I am infatuated with a female colleague

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2008
I am infatuated with a female colleague
23
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 5:33am

I am a 44 year old male and a professional in the legal field. I have become infatuated and may have fallen in love with a female colleague.

We are very good friends, but we don’t have any kind of intimate relationship, and she has never shown any inclination to start one.We have worked together for over 10 years.We get along marvellously. Apart from working in a team together,we generally enjoy each others company.We periodically lunch together and we seem to be able to discuss anything and everything together (family,friends,politics,the lot)for hours.We are very careful not to cross the line when together.

Both of us are married,I've been married for nearly 20 years and have three young to teen children.She will soon have 4 small children under 6.

My marriage has been a generally happy one.My wife loves me and takes good care of me and the kids.We enjoy a pretty good love life.She's a stay at home mum, small town type of girl.

My work colleague is also family orientated but challenges me more intellectually.I think that's why I've enjoyed her friendship over these years.She similarly is married to a non-professional, a tradesman, who doesn't share her interests in reading, restaurants,politics etc.

I want to get things back into perspective. I know that there is very little prospect of my obsession turning into a real relationship (with 7 small kids involved) and I don't want to get involved in an affair with my colleague.First,I respect both my wife and my colleague to much for that and I morally don't want to cheat on my wife. I also don't want to jeopardise my working relationship or personal friendship with my colleague. I want to make my marriage work. However, I am finding it very difficult to deal with my obsession with my colleague.I never intended for a moment to consider my colleague anything other than a good friend and my feelings for her have developed over many years.It is not some sudden infatuation.

She is constantly in my thoughts, and I crave her company. However, as we work together cutting myself off from her completely would be very difficult.To tell the truth I don't know if I want to.I want to maintain a close but non-intimate relationship with her.This is what I have had with her for years.However,for reasons I'm not sure my feelings for her have deepened.I certainly,never intended them to.

This is making me preoccupied and depressed, which doesn’t help my ‘proper’ relationship with my wife.

I have not mentioned my colleague’s role to my wife.

What should I do.Should I raise the issue with my colleague or my wife? Is there any way I can preserve both relationships, keeping one platonic.How can I return things as they were?

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-30-2008
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:21pm
Why not discuss this with a counselor who can help sort out the right path for you?
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:23pm
Fear of rejection

Along with the emphasis on positive qualities perceived in the limerent object, and preoccupation with the hope for return of feelings, there is a fear that limerence will be met by the very opposite of reciprocation: rejection. Considerable self-doubt and uncertainty is experienced and it causes pain, but also enhances desire to a certain extent. However in most cases, this is what helps to eventually destroy the limerence if a suitably long period of time has passed without reciprocation. Typically, limerence lasts about 3 years on average, but, as previously mentioned, can last decades or even a lifetime.


Limerent fear of rejection is usually confined to shyness in the presence of the limerent object, but it can also spread to situations involving other potential limerent objects, though generally it does not affect other spheres of life.


Although it appears that limerence blossoms under some forms of adversity, extreme caution and shyness may prevent a relationship from occurring, even when both parties are interested. This results from a fear of exposing one's undesirable characteristics to the limerent object.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:27pm
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:31pm
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:38pm
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:42pm
Sexuality

Awareness of physical attraction plays a key role in the development of limerence, but is not enough to satisfy the limerent desire, and is almost never the main focus -- instead, the limerent focuses on what could be defined as the "beneficial attributes". A person, to become the limerent object, must be a potential sex partner.


Limerence can be intensified after a sexual relationship has begun, and with more intense limerence there is greater desire for sexual contact. However, while sexual surrender once indicated the end of uncertainty in the limerent object, in modern times this is not necessarily the case.


Sexual fantasies are distinct from limerent ones. Limerent fantasy is rooted in reality and is intrusive rather than voluntary. Sexual fantasies are under more or less voluntary control and may also involve strangers, imaginary individuals, and situations that could not take place. People can become aroused by the thought of sexual partners, acts, and situations that are not truly desired, whereas every detail of the limerent fantasy is passionately desired actually to take place.


Limerence sometimes increases sexual interest in other partners when the limerent object is unreceptive or unavailable, such as when married people find sex with their spouses more pleasurable when they become limerent over someone else.


Limerent anxieties and shyness may interfere with sexual functioning. The continual concern to appear at the very best is not always compatible with the immodest behaviors and poses that arise in sexual situations.

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:49pm
If you think that limerence fits you then you should buy the book by Dorothy Tennov called Love and Limerence. There is also a support group for limerence on tribe.net !
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-07-2007
Sat, 09-13-2008 - 8:52pm
Limerence is a one sided affair. Emotional affairs are two sided.
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2008
Sun, 09-14-2008 - 2:50am
The answer is I can also have and do have great conversations with my wife.We both like travel,discussing the kids,antiques,our cat(I show him) etc... we sit and talk for hours.She is a small town girl , a great home-maker, interested in her family and kids,a practical woman but not an intellectual one, very warm and nurturing, an old-fashioned type of girl.She doesn't like reading but will go out searching for books for (to quote her) an intellectual husband who reads 3-5 books a week.Not at all career orientated. I was her first boyfriend and we married in our mid 20s. We get on well,despite having our ups and downs over 20 years like most couples.She clearly loves me .

With respect to my colleague,she is obviously more career orientated,has a similar tertiary education to me,is interested in politics,going out to restaurants,as well as being family orientated.She also comes from a similar background to me (Italian)so we have a lot in common in this regard.We also have our work in common.She is able to challenge me more intellectually.We too have similar but different interests.We also can talk for hours.

I never compare the two , they are two different women both with whom I get on very well.I find them both attractive but not necessarily for all the same reasons.

That being said clearly my friendship with my colleague fulfils some intellectual and emotional needs, my wife probably can't.Why should my wife anyway,its a bit unrealistic to expect another person to fulfil all your intellectual and emotional needs, no matter how close the relationship.

The same is probably true of my colleague.She married in her mid 20s to a boiler maker/welder with a High School Education.He eats very plain food,doesn't even eat Pasta, while we go to some great restaurants.He doesn't read and his main interest is rifle shooting, while she like myself likes the ballet (as does my wife).He's an atheist , while my colleague shares similar religious beliefs to myself (and my wife). I never ask about her marriage so I can not comment on the state of it. She likes my wife and have never, ever criticised my wife to my colleague (actually haven't got much to criticise).So I probably satisfy needs in her too.

For what its worth my faithful and wise personal secretary (she's been with me for 20 years and I'm fortunate to be surrounded by such great women)has told me:

1 its obvious to everyone that my colleague and myself have feelings and care for each other;
2its also obvious I have a good relationship with my wife;
3the girls in the Office admire the fact I've never taken advantage of the situation and have always behaved a gentleman;
4the friendship with my colleague is special and that we fulfil certain needs of each other and that she thinks we'll be friends for life;
5I have to accept the fact the relationship may be emotional but can not progress further to a sexual one, at least for the foreseeable future.However, who knows what might happen years down the track in life.
6She says I should calm down,accept how lucky I am to have such great women in my life (by the way she includes herself lol )while many men have no one.

I think she's right.Ironically,typing out these posts have helped me calm down, re-evaluate my situation and put things in perspective.Being somewhat obsessive and prone to over-analyse situations is a great characteristic for being a trial attorney, but not always for life.

Finally, what's strange I'd marry my colleague in a moment (if that was possible,which is not)but have no interest in having an affair with her.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2008
Sun, 09-14-2008 - 2:56am
Thank you for your lengthy response.It was interesting and I've never heard of limerence before.Although some characteristics are present , it much more likely to be an emotional relationship ,see my most recent post to cl-itwinflame. According to my secretary (who knows everything and has been with me for 20 years and knows all parties concerned), its obvious to everyone my colleague has feelings and cares for me. She even says she flirts with me, but I find women sometimes better at picking that up than men.