Overwhelming crush on colleague

[Crossingtrue]

I’m not sure if relationships is the right place to post this, because there is no relationship here.
Married - ups and downs but basically all good - two children. Find it all quite hard work with working full time, big mortgage. Feel huge sense of responsibility a lot of the time. DH pulls his weight though - he’s really committed to the family and does loads with the children. He also feels a heavy burden with work I think and can get quite down.
Anyway about six months ago I came off the pill (not trying for children, dh had the snip) and it was like my hormones just came roaring back to life. Having found sex a bit of a chore for a few years, suddenly I wanted it all the time. That’s died down a bit now but still am much keener on sex than I used to be which has been great for our marriage.
however around the same time I suddenly, almost out of the blue, developed this intense crush on a colleague (who is also married with children - I would not go there at all). He’s somebody I don’t even know very well, we’ve always got on ok and if I’m honest I’ve half suspected he might have liked me a bit at times but I never gave it much thought. Until now. Suddenly whenever I see him it’s like I’m fifteen again. I think about him all the fucking time, and can’t concentrate very well. I get these really intense daydreams and fantasies about us being together. Now I realise that a lot of this is probably just escapism and I also think it’s totally fine to think somebody else is attractive when you’re married, but this is another level and while it was kind of fun at first it’s like there’s this raging storm in my head now that wants something to happen (I DON’T want anything to happen).
There have been some good points - I have started taking more care of my appearance and doing more exercise and drinking less. Not deliberately related to him, more at the same time as this crush developed I had this desire to make the most of myself.
however increasingly it’s bad points. Can’t concentrate. Don’t want to get out of bed in the morning as it’s more fun daydreaming about him. (I think he would be horrified if he knew this, it’s just so embarrassing). Sometimes I ‘miss’ him which is ridiculous because I barely know him. I hope he hasn’t noticed, I don’t think so but whenever I do see him I just feel so tongue tied whereas I used to be perfectly confident around him.
anyway, what was a fun mild attraction has got stronger and stronger and I hate it. I know people talk about limerence which is a term I dislike slightly but maybe it’s that. Any advice please help.

I think it’s a sign of something missing in your life. I wouldn’t try to feed it by thinking about him. It’s a total waste of your head space. I would distract myself

You sound on top of the world, but I do rather rest my case! 😁

@PinkFox28 - Did you suspect he liked you too? Is he married as well? I am staying well away from alcohol and this man! Luckily not much opportunity for that kind of thing anyway apart from the odd staff party.

I think it’s more escapism than something actually missing. A sense that that wobbly knee, stomach butterfly thing is an experience in the past, and I’m not going to get that again. Then I have to remind myself of all the bad bits of that - guys not calling back/ghosting/guys who you thought were nice turning out to be absolute .

have been able to work from home for a few days. I don’t normally do this very much but chose it to deliberately keep away. Felt a weird sense of relief that I definitely wasn’t going to see him. Have to go back today.

If it makes you feel better, OP, I had a huge obsession prior to my divorce. It wasn’t the ‘reason’ for the divorce, but being in that warm glow of being loved and adored in my fantasy life and knowing I would wake up and not have that, not even be shown kindness or compassion, was enough for me to leave.
Your life is presumably not like that. You say your DH is a good one. I wonder what role the fantasy is playing? Sometimes it’s a form of nostalgia. Adult lives are complex and it’s easier to go back to a time where our problems revolve around whether someone reciprocates our small gestures or not. But you sound like you have a lot of insight and are aware of the impact of hormones etc. It’s hard to go against nature.

@HistoryisadiscardedVHS - I’m sorry you were so unhappy in your marriage - now you’ve left has the crush faded?
I guess I did really worry that maybe this was a sign I was unhappy in my marriage. I think it’s actually helped me see the good things in our marriage in a weird way, realising that there’s lots to keep us together, and we’d just got so worn down with young dc, work and making sure we can afford the mortgage etc. I think both of us were going through a bit of a low patch over the last couple of years. However recently we’re getting on much better - I think I hadn’t realised how much my reticence about sex had got my dh down. We still had sex, but to be honest I could take or leave it and he could tell that was how I felt.

Im.sure this will be the surge of hormones in the menopause . I remember feeling like this . Its like the surge in the teenage years . You must do everything you can not to let it take over - its a passing part of the peri menopause.

@ICanTellYouMissMe can you tell the whole story and what happened?