Am I embroiled in an emotional affair without realising it?

[Tocolleagueornot]

I worked closely with a male colleague for a year on a project. This involved a few lunches / coffees and we got to know one another over the year. Most of our conversations revolved around work, current affairs, politics, literature etc. Nothing I’d hide from my DH, or feel embarrassed about.

He’s 20 years my senior. I wouldn’t say he’s ugly but also not conventionally attractive, he dresses well but I wouldn’t say I ever really thought of him in that sense. Whether he thought about me like that or not, I don’t really know. Never picked up on any ‘inappropriate’ energy. He’s also married. He had a good reputation for being a nice guy, sometimes colleagues in my field are a bit wanky or creepy and will carry that reputation but he is known to be a good one.

Anyway project ended 6 months ago, we moved onto different things but started emailing one another. At first it was just about work, with a smattering of things we’d been up to or politics or books we were reading whatever. Never any pressure to respond quickly, sometimes I got busy and it took me 3-4 weeks to get back to him. I didn’t pick up on it at the time but he would usually reply within a week, irrespective of how long I’d left it.

Anyway the emails gradually got longer, they’re now essentially mini essays. Again, none of the topics are anything I’d feel remotely ashamed about or would hide from DH in any way. He’s dropped a few personal details in but it’s mostly professional although the formal way to start emails e.g Hi Adam/Eve has been dropped so it reads more conversationally.

I noticed over December he ramped up contact so we’d be emailing generally every other day, meaning a couple of essay length emails from each of us per week. He’s always kept the boundary of not emailing during weekends and didn’t over the Christmas break either but as soon as he was back in the office he did.

I haven’t opened it yet because I’m starting to worry it’s veering into EA territory. Only really because I keep reading threads on here about husbands and younger female colleagues so it’s made me think. I asked a friend and she just laughed and said he clearly has the hots for me. I asked why she thought that and she said men don’t send essay length emails every other day to women they don’t care about…

We are in a creative industry so writing at length isn’t unusual. Am I being horribly naive?

Can you insert mentions of your husband and his wife into the emails? For instance 'oh yes Brian loves flux capacitors too! We chat about it all the time'

You know what I think this sounds like? When you have a new friend and you’re so excited about them because you click, that you do have that sort of friendship honeymoon period. I’ve had it with women and men- and it’s a lovely thing. It shows you’ve connected. And like the other kind of honeymoon period- it wears off!

it would be SO sad - and deeply regressive- for society if men and women couldn’t share intellectual ideas because it was perceived as transgressing relationship boundaries…

If you wanted you could invite him and his wife for dinner, or have a dinner party with them included? But I wouldn’t end this friendship or conversation because some women on mumsnet can’t cope with the idea of mixed sex friendships

His has provided me with an interesting mix of responses, thank you all.

I very much saw it as friendship rather than romantic. He’s not really my type and I didn’t pick up on that sort of energy. We don’t really mention our spouses, I don’t think that means much. We have shared a few personal thoughts about our lives but honestly, nothing I’d be ashamed about or feel oversteps. Perhaps not usual in a professional colleague context and is more friendship but we have known one another for 18 months now so it’s a while!

I enjoy the exchange of ideas really. My friend thought the fact he sent such long emails and that he was dedicating time every other day to this meant he must fancy me.

I’d leave longer between replies probably and dial it down a bit. When I was younger I had a friendship like this with an older colleague and inevitably he did proposition me of course. I’m quite sceptical in my old age about male/female friendships just due to my own experiences. The only male friendships I have are with long term partners of close friends and even these I would be careful with. Sad but just how it goes ime.

This.

If at some point this man suggests something more, you will probably decline and the friendship will either survive that or not, but if this stays a meeting of minds then how wonderful is that - to have someone you can relate to creatively.

I think when men fancy you they can't help but flirt, there will be compliments on your appearance and make double entendres that's why a crush is obvious to everyone around the couple. However doing nice and thoughtful things or spending time to write back in a timely manner is well within friendship and career networking scope specially if writing comes naturally to them. You say he's not flirting, he has a good reputation and presumably he knows you're not single. I think your friend likes to stir up drama or doesn't understand the situation as you've explained it here to us.

These situations only really happen with older men and younger women. I think 99.9% of the time the man is sexually interested in the woman. Men don't generally send frequent essays to colleagues if they don't fancy them.

I expect if you put an end to it, he will eventually start up a correspondence with someone else and they will also be younger and female.

Is it possible he just sees you as friend. If he’s not flirting , or off loading then I’d say he likes your friendship. If emailing in work, that’s a great procrastination tool. Just another take on the situation

Nope. Relationships/affairs often start off by being friendly and feelings develop or become apparent further down the line. Added in the mix it this is a work friendship and they're both married so only a sleazeball would 'try it on' or flirt obviously.

Hard to say but in all honesty ( and I’m in my 60s ) every bloke that was over the top about meeting up, constant texts/emails outside of work , basically over involved was either ‘interested’ but just didn’t declare a hand - until they did - or a bit of an odd ball- be honest OP would you be happy if your partner had this level of involment going on with a woman ?

DH has form for this.
He makes a new friend through a hobby or wheatver and never shuts up about them, constantly messaging them. Eventually it cools to normal.
All of these friends have been men and I haven't thought twice about it apart from one who's a woman and of course I'm suspicious and I don't like it.
She's actually older than him, too.
I wish it wasn't different for men and women but for a lot of us, it just is.

You can be friends, and as long as you are comfortable with your DH reading your emails, why not? He knows that you are happily married, and to the best of your knowledge, he is too. There has been nothing inappropriate.

Just sounds to me like you've gone from colleagues to friends. I think some people call any kind of relationship between married people of the opposite sex an emotional affair. God knows how they'd cope if they were in a relationship with bi-sexual, any close friendships would be off the table.

Interesting you haven't answered if you'd be happy with your DH doing the same with a woman 20 years younger than him OP.

This - find ways to tell him you haven’t got time for lengthy emails!

I’ve not read the full thread, so apologies for that. I just wanted to share something in the same vein that happened to me.

My role is not usually customer facing BUT I ended up with customer contact with my level equivalent of the assistant on one of our customers. So I made an effort to be friendly with this man, and we got talking about our families, hobbies, what we’d been up to at the weekend, etc. We exchanged numbers purely for work purposes (I don’t have a work phone) but when he got a new puppy I asked to see photos so he sent on WhatsApp. So we were friendly but no boundaries crossed. We never met or had a call where we could see each other in person. But we would sometimes ail multiple times a day (non work) although all quite short and chatty.

So at this point I’m saying the original contact you and this man had seems absolutely fine to me.

When my contact got a new role in his business, we said we’d try to keep in touch as we enjoyed chatting. What actually happened is contact naturally dropped off and now we only catch up if we have a business reason to email. I became friendly with his replacement as we had a few things in common, so he and I would email like I had been with the original guy and then when he moved onto a new role, I was doing the same with the lady that took over next.

So my point is, the type of conversation was personal but it wasn’t something I wouldn’t send to others. Would you have had the same level of conversation with other people, similar topics, or was it just this one man? And realistically, it should have petered out once you stopped working together unless you became genuine friends and that was how it continued - in that case though I’d expect your respective partners to know all about them etc.

You said a few times it was nothing you wouldn’t tell your husband about - did you tell him? I know I mentioned how I was pleased to have been able to cultivate this really nice working relationship with my contacts and I showed my husband the puppy pictures too. Because there was nothing to hide. Only you know whether it ever felt like you were hiding anything.

I agree with the first posts I read though - if you don’t fancy him, it’s likely not an EA on your side. But it sounds like you think he might be interested in you. Whilst you can’t control his feelings etc, did you make certain nothing you sent ever crossed a line? As long as you did that, you know you haven’t encouraged him. I would now try to leave it longer between emails, and in replying make it shorter and shorter each time. If you need an excuse just say work is super busy and you’ll catch up in a few weeks… then just don’t.

Maybe just a good friendship, but if I were you I'd keep mentioning my hubby in the emails just so you're making it clear that that's all it is. To be fair he probably does fancy you. Have you watched When Harry met Sall? 'No, you pretty much wanna nail 'em too'!

As most people have said , he sounds like he has a crush on you, as it not really normal for a married man to have what is effectively a “pen pal” or more ? ..or maybe ask whether his wife reads his messages - l’d imply your husband does - or suggest the four of you meet up sometime ! If it’s wholly innocent no one involved should have a problem with that . Otherwise it’s shaky ground in my opinion.

Yeah, I'd be delighted if my husband was constantly sending long emails to a woman twenty years younger than him 🤔

This.

One of my best friends is male. We just got on well from the time we met. We had a conversation about our friendship and we both established that we were happy having each other as best friends as we would another of the same sex. I've always had friends of either sex with no danger of it veering in to next step terrorist but different people and relationships need to be approached differently.

I'd be happy to delay/shorten email responses, but I'd be happier to have a quick and open conversation to establish that this is a valued friendship, no more...

Why him and not her? Genuinely curious

I don't think you're in a EA at all as you don't hide things from your Husband & both of you haven't said anything other than having general chit chat. I can't understand why it's frowned upon for a man & a woman to have a platonic friendship. Maybe he doesn't have many friends or feels he can't chat to his male friends & finds conversation via email with you easier & enjoyable. Do you both discuss your other halves in conversation? Maybe arrange for you & your Husband meet up with him & his Wife so you're all aware that this is a friendship & nothing more. You never know you may get on with his wife just as well as you get on with him & same for your Husband & it works well for you all as couples to have a new little friendship group.

Wanted to come back to this because I took the advice on here and mentioned my DH more in the last email I sent and lo and behold, he hasn’t replied as yet. May just have got busy so it might be nothing but given his increase in tempo last month, I’m thinking he didn’t like me talking about my husband!

Well done, perhaps he’s had a bit of an awakening too!

If you want to keep exchanging essay-length emails, keep going. I mean, if you're enjoying, and it sounds as if you are, putting thoughts into writing.

If not, why not just have a coffee with him periodically, and just talk about the stuff?

Some of my best friends were made at work, and it sounds as if you have a connection.

DH's best work friend, who became an out of work friend, was a woman about 25 years his senior.