To have feelings for a married man even though nothing has happened between us ?

[DeepGreyFish]

Nearly a year ago I (35)met a man (41) at a work conference in the US. A colleague introduced me to him we clicked immediately. He is American but lives in London and we work in the same professional field, so we naturally had a lot to talk about. We got on really well and ended up spending quite a lot of time together during the conference.

He asked if I wanted to go for a drink which I agreed to. It was genuinely just two colleagues/friends getting to know each other. Before we left we exchanged numbers, and once we were both back in London we met for dinner.

Over the past year we have stayed in touch and met up frequently. We have a lot in common, similar interests, similar outlook. We text often but nothing explicit or inappropriate. We have never kissed, slept together or done anything physical.
The complication is that he is married.

I knew this from the beginning and I have always respected that. I have never wanted to be the person who interferes in someone else's marriage. Even though I have developed feelings for him, I have kept those feelings to myself and tried to keep things as a friendship.

Last weekend was my birthday, we have a mutual colleague who he attended my birthday drinks with and later on in the evening he pulled me to the side to give me my gift, it was a necklace and he said he went all over London looking at jewellery for me & got it at an auction house then told me that he has feelings for me and that he wants to leave his wife because he wants to explore whether there could be something between us.

I feel completely torn. Part of me feels awful because I don't want to be responsible for the breakdown of someone else's marriage. Another part of me feels that if his marriage is already unhappy, that is something he needs to address independently of me and maybe they can work things out.

I do like him. I find him attractive, intelligent and we have a connection that I haven't felt with someone for a long time. But I also don't want to be someone's "reason" for leaving.

I think this. Would you be happy if you were in a relationship with him and he conducted himself as he has with you? This declaration of feelings for you has not come out of nowhere- you must realise that?

I would be if the opinion that you and he have been conducting an emotional affair, even if not a physical one. Enough of a relationship for you- and possibly him-, if he is being truthful- to develop strong feelings. You might not have said anything to him about those feelings- but it must have been clear to you both that something was going on. This simply was not an innocent friendship, it just wasn’t and even if that was not your intent at the beginning. You could have stopped the friendship at the point of realising it was more, but you didn’t, and I think there was a reason. At least be honest with yourself, if nothing else.

It is a horrible thing for him to have done to his wife. You might not want to be involved in their marriage, but you are. You aren’t responsible for the failure of the marriage, though.

And no, he should not stay in an unhappy relationship if he does not want to try and work on their problems. That doesn’t mean he should have started an emotional affair with you before ending his marriage though. That is a betrayal of his wife, of sorts.

I agree you should let him end his marriage and deal with the ending of that relationship, before starting anything with him. If nothing else, I’d be wary he is (however unconsciously) looking at you as a way out, with support and someone else he does have feelings for, rather than you being the driving factor. I might be wrong, but it would be one concern I would have in your shoes.

The other concern I’d have is the “I’m so unhappy, my marriage is awful, I’m going to leave her for you” narrative. It’s a bit cliche’d. If he was so unhappy, why not end the marriage and then declare feelings for you? Is it because he’ll only do it if there is a safety net (I’d steer well clear of that)? Or is it that it’s a line to see where it gets him? I’d want to see the actions- ending the marriage, living separately, etc, not just hear the words. I may be cynical, and maybe he is genuine in his feelings towards you- I’d just be very careful. He’s already shown you he is happy to indulge in emotional infidelity, so I’d want to be very cautious.