Do I have the right to be upset?

So here it goes. I am 37 years old and have been married for only 4 years. I was a single mom before that. My husband is only 32 years old and is an over the road trucker.

I have a 19 year old sister that my husband seems to be extremely close to. He actually took her on the road with him at one point to bring her back to where we live to visit with us and her friends (her and my parents moved to another state). I have found what I believe to be inappropriate messages between the two of them, inappropriate pictures, and when she is around he hovers around her.

The inappropriate messages are messages that sound like flirting. My truck misses you being in it, you are good cuddler, beautiful, sexy, etc. Then there are the sexual innuendos (could be something else) which I can not post on here. He talks to her while on the road more than he talks to me or my children (his step-children). He talks behind my back about me with her. He has several pictures of her on his phone from when she was on the truck with him (most were taken by her).

One particular picture was her in a costume that looked like lingerie and she was posing in a sexy way. I have confronted him about this and have told him how it makes me feel and why it makes me feel this way, but he still chalks it off as me just being a jealous person (which I am). I try to explain to him how it looks and all I get our excuses or maybe they are the truth. He told me she wanted him to take the picture so that she could send it to her boyfriend, however, it was not sent to her boyfriend, I checked.

He says that he compliments her because she has him believing that she has really low self-esteem (which she does not) and he is just trying to make her feel better, he worries about her because she cuts herself and he worries that she is going to really hurt herself. He says that the innocent flirting is because everyone assumes that something is going on between them and they think it is funny so they make sexual jokes.

My sister is a master manipulator. She likes to make people think that she has had this horrible life (which she has not), that she is the nicest person in the world and everyone is out to get her. She has my husband believe that she is the innocent victim and everyone else is mean and hateful to her. He tells her everything (including what I say about her) and goes to her when he is having a bad day.

To me he treats her more like his wife than he treats me. I have very low self-esteem especially since I put on the extra weight since we first got together 6 years ago. I try not to worry about him and her, but it is hard when I want him to do those things and say those things to me.

Am I wrong for feeling this way? Am I blowing things out of proportion? Should I be concerned?

Wow, what a difficult situation you are in. This would make me really uncomfortable as well. In my opinion, even if nothing is going on, the fact that it makes you uncomfortable should be enough for your husband to respect that and change the way he interacts with her. I know you have tried talking with your husband about it, but have you brought it up with your sister? Maybe if you explain how the situation looks from your perspective, she will take that into account during her interactions with him. It could just be that they both like the attention and weren't really thinking about how that would affect other people. Good luck, I hope you figure things out.

The foundation of every relationship should include honesty, communication and trust. Without these, most relationships don't work for the better. I truly feel for you and I understand that you have the right to be jealous especially since you have seen and felt things a wife would feel when her husband is out with her own sister who's much younger. A woman's intuition is never wrong. The situation you're in is really hard and no woman should ever go through that. I hope you could also talk it out with your sister and confront her about what her actions make you feel.

I think that your husband's excuses are kind of lame and far from what is really going on. Always remember that you should love yourself first before anyone else. The truth will always find a way to come out, sometimes it blows up right in our faces, most times it's right under our noses but we keep denying the truth simply because it hurts. Take care of yourself and your children. You are important, especially to your kids. I hope you figure things out and everything turns out for the better.

Thank you so much for that reply. As far as talking to my sister that is a no go, but I do talk to my mother and she talks to my sister. I am trying to work on loving myself, that's one of my resolutions. I am going to see what happens, not worry about it anymore, and not bring it up to him anymore. I have no physical proof that there is something to worry about so I am just gonna try and leave it alone. Well, I may talk to him one more time about it. Maybe try and get him to understand that what he is showing me is that he no longer loves me because if he did then he would change the behavior to prevent from hurting me further. I do feel a little better about things today, but I will try to remember to post here if anything changes. Thank you for your advice and kindness.

You are better than me. I would have gone off. There should be no reason...and I mean NO reason those pictures and that behavior should be going on. I have 2 sisters and let my man have something like that. I don't hold back, I am blunt and bold. I would be demanding answers. If I didn't get them, I would leave.

I'm not sure where the confusion is, personally. I don't think the behaviour could be anymore obvious without you walking in on them. Put it this way; would you do ANY of this to him? Would you be telling his brother he is a good cuddler if you'd never cuddled with him? Would you take inappropriate pictures of him? Basically, would you behave as his girlfriend if you weren't his girlfriend? If not, why not? Because you love your husband? Because you're committed to him? Because you're mature and loyal? Why are you okay with any less from him? Why the excuses? He's not acting like a real man or husband. In my opinion, there is no confusing any of it. You're making excuses on the way off chance he's being honest. But even if he's telling you the truth, his truth is sketchy too. At the very least.. the VERY least, he's flirting with her to make her feel better about herself. No committed husband does that and it makes no sense. And although your sister should know better and she's being really shady.. it's your husband at fault for any wrong doing in the marriage, not her. He's the one who stood by your side and promised a long life of NOT this. And you haven't even shared everything that's going on because I'm assuming it gets more inappropriate.

You're worth so much more than this. Whether you stay or go is nobody's business but your own. That's fully your choice.. but please don't allow him to confuse you anymore. Everyone deserves to be secure in their relationship and everyone should live in a way that allows that.. whether it's leaving or staying and demanding the respect and relationship you deserve. If you're going to stay, stand up for yourself and your sanity. No real husband acts like this.. believe in that and stop letting him turn the tables on you.

While I realize that there are undoubtedly going to be people telling you that you need to trust him, (and her for that matter) I think that after everything you've said here that you found like the messages, etc. (In my mind, there's NO mistaken identity with things like 'good cuddler" "sexy" and the other things you mentioned) that I'd not really give him/them an opportunity to make excuses. Sounds rather cut and dried to me.

By my way of thinking, sure we need to trust *until* it's shattered, and then it is often foolish and turning a blind eye if we refuse to see what's biting us in the backside. If it's not our *own* relationship, it's easy to say "oh yeah, trust him" to someone else.

I've found out in life that patterns like this continue. It's rarely a one-time thing. I respect myself more than to be a player in THAT game.

So, I wanted to add to my last post. I read this to my fiancé who immediately said they have something going on. He said he has never even thought to disrespectful like that. I am sorry your husband is doing this to you. I know denying it may seem easier, but do you really want to be with someone like that...let alone let your kids look up to someone like that!?

Laurelbell85 said:
You are better than me. I would have gone off. There should be no reason...and I mean NO reason those pictures and that behavior should be going on. I have 2 sisters and let my man have something like that. I don't hold back, I am blunt and bold. I would be demanding answers. If I didn't get them, I would leave.

That's exactly how I feel. This is serious. A husband and a sister are very important people in a woman's life and if they are upsetting you like this, the problem has to be resolved. I would confront them together and see how they react. If you sister is manipulating your husband and he is blindly falling for it, then maybe you need to cut these people off. You don't need this kind of drama in your life. Be there for yourself and your kids.

There is no manipulating a man into cheating on his wife. I think we should make that clear before more excuses are made and he gets off the hook as a victim. It's the absolute EASIEST thing in the world for me to not cheat on my husband or be innapropriate with other men in any way because I respect him and could never ever hurt him. There is no respect if you make a conscious choice to hurt the person you're supposed to love most in the world. No excuses. He's either cheating or he isn't, and if he is, he's choosing that. All on his own.

JosieP is right... 100% right. This is not a victim whether or not the sister initiated anything. He took her on trips, he sent inappropriate messages and texts, he compliments her, he flirts with her, he "tells her everything." There is no WAY this dude is an innocent bystander who fell into a trap.

The danger I see here is that he'll pull the age-old cheater stunt and come home with candy and flowers and empty promises to "never do it again." Maybe some tears. The pattern is always the same for cheaters and abusers.

I just couldn't allow such poison into my life... from *either* of them... I respect myself, AND my child, too much.

Thank you for all your posts. It has all completely stopped. My sister no longer allows him to talk to her in that way and I was able to get him to see what it was doing to our marriage, me, and the kids. He also is quite aware that I will not allow this to happen again and if he does something like this again without taking my feelings into consideration that I will not hesitate to leave. We had a very long conversation regarding all of this without any interruptions. Again, thank you so much for your responses. They really shined a light on everything. I believe in working things out in a marriage. I took a vow for better or worse and I intend to stick to that until I have tried everything to work it out. That does not mean that I will sit back and allow my husband to mistreat me in anyway. It just means that I take my vows seriously and I refuse to give up on my husband because I married him for a reason and that person is still in there.

Absolutely!! You should be concerned and this is not to scare you or to make you sad. It is better to know than be a fool and these are obvious signs that your husband has little to no respect for his wife whatsoever. He should not be going to any female or male for that matter discussing private issues between the two of you. That is on another level, and even if they are just innocently doing these flirtatious things, it shows lack of respect for you on both their parts. I think you should do some undercover snooping to see what is really going on because it seems you are in the dark and need to be brought to the light. The issue about sexy pictures of your sister in his phone is an absolute no-no. That is very unacceptable and I really wish you the best in this situation and hope you get down to the truth and set these two straight because the level of disrespect is uncanny.

kacalhoun said:
Thank you for all your posts. It has all completely stopped. My sister no longer allows him to talk to her in that way and I was able to get him to see what it was doing to our marriage, me, and the kids. He also is quite aware that I will not allow this to happen again and if he does something like this again without taking my feelings into consideration that I will not hesitate to leave. We had a very long conversation regarding all of this without any interruptions. Again, thank you so much for your responses. They really shined a light on everything. I believe in working things out in a marriage. I took a vow for better or worse and I intend to stick to that until I have tried everything to work it out. That does not mean that I will sit back and allow my husband to mistreat me in anyway. It just means that I take my vows seriously and I refuse to give up on my husband because I married him for a reason and that person is still in there.

I am so happy to hear you both had a really great conversation. I wish you both the best of luck in your future. I'm happy your sister backed off as well. I have to commend you on sticking through your marriage and working on things. Not a lot of people do that, and I feel that is a huge reason our divorce rate is so high. People don't uphold their vows anymore, and when things get rough, they find it easier to just bail and move on. Please keep up posted! I hope everything works out for the absolute best.

I think you are right to be upset. Have you tried talking to your sister about it? May be it's high time that you talk to her and explain your concerns and how all this is affecting your relationship. If things don't improve then consider breaking off all contacts with her.

I believe you have every right to be upset. Whether there is something going on or not makes no difference. If you have told your husband how this makes you feel then he should respect your feelings and stop doing the things he is doing. As for your sister, she must not think too highly of family for her to be able to do this to you. I cannot imagine ever doing this to someone in my family or even to my friends. Your husband is supposed to be someone who you can confide in, to tell them your feelings, and not have to worry about being blown off. The same goes double for family. I am very sorry for what you are going through and I hope that your situation gets better for you. I do not even know what I would do in your situation.

If this was me, I would have packed up and left. A relationship has to be built on respect, honesty and trust. After reading those messages, I wouldn't be sure if I would be able to trust again. And being that it involves a family member as well, makes it even more difficult to stomach. For one, siblings should never cross that line with your husband. That is disrespectful. Second, your husband has some nerve to not only put you through this situation but also ruin the relationship you have with your sister. If you respect yourself enough, then you should remove yourself from this situation.

We teach people how to treat us by what we are willing to put up with. He is showing an incredible lack of respect for your marriage and you. Of course, you have a right to be upset! He sounds like the type of man who is going to keep pushing to see how much he can get away with. Put your foot down and be strong.

It's one thing to think it's wrong for your sister to act the way she acts around your husband but come on your husband is an adult who knows what's right from wrong he has the ability to make the correct decision and chooses not to. When it comes down to it it all comes down to respect and both your sister and your husband have no respect consideration for your feelings. I suggest you have a serious talk with the both of them.

kacalhoun said:
Thank you for all your posts. It has all completely stopped. My sister no longer allows him to talk to her in that way and I was able to get him to see what it was doing to our marriage, me, and the kids. He also is quite aware that I will not allow this to happen again and if he does something like this again without taking my feelings into consideration that I will not hesitate to leave. We had a very long conversation regarding all of this without any interruptions. Again, thank you so much for your responses. They really shined a light on everything. I believe in working things out in a marriage. I took a vow for better or worse and I intend to stick to that until I have tried everything to work it out. That does not mean that I will sit back and allow my husband to mistreat me in anyway. It just means that I take my vows seriously and I refuse to give up on my husband because I married him for a reason and that person is still in there.

I'm so glad this all worked out for you. It sounds like you were completely justified in feeling the way you did, and you handled it exactly the way you needed to. Still, I'd keep an eye on things. If your sister's a master manipulator, she may try something like this again once things cool off. As for him giving her rides again, I'd say forget it. Buy her a bus ticket next time. You've got to protect your marriage, and it's so easy for things to happen, even when the people involved may not necessarily be looking for it to happen.

Also, just as a suggestion, could your husband maybe get a local driving job? My husband was OTR before we got married, and I know how hard it is. Now he drives local. He doesn't make as much, but he's here a lot more, and that's worth the trade-off, as far as I'm concerned.

Wishing you the best!