ending coworker A

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-30-2004
ending coworker A
13
Sat, 07-31-2004 - 11:20pm
Hi,

I am new to this board although I have posted at the My Affair board in the past. I have been having an A with a coworker for three years now. We were close friends as well as coworkers for the past 15 years, but the physical part of the A began three years ago.

I have been married for 27 years and my OM is married also. My marriage had become very complacent with my H paying little attention to me I felt and I responded to the attention I received each day from the OM. We are very compatible, in fact some people at work have said they think we must have been married to one another in a previous life. The OM and I have been such close friends for so long, that I think this has kept people from suspecting that we are actually having an A. Although, I may just be fooling myself on that.

My point, I suppose in posting here, is to see if there is anyone out there who has successfully ended an A with a coworker yet still been able to continue to work together. My OM and I work side by side in cubicles. He is not my superviser, we have very similar positions. My H and I have worked on our marriage throoughout the past three years and I am much happier at home and would not want to hurt my H for the world. However, I still find that I cannot make myself walk into that office and tell my OM that I cannot and will not be with him any more. I have tried several times during the past year, once when he was out of work for six weeks on medical leave and I thought the separation time would be a good time to end it and give us both space, but he always manages to win me back and break down my good resolutions.

I have been told that having no contact is the only sure way to end these things, and that if I valued my marriage I would do this even if it meant leaving my job.

This may be true, but in practical terms, easier said than done. I am 49 years of age and have a very good job with a good income and I love my job. It would be extremely hard to find another like it. I work in the same department as my H, although we work in different buildings, so I would have to have a very good explanation for wanting to quit my job. My H knows I love my job.

I care deeply for my OM too. When we began the intimate part of the A it was with the understanding that we would remain friends even when one of us felt it was time to end the A. I guess the bottom line is that maybe I'm not as ready to end it as I think or I would have the strenth to just say "no" and really stick with it, but that constant contact, eight hours a day five days a week, makes it so hard. It's like having two H's, my work H and my H at home.

Does that sound crazy?

Has anyone been in this work place situation and if you ended it, how did you do it? Any advice will be welcome.

And yes, I know now why I always heard it was a huge mistake to have a work place A. It most definitely is.

Thanks for any help you all might offer.

IP

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iVillage Member
Registered: 05-02-2004
Tue, 08-03-2004 - 12:15pm
Dear iv,

Seems to me that you have been contemplating on ending it for several weeks by the thread you started mid July:


http://messageboards.ivillage.com/n/mb/message.asp?webtag=iv-rlending&msg=13787.1

So, how do you know it's time? YOU already know the answer to that. Just do it. No better time than the present. Don't you think it's time to get on with your life? YOUR life? Not his, not what was, not what will never be, BUT what you can do right now to liberate yourself from the hold that only YOU allow this man to have on you.

Today is a new day. Come out of the dark and move into the light. Good luck.

True

 

 

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-07-2004
Tue, 08-03-2004 - 2:30pm
b true,

Yes, I have been thinking about stopping this for a while now.

I have quit smoking, and that was simple for me. See, I wasn't addicted!

I know that I can do it - it's just going to be hard. Probably one of the hardest things I've ever come up against.

iVillage Member
Registered: 12-28-2003
Tue, 08-03-2004 - 8:04pm
HI IP

If he starts pouting like a spoiled little brat again this time give him a good slap, I hate it when they do that.

IP in all serousness I think you going to learn the hard way that your going to have to let the friendship thing go or he will just exploit it as a weakness, a chink in your armour.

Maybe not all at once but it will happen.

More power to you.

Free

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