Using an old account for this for obvious reasons.
I have a crush on my coworker. I am also married so I hope it goes nowhere (I would absolutely never make the first move; for it to “go anywhere” she would have to make the first move and I’d have to have a moment of weakness).
I feel awful about this. On one hand it’s tormenting me bc society raises you to believe that you’re supposed to fall madly in love with someone, marry them and then be completely incapable of feeling anything for anyone else for the rest of your life. On the other hand, having a crush is a rush of feel good brain chemicals when you interact with them, so part of me doesn’t want it to go away yet.
Posting this bc the research I’ve done says that this is normal, but I never see it talked about, which made me feel even worse at first. Hopefully someone struggling with this too sees this and knows they aren’t alone.
There was someone at my old job who I sometimes felt like she was flirting with me, but I’m very sure she’s just nice to everyone and has learned from early on that if you look at men a certain way and talk to them a certain way, they tend to hang on your words and want to help you out. She is very pretty, engaging and fun, but that was the beginning and end of it. Younger me would have been completely and utterly smitten but by the time I met her I could tell what the score was.
I don’t even think she’s flirting with me, but I feel connected to her for some reason. Ig it’s bc we bond over our mental health struggles, and I don’t know many other people who are comfortable with being as open about it as she is.
Believe me, when I first caught feelings I did everything I could to convince myself that it wasn’t real. I have a mental disorder (being vague here on purpose) that makes me process crushes differently than people without it, so I hung onto that for a while.
No need to be vague about mental illness. I am pretty open about mine as I’m bipolar. Mental illness is a no-fault condition and should be neither shameful nor taboo.
Using an old account for this for obvious reasons.
I have a crush on my coworker. I am also married so I hope it goes nowhere (I would absolutely never make the first move; for it to “go anywhere” she would have to make the first move and I’d have to have a moment of weakness).
I feel awful about this. On one hand it’s tormenting me bc society raises you to believe that you’re supposed to fall madly in love with someone, marry them and then be completely incapable of feeling anything for anyone else for the rest of your life. On the other hand, having a crush is a rush of feel good brain chemicals when you interact with them, so part of me doesn’t want it to go away yet.
Posting this bc the research I’ve done says that this is normal, but I never see it talked about, which made me feel even worse at first. Hopefully someone struggling with this too sees this and knows they aren’t alone.
Thanks for your honesty.
There was someone at my old job who I sometimes felt like she was flirting with me, but I’m very sure she’s just nice to everyone and has learned from early on that if you look at men a certain way and talk to them a certain way, they tend to hang on your words and want to help you out. She is very pretty, engaging and fun, but that was the beginning and end of it. Younger me would have been completely and utterly smitten but by the time I met her I could tell what the score was.
I don’t even think she’s flirting with me, but I feel connected to her for some reason. Ig it’s bc we bond over our mental health struggles, and I don’t know many other people who are comfortable with being as open about it as she is.
Well, at least you’re being honest self and not being cognitively dissonant. Honestly is always the best course of action.
Believe me, when I first caught feelings I did everything I could to convince myself that it wasn’t real. I have a mental disorder (being vague here on purpose) that makes me process crushes differently than people without it, so I hung onto that for a while.
No need to be vague about mental illness. I am pretty open about mine as I’m bipolar. Mental illness is a no-fault condition and should be neither shameful nor taboo.
No, I’m being vague about it bc it’s basically a personality trait of mine that I tell to everyone, so it could be used as an identifier.
Ah okay. I can respect that.