A World Of Blurt
I'm in love with my married female co-worker. I'm married and have no intention of leaving my wife, and I doubt she'd leave her husband, even if she shared my feelings. I love how caring and kind my co-worker is -- how she understands that you show love through action. I do this by often giving my wife romantic cards and by cleaning the house and doing the dishes every night after I get home from work and school. Feeling my wife wasn't reciprocating, I started fantasizing about being in a relationship with my co-worker, who also feels unappreciated by her spouse. My feelings for her have become overwhelming, and I feel a pressing need to tell her. I understand that this could make work very awkward. Best-case scenario, she's flattered. Is it selfish to want to unburden myself?
--Boiling Point
Confessing your crush to your married co-worker is like arranging a transfer to her -- of your 26-pound tumor: "His name is Fred. He enjoys fine wine, banned preservatives, and cigarette smoke. I hope you're very happy together!"
Your desire to tell isn't noble or wonderful. In fact, it's pretty much the psychological cousin of an intense need to pee. To get why that is, it helps to understand, as evolutionary psychologists John Tooby and Leda Cosmides explain, that the emotions driving our behavior today motivate us to behave in ways that would have given our ancestors the best shot at surviving, mating, and passing on their genes. Unfortunately, solutions for recurring challenges in the ancestral environment aren't always a perfect fit for the modern office environment.
Consider our basic biological needs -- like for food, water, and sex. When we feel the urge to satisfy these -- like when we're hungry or hungry for a co-worker -- our emotions kick into gear, pushing us into a motivated state, a state of tension. That's an uncomfortable state to be in, so we look for the quickest, easiest way out -- like "To hell with my job and my marriage!" -- which conflates a powerful evolved urge with a wise modern course of action.
Understanding this need to reduce emotional tension should help you realize that what's driving your obsession is more mechanical than magical. But there's another problem. Our motivational system comes up a little short in the brakes department. We have a "GO!" system to push us to do things, but we lack a comparable "STOP, YOU IDIOT!" system.
This makes inhibiting a feeling (and whatever course of action it's pushing you toward) terribly hard and uncomfortable work. And as social psychologists Daniel Wegner and James J. Gross have independently pointed out, doing this on a continuing basis can have damaging effects on your physical health. Trying to quash some recurring thought also tends to backfire, making you think the unwanted thought more than if you hadn't tried to stop. For example, in Wegner's research, subjects told, "Try not to think of a white bear," failed every time. Wegner suspects the mind sweeps around to see that we aren't thinking of the thing -- which means we're thinking of the thing in the process. (Argh, huh?)
Considering all of this, when you're looking to keep yourself from doing something, it helps to take the approach Aikido practitioners use. When a powerful blow is coming at them, instead of meeting it head on and taking the full force of it, they divert it -- push it off in another direction. Following this principle, your goal shouldn't be stopping yourself from telling your co-worker but redirecting the energy you've been putting into your crush into your marriage.
Tell your wife you love her and discuss what might be missing in your marriage -- for each of you. However, don't do this by accusing her of failing to appreciate you (which will lead to defensiveness, not inspiration to change). Instead, lead by example: Explain the ways you show your love for her (helping her connect the clean living room to the loving motivation behind it), and then tell her what would make you feel loved.
In case loving feelings have given way to hard feelings, there's good news from a relatively new area of psychology called "embodied cognition" -- the finding that taking action leads to corresponding feelings. So, it's possible that acting loving can resuscitate the love you once felt.
Getting back to your co-worker, it doesn't take much to lose yourself in fantasies about how great it would be with somebody new. However, marriage -- to any person -- is hard. Still, it has its perks, such as that wonderful ease that comes out of being with your spouse for a while -- allowing you to finally feel comfortable talking about what you really need in bed: "Are you there yet? Hurry! I gotta wake up early!"
I have been the "co-worker" that several men have confessed their deluded fantasies to.
After one guy got laid off (for unrelated reasons) he felt compelled to call me up and tell me how much he missed me and if I was interested in going on a date. He was married with a fucking newborn!
Before I get accused of being some flirtatious tart it has generally been men I was barely aware existed. What I now assume brought about these fantasies is I am the only woman they come in contact with consistently since they are stuck in the bump and grind of marriage and kids. Like a bartender or a cashier I am the target of fantasies.
The single guys have never been a problem. I think they are too busy getting their rocks off with other ladies to notice a woman who is rarely around. It's always some lonely dude with marital problems.
I always have to be extremely clear I am NOT interested. They don't take the fucking hint because it's like they are living in some fantasy world where a "good morning" means "I want to have an affair with you".
Ppen at April 25, 2017 7:23 PM
"... I am the target of fantasies."
W/o those "fantasies" men would never get over the high rejection rate trying to get a "yes".
BUT, that does says good things about you that probably come from w/in (kind, caring, at the very least polite?, etc.) and not necessarily from your outer appearance. (Bimbos are a dime a dozen after a certain age but a "woman" is a little hard to find.)
Bob in Texas at April 26, 2017 5:33 AM
"Before I get accused of being some flirtatious tart"
Dammit, Ppen, I was just about to accuse you of being a flirtatious tart.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at April 26, 2017 8:36 AM
Boiling Point: you sound like some stalkers I have known. The co-worker is likely aware of your fantasies and trying to deflect. You are not on a healthy path. Keep it to yourself and deal with your feelings and your own marriage and life - away from work.
zapf at April 26, 2017 10:41 AM
Even if they do have a deep work-friendship that's blossoming into so much more, they are both in relationships. Confessing would make work SUPER WEIRD and could jeopardize both their jobs.
You don't get to romantically be with everyone you want to be with. It's a fact of life.
sofar at April 26, 2017 11:10 AM
How is my favorite tranny doing?
john astor at April 26, 2017 11:58 PM
"How is my favorite tranny doing?"
Dunno which one you mean, but you can go see.
And... sorry about your ED problem. There's probably no cure.
Radwaste at May 3, 2017 4:27 PM
@PPen Someone liking you whom you don't like back is 'deluded fantasies'? That's kinda egotistical and cruel. I have a number of women interested in me that I'm not interested in, but I certainly don't go jabbering loudly that they have 'deluded fantasies' ... they're human beings.
Lobster at May 28, 2017 5:40 PM
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