Is this an emotional affair? Feel like the 'Other Man' after drunken kiss.

[Eyebrows]

We hit it off pretty much straight away at work. She opened up to me pretty quickly. She has been married 20 years, is a Jehovah's Witness and is 13 years older than me. She's 43, I'm 28.

 

It started off slow. She would make comments about how she got married too young and it wasn't the best idea, that she couldn't do things because she had nobody to do them with. She broached the subject of us meeting up to do things, then never had the time. She told me she would run away to Iceland and her husband would tell her to stay. That night, she text me to tell me that she knew how I was feeling (in regards to my ex) because she is always giving and never receiving. "Only you were different. See you are special," because she had to go home and clean the kitchen, and saying things like "I really like the new you". "We have to support each other. "Thank you for caring for me."

 

For context, I had an AVM and brain surgery last year and have been struggling afterwards with my identity.

 

She opened up to me more and more about her life and her past. She said I was the only one who made her giggle and could make her feel good when she is feeling bad or having a bad day. She says I am always increasing her confidence. She says she is always happy in my presence. She would say 'Sweet dreams Misiek' (Misiek meaning Teddy Bear). She would say I was the only person in the world who could cheer her up instantly. Told me about her Dad passing away, her mother, everything, and told me things she's never told anybody before.

 

Then the husband talk got more explicit. She told me her marriage was having problems when she was younger and she ran 600km away. She hid in an attic for three days. She said her husband makes her feel like she can't do anything, and she feels dependent, and she'd be happier alone. Then she looked at me and asked me if I'd ever met anyone who lit a fire under her. I drew her a post-it note of her in a lodge in a forest in the day she was feeling down and she said "There's only one thing missing" and added me to it.

 

I tried to set a boundary after that, no husband talk, and said it felt like it was heading in a direction I wasn't comfortable with. She said she had no romantic feelings, nor was she developing any. Then again, she told me that her husband makes her angry because he makes her do everything and guilt-trips her if she doesn't. I heard them have an argument on the phone in Polish.

 

So, team night out comes, and we meet for a drink before meeting anyone else. She says, "I got married to escape from my Mum's influence which wasn't the best idea" and "My whole life could be different."

 

The whole night she is putting herself around me. She is falling into me and embracing me. She tells me again that she wishes her life was different and that I make her happy. Everyone else goes home. She wants to stay. We dance and we kiss. She walks me to the train station and we kiss again.

 

She tries to write it off as a drunken mistake and she won't talk about it. I say I feel like I need to and she agrees. I say that I don't think we can blame alcohol entirely for it, that it's happened because of the chemistry and that it feels like we're halfway between friendship and relationship. She agrees. She admits that she really enjoyed the kiss. I'd written down what I'd wanted to say to her and she wants to keep a copy to read over and think about.

 

The next week consists of her telling me she was never seeing me that way before. She says that something has changed between us and she recognises that but we have to re-establish our friendship. She says that the only thing she is worried about is that she will hurt me and she doesn't want to give me hope that she will leave her husband. Right after that, she pulls me aside and tells me "I just wanted to say though, that I really love your voice, I could listen to you all day...and I really love your eyes..." then we're interrupted by a colleague so she stops. The next day, because she didn't understand why I wanted to be with her, I wrote her a list of all the cute little things I loved about her. She texts me 4 times that night but the messages don't come through. The next day she seemed upset I hadn't gotten them and showed them to me. It says "Just read your letter, I love it." Then Thursday night I'm telling her how I don't like the people at her other job because they're bullying her. She tells me we can't be angry together because "Someone has to cheer me up."

 

Then Friday she cuts it off and says she isn't available and won't be available. I ask if I misread everything about her being unhappy and she tells me she was telling me things about her past and she wasn't happy for years but thinks change and "I'm happy now, I think". She doesn't seem happy, considering she tells me how she sometimes thinks it'd be easier to go to sleep and not wake up, though she wouldn't act on it. The things she was telling me weren't just about the past, they were also recent things.

 

She says that she did think 'What could be if...' but couldn't dwell on that thought.

 

When I talk to her on Monday about having feelings she says she doesn't connect with her husband the way she does me. That she can't be herself around him like me, they don't have the same sense of humour, she laughs more with me. She says that she is missing that, but she still wants to be friends.

 

This friendship will always feel like an emotional affair to me if the dynamic continues as it has been. I will always be providing her with what she isn't getting at home and she will always be confiding in me more. I will always take on the burden of worrying about her because she doesn't tell her husband these thoughts and feelings she has about life and death and everything.

 

The way she was on the night out, that kiss felt inevitable. And I consider it cheating, especially given it was with someone she has an emotional connection with. Now, I don't think I can go back to being friends. I've told her that it feels like an emotional affair.

 

It's just not sitting right with me. She freely admits she is missing something at home, that she connects with me better, laughs with me more, I cheer her up more than anyone. Is she exaggerating for attention and her marriage isn't as bad as she makes out? Am I just an emotional outlet for her to vent to? There seems to be attraction there at least, if not feelings, but it does seem like she cares about me. But on the weekends, it's like she just doesn't have time. When we first became friends she was texting always, Goodnight texts, Good Morning texts. Then it just dropped off.

 

This friendship isn't healthy for me. I don't know how to extricate myself from it, but I need to because I realised how much I missed her this weekend.

[aileD]

Yes it's an affair.

 

It's not a friendship

[Mrs. John Adams]

Yes it is...and you should break it off now before you get terribly hurt.

[Eyebrows]

I thought she had done it herself, by saying she only saw me as her best friend. Saying that the kiss and those words said when she was drunk were just caused by alcohol.

 

But she is still touching me. Playful punches when I'd been teasing her, bumping into me in mock-anger, touching my hand when I was talking about my ex. I was flirting and teasing another woman on the team (just in jest this one, she is 59, I always joke around with women around that age and they joke around back) and my friend pulled on my shirt when I was talking to her and joking about how she was going to hang me in the cupboard for teasing people.

 

I've mentioned the touching to her before and how I feel it crosses a boundary. She is doing this the day after I told her I had feelings for her.

 

Whether she has them back, or it's just attraction, whether there's no attraction, I don't know. I don't know if she's rationalising or denying anything. She seemed to be wavering, one day saying that she was thinking that I was right (about there being something between us) and then going the opposite way.

 

I've already felt pretty hurt by it.

 

But I did write her something and said that affairs don't always have to involve sex and that it's easier to justify it as doing nothing wrong. Yet still she continues.

Edited May 29, 2017 by Eyebrows

[mightycpa]

She's giving you the old push-pull treatment, and she's doing this because part of her wants you and part of her doesn't like that she wants you. Also, she's weak. She will succumb to temptation, and each time she defeats a minor adultery demon, the push-pull will go a little farther. The more physically intimate you become, the worse that's going to get, and you're going to eventually start acting completely out of character. You're also going to get hurt, time and time again in the short run, and in the long run.

 

What do you want from this woman? Are you catching feelings? You're young, you're unmarried, you should probably start dating some people to combat your affection for her. Otherwise, I have a feeling that you're going to get involved a little more than you'd like.

[DKT3]

Stop it.... I know Abit about Jehovah's Witness, there is no future, stepping away from her marriage would mean she would be excommunicated from her family.

[aileD]

Those Jehovah witnesses love their illicit affairs. The OW that messed with my husband was JW. She got kicked out of her house (she was 20), her family shunned her. They kicked her out of the church and everyone was not allowed to talk to her. All her friends were JW so she lost everyone.

 

Good luck with that.

[Eyebrows]

I don't think she goes to a Kingdom Hall or is active. Not that it matters. She doesn't have many friends and not much family.

 

How should I go about having this conversation with her? I don't want to cause an atmosphere at work.

[Eyebrows]

Well, I spoke to her today and she said there I should no attraction and no feelings, she isn't attracted to me as a man. The kiss and how much she was all over me leading up to it, she was just drunk.

 

No romantic feelings, no attraction.

 

Guess it's ended one way or another.

[harrybrown]

find someone that is not married.

 

Think about you being married and your wife cheating on you.

 

Do you feel anger towards the OM?

 

Many husbands come after the OM with a gun.

 

Save your life and move on to single women.

[Ruffian1]

She is toying with you because she can, you are much younger and inexperienced and recovering from brain surgery.

 

Stay away from this manipulator, and find a girl your own age.

[Eyebrows]

Ended this friendship yesterday, it's over.

[whichwayisup]

Ended this friendship yesterday, it's over.

 

Glad to hear you did end it.

 

No good can come of continuing with her. You'll hurt more and more as time goes on.

 

Do your best to stay in NC mode, block her on all social media and on your phone too. Stay strong.