A
female
age
36-40,
*asySTon
writes:I’m married (unhappily) and to cut a long story short I slept with someone I work in a team with. We had sex 4 times over the space of a year, last year. He is now my manager!! Before we had sex, we were very friendly. Now we barely speak. There are so many social occasions with my work and when we’re all out, he’ll openly flirt with another member of our team. He’ll look over quite a lot but rarely go out his way to talk to me. He made a comment last week when we were all out ‘do you remember this place?’ as it was the place we first kissed then he waltzed off to talk to someone else. I’m not proud of what I did but I feel I am losing my mind. I have to see him every day. I don’t know what I expected of him with me being married. It just hurts so much knowing he doesn’t want me. I’m not shy in my work so I will chat and have fun with my other team mates and he’ll do the same but never with one another. I feel like I have to put on such an act every day, pretending I don’t care. I’ve deleted him of all social media but I can’t leave my job. I just don’t understand why it’s so hard and I don’t understand what I’ve done to him to warrant not speaking to me unless he has to.
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reader, anonymous, writes (24 November 2019): It's good that things have gone back to a professional relationship at your workplace. It was a regrettable indiscretion; and nothing could come of it anyway, if you're still with your husband. It is clear you will receive no favoritism or bias from your fling turned manager.
If you offer someone sex, and there was no real emotional-connection before the sex-act; it is unlikely spontaneous love will occur. As usual, it is likely a woman will attach emotion to sex; where the man simply enjoyed it for the sake of pleasure. Although women can definitely enjoy sex without any emotional-attachment; men are more emotionally-adapted and socially-conditioned to it.
Now take the wasted attention and energy you are focusing on your co-worker; and direct the effort towards your husband and your marriage. Maybe it is salvageable. If it is as unhappy as you say it is; then work on ending it, so you will be free to pursue romance as a single-woman.
Unrequited feelings or infatuation can go one of two directions. They can fester, and evolve into an obsession; or they'll fizzle, and just fadeaway.
You can keep submitting to the cravings and basking in the soap opera drama; which are most likely coming from an overdeveloped sense of entitlement, and most definitely sparked by resentment for being ignored. Otherwise, you can just decide enough is enough...and give-up! If you really feel you're losing your self-control, and the suppressed-resentment might result in an outburst at work; get some counseling-therapy. You are trying to find a source of affection and attention; but avoid the emotional-discourse of a divorce. Thereby, having your proverbial cake and eating too! It just ain't gonna happen, my dear!
You'll reap what you sow. If you don't learn from mistakes, you'll repeat them; with the negative outcome becoming progressively worse. You'll also face the consequences and pay a price for foolish actions you know will lead to trouble down the road, but stubbornly indulge yourself anyway.
A
female
reader, anonymous, writes (23 November 2019): Um you slept with him and you stayed married. You used him. And yet you want him to chase after you?
How long are you going to stay in a marraige you dont want to be in? What purpose does that serve? How much more of your life and your husband's life are you going to waste?
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A
female
reader, Honeypie  + ♥, writes (23 November 2019):
 My guess is HE is hurt but the fact that you used him. Because you did. You didn't start stuff with him because of HIM, but because your marriage isn't/wasn't working.
People who FEEL used, can carry resentment for a long time.
As far as he goes, you made your bed and now you have to lie in it, I know it sucks, but really... what did you expect when you first decided to MAKE the choice to hook up with a coworker?
I think the BEST thing you can do is to ACT professional and yes, if you ACT like you no longer care, then SO BE IT. And stop focusing on HIM but on YOUR own life, future and well, HUSBAND.
Second piece of advice? SORT out your life. Do you WANT to continue to be married? If so, you and your husband needs to figure out what is wrong, where it went wrong and HOW to fix it. You can't do that alone. It will take effort of BOTH your behalf.
If you two can't make the marriage work, you both know what would be the next logical step.
TAKE some responsibility for your own actions, your life and your marriage.
PS. Cheating on your spouse RARELY help anyone, least of all the marriage.
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A
female
reader, Youcannotbeserious + ♥, writes (23 November 2019):
 If ever there was a cautionary tale about why you should NOT mix work and sex. This is exactly why you will see, time and time again, aunts and uncles on this site advising AGAINST getting involved romantically/sexually with work colleagues. When it all goes pear-shaped, you still have to work with these people.
As to why your manager is being so off with you, only he knows. You don't say how the fling ended but my guess would be he suddenly realized there was no future in it. Perhaps he is embarrassed that he gave in to temptation. Perhaps he is worried you will expect preferential treatment because of your "history". Perhaps he thinks YOU are being off with him?
Now for the IMPORTANT bit of your post: your marriage. Why are you unhappy? What are you doing to fix/sort it? If it is something which can be fixed, you should be working at fixing it. If not, you should be looking to end the marriage and move on. Filling your head with thoughts of your manager is pointless. Sort out your marriage, one way or the other. Then you will have a real chance at happiness.
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