respect her feelings in this case would be futile for the very reason that he would appear to take pleasure in making her uncomfortable, and calling attention to how to to that (e.g. who has insulted her) would just be an open invitation.
Listen, I don’t care where you live. For an AQUAINTANCE to say in casual conversation that you and your family are slobs, and suspiciously withhold your husband from that statement, is a little fishy. If she gets her jollies making fun of someone’s wife with him, she’s a sad, sad case.
By the way, it’s cracking me up how so many people here claim that it’s not much of an insult. I’m not buyin’ it, if you were in her position.
If the woman insulted your children, she also insulted your husband’s children. Anyone who insults your/your husband’s children should be treated with icy disdain until he/she apologizes. No, you are not asking too much of him. By continuing to be friendly to the woman, he is giving at least tacit permission/approval for her to continue saying insulting things about your/his children. There are cases where a married couple should present a unified front and not allowing your children to be insulted is one of them.
