How do you fall OUT of love with someone who isn't your DH?

[DontLikeLying]

DH and I have been together for 13 years and have 3 children. If I'm really and truly honest I have to say that I have never really loved him in the way that I should, although we did get married a couple of years ago. However, I love him dearly as a friend and I do not want to hurt him in any way.

The problem is that I have fallen in completely and utterly in love with someone else. I have no intention of doing anything about this, although I'm fairly sure that the other man feels the same. I'm not going to go into details but we work together and are already good platonic friends, although we have never discussed any further relationship. It's not an infatuation that will just pass of it's own accord and I'm aware that, having loved him for almost a year now, it's something that I need to deal with one way or the other.

My relationship with DH had deteriorated so much that I tried to leave him before Christmas. He hadn't realised that things had got so bad and made it very clear that he would be devasted if we split up, and I'm acutely aware that all 3 children would be too.

So, I can't split up my family and I don't want to hurt H. So, how do I deal with this? I don't want to change jobs as the hours fit with childcare and I'd be hard pushed to find something with similar hours, pay and pension etc. How do I fall out of love with someone that I see every day, and someone that I feel more strongly about the more I learn about him? And how do I keep putting H off wanting to have sex, when he thinks that everything is getting back to some kind of normality after what he has convinced himself was just a pre-Christmas "hiccup"?

Sorry if this rambles, but I can't go on feeling like this and I need a strategy to cope with staying with an H who is a friend but not my soulmate anymore.

Just remember that it's easy to get infatuated with someone that only have a surface relationship with .... you can imagine to yourself that this man would put his socks in the wash, wouldn't watch football like it actually mattered, would put the bin out when it was full, wouldn't fart in his sleep, would buy you flowers "just because" and whatever else you think a relationship should be and yours isn't. Esp. when the man is a good friend it's easy to imagine that it goes deeper and he is more interested in you than DH, but if there has been no firm indication on his side after a year, then it sounds to me like it may not be coming.. (men just aren't that subtle)

If you and DH are together after 13 years and there's nothing hugely wrong with him (not a violent alocholic cheat or anything) then maybe what is happening is you just needing something more in your life, rather than this specific other person. All relationships have bad patches, and the grass can look greener on another side. Having a crush on someone for year, does not make it true love, and a relationship which hasn't even happened yet is not a good reason to leave a marriage.

Maybe find a counsellor and talk things through (I don't mean you are ill, just that it may help you look at what's really going on in your head) and perhaps take stock of your life overall...

A clean break is best although I had lunch with a friend last week who is apparently very happy both with their spouse and their long term lover (apparently every Friday afternoon and lots of contact in between)... you wonder how some people can do it but that's in year 6 and seems to suit them all except I suppose the spouse who doesn't know.