My wife’s best friend who I will call Sarah moved in with us about 1 month ago after her husband had her arrested for getting physical with him and scratching his face.  I have been a mutual friend with both Sarah and her husband that I will John.  Our kids are friends and we would often get the families together.  We have been put in the middle of the feud.  John has a restraining order out on Sarah and the only way she gets to see the kids is supervised visitation.  John listed my wife as the person that has to be present while her kids visit in 3 hour time blocks.  I thought it was weird that John only listed my wife on there considering I am the only one (between my wife and I) that directly communicates with him (text and calls).  John and my wife were always cordial to one another but between all 4 of us, they are the only two that had no real friendship.  My wife is prettier than Sarah, and I have caught John staring at my wife’s chest and ass in the past. It never bothered me.  During one of John and Sarah’s last fights, he said that Sarah’s face looked much older than my wife’s (both are very into skincare and anti-aging, so this really pissed Sarah off).  John is an incredibly controlling husband that treated Sarah very poorly and my wife has always said that he is such an asshole and that she can’t stand him.

This is where things began to get weird…

After Sarah moved in, John continued to call me to discuss his wife.   My wife told me that I was being too kind to him after the way he has treated her so poorly over the years, and having her arrested.   My wife told me that it was time to choose a side (Sarah’s) and to stop talking with John.  She told me I was two faced for continuing to speak with him.  She called him Satan because he was already running around with a few different women and their kids, all while taunting her in various ways and trying to destroy her life.    Suddenly John starts reaching out to my wife to schedule visitations with their kids based on my wife’s schedule.  He could’ve listed both of us on the supervision list but he only put my wife.   I suspect that he felt like it would lead to an open line of communication between the two of them(previously my wife didn’t even have his number in her phone) My wife acted very annoyed that she was put in that position because he never asked beforehand.. basically if Sarah wanted to see her kids, my wife would need to be involved.  Here is where things got weird…

We had a birthday party for one of our daughters and we invited his kids to her party.  He brought the kids and oddly stayed in the area with his youngest and waited around, but didn’t join the party.  Later that day I sent him a text thanking him for the gifts they got.  The next morning(Mother’s Day), one of the first things my wife does is send him a thank you text that I felt was a “gushing” thank you.   It was weird to me that he was not only the first thank you text that she sent, but she only sent 3 out of the 8-9 parents that were there. 

Is this thank you a bit much?

“We had the gifts mixed up but Sarah later clarified the gifts with the flower wrapping paper were from y'all! But as you can see, she loved them.
Thank you very much for going out of your way to get them and for bringing the kids out to celebrate with Tara(our daughter) and waiting so patiently with jane(his youngest daughter). It meant so much to us!”

Here was my thank you the night before …

“Thanks a lot for all the stuff for Tara.  She loved it all.  You got much more than you should’ve”

John’s reply to my wife’s thank you text and then wishing her happy Mother’s Day.

“You are so welcome, a bit sad we were not able to be there as a complete family. Praying next year is different.”

“Happy Mothers Day, the kids and Dave are so blessed to have you.” (Clearly a compliment to her and a dig at his wife)

My wife’s reply…

Sunday 1:56 PM
Thank you! I am sorry for leaving you hanging about today. Would you like to plan for around 430-730? We are getting a slow start and I
just hoped to go to the beach for a little bit.

(She just says thank you?  I would’ve thought she would’ve also said that their kids are blessed to have her best friend as a mom as well)

-John’s reply-
That sounds perfect. See you then.
Sunday 2:58 PM

(Sarah then sent a screenshot of the family app that they are legally allowed to communicate on.  She told him that he was intruding on my wife’s Mother’s Day, and it was stressing my wife out, which was true.  After seeing what Sarah told John, my wife felt compelled to reach back out to John with the following…

“Hey John. I'm not stressed. It just took forever to get the kids ready and out”

Keep in mind that he has repeatedly verbally abused her friend, has been hanging out with other woman, kicked her out of her house without her belongings, reported her to the state licensing board for her “arrest” and caused her license to be suspended, told her that he hope she died during an upcoming surgery she was supposed to have, and insulted her by implying that she was a harm to her kids and her best friend needed supervision during the time she spent with her kids… I was called “two faced” and told I was betraying Sarah, simply because I would answer John’s calls and texts.

We get home and John brings his kids over with a Mother’s Day plant and card (same ones, for my wife and Sarah).  I thought this was weird and another way of slighting at Sarah, putting the two of them on the same level.   The next day, my wife (who doesn’t garden) was watering the plants and walking around with the plants looking for a place to plant them.  (I mentioned to Sarah that my wife watered the plants and she seems very surprised and upset that she did that, considering it was intended to be a slight to her.).  I was very surprised considering our 9-year-old got her a plant from Lowe’s a year or two ago and she simply let it dry out and die on the counter (never watering it) which really hurt our daughters feelings….

Two days later I looked at my wife’s messages with John and was very surprised.  My wife knew I had looked at her phone and sent me a nasty text to stay off of it.  I told her that I was surprised that she was being so chummy with John considering how he has been treating Sarah, and had previously called me “two faced” for continuing to talk to John.   I told her that her thank you to John was “gushing” and clearly made him feel good as he gave her a compliment about how blessed we were to have her immediately after that.  I told her I was also surprised that she didn’t just have me tell him thank you considering she knows we talk and are friends.    My wife got really mad and said she did nothing wrong and called me a jealous psycho.   She said she would show the thread to Sarah because she had nothing to hide and did nothing wrong. I told her that I would strongly advise against it because I think it would hurt Sarah’s feelings and cause her to be upset with my wife.   My wife continued to call me a lot of mean names and told me I needed professional mental help.  She then changed the password on her phone.  She then told Sarah that it would prob be best for her and John to coordinate through the app because I was acting very bothered by her talking to John (implying jealousy).

My wife and I began talking about the situation again yesterday and I told her that I wasn’t dwelling on it but wish she would acknowledge the inappropriateness of the conversation, considering the circumstances. She refused and again began calling me a psycho that is destroying her life.   I told her that if she felt like it was a completely appropriate conversation, then she should show Sarah. She refused.  She then sends me the following :

“I deleted his thread and his contact information. Accidentally called his number while I was trying to figure out how and immediately hung up. I’m sure you’ll say I called him on purpose. I have a screenshot of the thread so you won’t accuse me of trying to get rid of evidence.”

As it turned out, she didn’t have a screenshot of the thread.  I found it very odd that she deleted the conversation (she did it during this last argument we were having about the appropriateness of it and telling her to show Sarah..

The other things that bothered me was that I wrote a kind Mother’s Day message on her Facebook, which she saw but never acknowledged on Facebook or said anything to me, and she completely ignored my happy birthday post to our daughter on Facebook.   She was so quick to acknowledge the person she called “Satan” but not to her husband.   I am considering the possibility that I am overly sensitive these days.   My wife just went through a real bad case of postpartum rage where she was verbally abusive toward me and I genuinely felt like she hated me. It has left me with what she believes to be ptsd and says she feels very badly about it.  It was the worst thing I have ever experienced and it nearly ended our family.   Am I over-reacting or was my wife out of line?

Why did she delete the thread when I pressed her to show Sarah?

Was her thank you “gushing” and a bit much, considering the circumstances?

Is my wife really the one that’s two faced?

What should I make of John’s actions with my wife?  Should it rub me the wrong way!?

Was telling my wife that we were so lucky to have her flirtatious and should she have replied that they were blessed to have Sarah!?

Would Sarah be hurt by my wife’s conversation with her husband?

Why did my wife feel so anxious to be the one to thank him for the gifts directly and praise him for coming and telling him it meant so much that he brought the kids and waited around?

Thanks in advance