Obsessed with co-worker

I have been working with a women for almost 14 years now. I think I have had a crush on her from day one. We are both married. She is two years younger than me and we are in our 50s. Over the last year we have been working more closely. I never let her know how I feel and she has never given me any indication that she likes me, I think.

The problem is that six months ago I found out she had an affair with someone in the office about 10 years ago. Since then, I've been thinking there is a chance. I think about her all day long. First thing in the morning when I wake up and last thing at night before I sleep. We have socialized outside the office a few times with our spouses. She is very smart, sexy, classy and pretty. She is one of the only women I know that doesn't talk a lot.

My wife is a negative person. Doesn't like to travel, finds fault with people and isn't fun to be with. I always have fun with my work friend. I don't know if I love my wife anymore but wouldn't divorced. She would be crushed and I wouldn't do that to her.

I really want to put this obsession to an end and have tried but I just can't get her out of my mind.

My question is do I tell my work friend how I feel or just keep suffering?

Hi, I would be careful of letting the cat out of the bad so to speak.

Do you think you could try to make your marriage work again? Maybe get some marriage counselling and try to put fun make into your marriage.

It could be that your wife is struggling with her own mental health and needs support.

Unless you found out from this woman that she had an affair, you cannot consider it anything but a rumour. Please don't put her in that situation again. People don't always go headfirst into affairs, but are weak and find themselves falling into them. She may have been involved in an affair before, but it's unfair of you to tempt her into that again.

As for your suffering, I think you need to work on why you're suffering. You said you don't know if you love your wife anymore. Is it fair of you to 1) go willingly into an affair or 2) not give her a choice to be with someone who does love her? Does she love you? Verity is correct - your wife may be dealing with her own mental health concerns. Perhaps you could open up dialogue with her.

You are in a difficult position - trust me, I know. But sometimes we need to look past our own selfish needs and desires. I don't look poorly upon those who have affairs. There is often a complicated situation behind every story. But we all need to look on the other side of the room to see who we might be hurting.

I would think about all of the ways this could go wrong before doing anything. What would happen if she wasn't interested and reported you to HR? What would happen if your coworkers found out? Or your wife? Or her husband?

My coworker dating experiences have been awful. In one situation, I eventually became the person's boss. His job was eliminated and a transfer to my department kept him employed. If the company had known we had dated, they wouldn't have permitted the transfer and he would have lost his job.

We were no longer dating, but either one of us could have been fired for violating company policy which prohibited dating between superiors/subordinates in that case. It was extremely stressful.

In another workplace, the company owner had an affair with a customer in another country. She wrote off all the travel as a business expense for ten years. When the partnership split up, the other partner informed both spouses, all employees, some customers, and the tax authorities about the affair.

Personally, I would search harder for a way to end the obsession rather than introduce more complications. Could you transfer departments? Make a list of her flaws and remind yourself of them whenever you have lustful feelings? Good luck. It's a tough situation.

Thank you to all for your thoughfull comments. I hadn't thought about a lot of those things.Blinded by love I guess. Especially the part of her being a victim. We work at a small company so there is no transferring. We are both on the same level. We are basically second in command to the bosses. I will try all those things to change my feelings.

I'm grateful for this forum to be able to get feedback from unbaised people.