To ask how you deal with your partner’s crushes?

[RubyTuesday10]

I know I’ll probably be seen as silly but I’ve always been very insecure about my looks after being teased at school a lot, even at the ripe old age of 46. My partner now and then will voice his appreciation of famous women and it utterly destroys me inside. I compare myself to whoever it is and beat myself up about how I’m not as attractive and feel like if he likes this woman, how can he possibly fancy me. He’s into health and nutrition and currently has a crush on this lady called Dr. Federica Amati and talks about how clever, beautiful she is, what a sexy voice she has etc. I cry about it in private because I feel like I’m always going to feel bad about how I look. He says it’s silly and he loves me as I am but I can’t explain it, it just really really hurts to think of him wanting another woman even on a fantasy level. How do other women deal with this mentality and not feel remotely bothered?

He must know you're in therapy and that you are very insecure about your appearance. He's either got a cruel streak or he's an immature idiot.

Tell him to stop doing it and also to stop minimising your feelings. And please stick with the therapy, you need urgent help with the self-harming if nothing else x

If he has a crush on someone, it doesn’t mean they are better or more attractive than you. It just means he finds them attractive AS WELL as you.

The woman in question? All of her partners will have found other people attractive too.

I agree about therapy being a good idea.

I think the word “crush” also throws things off a bit. To me a crush is like a teenage, butterflies in your stomach, thinking of them all the time and getting giggly. I don’t have anything like that about celebrities and I don’t think DH does either, although I know he finds lots and lots of them attractive and enjoys watching them and presumably thinks about them in a sexual way in passing. But I do think it’s really in passing and not something that takes up a lot of his headspace. Which is another reason I think it’s more ok to have crushes on celebrities - it’s not just that it’s unattainable but it’s the fact you don’t actually know or spend time with them so you’re not thinking about them all that frequently. If DH has a crush on Jane from work it feels more like the teenage giddy can’t stop smiling type of crush where she would be on his mind all day just because she’s present.

I don’t think you answered whether you have crushes OP but i would think about that. There’s an actor from a show and I just think he’s so attractive. When insecure, I try and remember that feeling and consider the way I think about my DH alongside that. It doesn’t make me love or like or fancy DH any less at all and really genuinely even if the actor man jumped out of the TV I wouldn’t choose him over DH. I really believe that, while my DH definitely fancies Stacey Solomon, even if she somehow turned up and knocked on the door and confessed her love for him he’d stick with me.

Being attracted to your partner is important but it’s only a small part of choosing to be with them and I don’t think there’s any level of attractiveness alone that could tip the scale when you love someone.

I mean, Stacey Solomon also seems to really have a good personality so perhaps if she moved in next door and befriended him and also confessed her love then I’d have to worry. But as a stranger he doesn’t know, based off attraction alone? He loves me and I’m positive he’d say thanks but no thanks.

I also don’t think “do it back to him” is the gotcha that a lot of people think. It might work, but ime it would only work if he was doing it on purpose to make you insecure. A lot of people are ok with this kind of talk and he genuinely wouldn’t mind you fancying celebrities. We can see from the thread it’s quite split in how acceptable it is in relationships. I think it’s completely ok to tell him to stop if it bothers you, but I wouldn’t agree that for all couples it’s a really disrespectful thing to do or that he’d hate it if you did the same.

Thank you your post was very well thought out and helpful. Really appreciate it.

Considering you have gone out of your way to let OP know how beautiful you think this woman is, I am wondering if you want the OP to feel worse than she already does. Or maybe you are just naturally insensitive.

Thank you xx

The self harming is mild and just a release for all the loathing. He must feel utterly repulsed by me after looking at her and listening to her. He knows nothing about it, I just keep it to myself.