How would you feel if your partner wanted to take a trip with a member of the opposite sex?

lol heh, look at it this way. If he wants to cheat on you during his vacation, it doesn’t really matter if his gale pal comes along or not.

My advice, have a chat about it, tell him what has you concerned, make sure he knows you do trust him, and then listen to his side. outside of that, you can’t tell him not to take a trip.

We’ve done that, but I don’t agree with it happening. What if it were your girlfriend? Am I crazy to even have a problem with this?

Sounds dubious to me. By any chance, is this other state called Argentina?

I would not be ok with this. But that’s just me.

weird. my real name is Janet.

@shilolo Could you elaborate? I hope it isn’t!

@jonsblond He sees this as a non-issue. My heart feels it is a big one.

@lucyrandom Surely.

I’d be nervous about it, but that’s part of a relationship I guess. you’re not always going to know for sure. A tricky idea, trust is.

@shilolo I meant regarding what you meant by it being dubious. Did you mean it is doubtful this is an issue? I was confused.

I mean, dubious in that I don’t think this is a normal trip, or normal behavior. You are right to be concerned.

Edit: What @jonsblond said below.

You’re in a long distance relationship and your partner gets to vacation for a week. If I were your partner, that vacation would be spent with you. Not Janet.

@shilolo Gotcha.

@jonsblond That thought did cross my mind, but he is going to a place he hasn’t been in a while and I am fine with him going there. It was originally supposed to be a guy friend of his, but this guy friend may not be able to go and he invited Janet. I wondered why he would even invite Janet. Why not invite another guy friend. Unfortunately, I’m really looking for either a way I can explain this to him and he will understand and not take her, or to see if maybe I’m just being silly.

Long-distance relationship?
If that’s the case, why would he go to another state to sleep with somebody?

Sometimes, people are genuinely friends with the opposite gender.

@Sarcasm Janet lives in the same state he does. They’ve been friends for a long time. I believe it is a genuine friendship, but I don’t think a vacation for two is a smart choice to make when you’re in a serious relationship.

I’m not the jealous type but I wouldn’t be okay with that. He could have at least told me first that his guy friend backed out and that he is thinking of inviting a girl to come along with him instead. I mean, he could have at least considered how you would feel. Plus, how come he has never mentioned Janet before and suddenly they’re so buddy-buddy that they’re even travelling together?!? I’d be concerned.

On the other hand, if your boyfriend wanted to cheat on you, it really won’t need a trip to do that since, like you’ve said, they are in the same state.

I guess you should just let your boyfriend know how you feel about this…

I agree with jonsblond—he has a week’s vacation, and is not spending it with you, but with another woman? Unless you’re in the military and are off limits, why isn’t he spending his vacation with you? Are you sure you’re in a relationship? And is he in the same relationship that you are?

I’d be fine with it. If you trust your partner, he’s been friends with her forever, I see no reason not to trust him.

He’s probably not seeing it as an intimate getaway, but as a vacation with his friend. If they’ve really been friends for a long time, that’s probably all he sees her as—he can’t even imagine seeing her as something more.

Anyway, you say you trust him, so trust him! Following that with “but I know nothing about Janet” does yourself a disservice. You trust your boyfriend, he trusts Janet, accordingly, unless your boyfriend has horrible taste in personal relationships (in which case that says something about you as well), it should be fine.

I have to cast my vote in with the “I would NOT be okay with it” lot.

And regarding him seeing it as a “non-issue,” whether he sees it as non-issue or not is irrelevant—his partner, his girlfriend, the persopn he is in a relationship with, sees it as an issue, so if he genuinely cares about and respects you, it should be important to him, too.

I would not be in a relationship with someone who would rather spend time with someone else (be it a man or a woman) when we live far apart. I would expect him to want to see me more than anything. Who youre with is much more important than where you are- meaning I would rather be with the one I love in a crappy town than be without them while laying on a sandy beach. His vacation should be spent with you.
Like others have said, if he wants to cheat on you he will no matter if he’s across town or across country. This whole situation wouldn’t fly in my book, but I also have really high (some might say rediculous) standards. I expect to be treated well, therefore I am.

Long distance relationships can be hard, It sounds like it is a convenience for him. If he doesn’t consider your feelings about this it seems like he is not real invested in the relationship. If it were me, this would be a deal breaker.

whether or not there is anything in it, I think he should be a bit more concerned about the sort of message he is sending to you by going on a holiday with another woman… like jonsblond…why wouldn’t he spend the time to come and see you or invite you instead?

I’d be well pissed off regardles of how much i trusted him – I don’t think that comes into it

@lynneblundell ; Like mom used to say, “the appearance of impropriaty.” I’m quoting my Mom a lot today!

This isn’t so much an issue of trust, it boils down to your feelings and the oddness of situation.

In my relationship, I’ve gotten heat for just talking to old female acquaintances or taking a vacation with other guy friends. I feel those things are okay but obviously my partner didn’t. I would categorize that behavior as paranoid/crazy/jealous since those are things normal people do and her insecurities were just getting the best of her.

When it comes to someone of the opposite sex, when you’re in a long distance relationship especially… taking a whole week off to hang out with this person is really sketchy.

It would be entirely different if you lived in the same state, lived together, he had a vacation planned with his guy friend, then he asked you if it would be okay to take his friend Jennifer (who of course you would know)

I’d say being concerned is extremely okay in this situation.

Nope, not going to happen.

I wouldn’t be ok with that, but I was in a similar situation a little over a year ago. My babe took a previously planned (i.e. before we were together) cruise with a woman. And she was (and still is) in love with him. I hated it, but there was nothing I could do. I just had to trust him.

Maybe you can just ask him about the trip. Why they’re going. When it was planned, etc.

@Facade ; I can’t believe you stayed with him. I would NEVER put up with that!!

You’re in a long-distance relationship. If he wanted to cheat on you, he could be screwing a different woman every night of the week. Why do you trust him to behave well under those circumstances, and then, when he says he’s going on a vacation with Janet, you get suspicious?

What’s the difference between trusting him to not cheat on you with a coworker that he never mentioned to you, and trusting him to not cheat on you with a friend that he actually mentioned to you and told you he was going on vacation with?

@cwilbur ; Sometimes philanderer’s de-sensitize their victims over time. If she will accept “this” then it only makes since she should accept “that.” When I was 19 I dated a guy who was much older and manipulated me into thinking all kinds of things were acceptable. In retrospect I am pretty appalled at myself for not realizing how I was being manipulated.

@Judi Calm down, he’s a great guy. He made sure the reservations were changed so they had separate rooms. Nothing happened.

@Facade ; you are much more understanding than me :-)

I’m not, really. If it were any other man, things would have been different.

I don’t see this as a good thing. I would be upset if my wife did this, especially if I didn’t know the other guy. But since she already knows me well enough to know what I would and would not put up with, its not an issue for us.

But I would be thinking that something else is going on. He should be vacationing with you, not some long-time friend.

If my soon-to-be wife wasn’t someone I could trust, then she wouldn’t be my soon-to-be wife.

But then, we live near each other and see each other every day. If I was in a relationship that didn’t allow that I would be pretty disappointed that she didn’t choose to spend the week with me instead.

@Judi: I think long-distance relationships are crazy to begin with—I don’t see what the qualitative difference is between not trusting him to not cheat with an unnamed coworker and not trusting him to cheat with a named friend.

I think the assumption that he’s philandering is completely unsupported. The fact that he’s going on vacation with another female friend instead of his girlfriend means the relationship probably isn’t that healthy or that high a priority for him, but hey, it’s a long-distance relationship—it has two strikes against it from the start.

Thanks for all the responses. Instead of answering everyone individually, let me clarify things.

Originally it was him and Joe. He invited a few other friends, Janet happened to be the only girl. Everyone else invited, including Janet, said no. He never told me he had invited anyone else. Now Joe may not be able to go, which I was told last night. Also last night he said Janet may be going. I was shocked since he hadn’t mentioned inviting her. If it was a group going, I’d be better with it. Janet has a boyfriend, he has never met, and school. I don’t see how she can take a week off to go since she has classes. I also don’t see how her boyfriend is ok with this. I don’t know if he is or not. Why not let the boyfriend go, too? That’s going to be what I say to him. He wants to go to the state, which is fine with me. I do wish he’d come see me instead, but he may be moving here shortly after he gets back from this trip.

I wish he hadn’t invited her. Now I don’t know what to do. I do trust him, but this is a bit of a challenge to my trust when it doesn’t need to be. I plan on showing him this question at some point in hopes he can see my side. He thinks it isn’t a big deal and immediately got angry when I said it was.

I wouldn’t like the idea at all unless I knew more about Janet and felt they were only platonic friends. I’m a female and have many male friends I have taken platonic jaunts with, hardly ever thinking about what it looks like to other people but I’m sure some think it’s odd.

HELL NO! Sorry. Even if you trust that person the other persons MORALS or MOTIVE might not be in the same… each couple is different… but I think precaution is IMPORTANT in protecting eachother. My husband and I have a pact NEVER to drink without eachother :) We are both LOYAL… we just would never put ourselves in any type of questionable scenario… that others would judge even if we were BEING EXTREMLY PLATONIC with the opposite sex.

My wife has a long time good friend. If she went out of town I would trust her, but I would not trust him. Think about it, if he is going to cheet he will anyway, sooner or later. Good Luck.

It seems very fishy to me for a long distance relationship when he has a vacation he can’t either bring you to see him, or come to see you. I would be so jealous.

I absolutely would not be okay with this. Like people who have posted before, I am not sure why he wouldn’t want to come be with you. I could see if possibly the trip was arranged before the two of you were together then maybe, and yes it is perfectly possible for men to be JUST friends with women, buuuuut there is something weird about this situation. I’m not trying to create more paranoia, but I was engaged at one time and my fiance went on a week long vacation with another girl and he came back and told me he was calling the whole thing off and moving to Chicago to live with her…all in a weeks time. He then later got her knocked up… I just know I wish I would have listened to my gut when I had the chance. So if you feel uneasy enough about it and all these people are telling you you are not wrong then maybe you should bring it up to him in a more serious way.

@Allibaby808: Do you think he wouldn’t have left you if he’d not gone on the trip for some reason? The trip probably just saved time. It’s nothing against you, but a man who is willing to stray will stray and a man who isn’t won’t.

Yes you are right I think eventually it would have probably happened anyway looking back on it. To the poster: You have to be able to trust what you feel is right. Maybe a good way to go about it is if he does go on the trip, after he comes back see if he wouldn’t like to have the two of you meet.

It’s really fishy that this is a guy trip, and then all of a sudden Janet is the only other person going. If you knew Janet and her boyfriend, it would be okay, but it sounds like you’re getting second hand information…

Why isn’t he coming to see you if he has time off?

i would talk to him about it. i’m female and my best friend is male so for me it would be something completely normal and i wouldn’t even THINK of cheating with him. but thats just the relationship we have, i guess everyones different but i do think guys n girls can just be friends :)

I’m putting in my vote for “not being okay with it”. My concerns have already been brought up in this thread (him not coming to see you, how would she be able to do this as she’s so busy (and if she actually sat down and made the time, I’d say THAT’S suspicious), how he’s brushing off something that obviously matters to you), but since you may be showing this thread to him, I though I might chime in and add my voice, if only so there’d be another “No, she’s not crazy.” message.

Another thing to consider: Perhaps it’s one of those crush things. Either she has a crush on him or he on her. Yes, if he’s a cheater he’ll cheat, and if he won’t, he won’t, but if he or she are one of those people who aren’t firmly planted in one or the other, this trip may be a deciding factor. I’m not trying to be pessimistic, I’m trying to look at it objectively. (Trust me; I can come up with worse scenarios.)

Wow! great question! I would feel extremely wary about this situation. Did you two establish conditions or boundaries when y’all agreed to try to maintain a long-distance relationship? This topic of “apparent relationship with a woman you don’t know” sounds like something that needs a lot of talking out.

It would put an interesting twist on the situation if, despite calling yourself “Lucy”, you were actually male. In any case, i think this “partner”‘s got a lot of “splainin’” to do!