A reader married for 20 years with two children has developed strong feelings for a teacher at their children's school. The reader and the teacher also attend a weekly non-school activity together. Nothing inappropriate has happened, and neither has acknowledged romantic feelings, but the reader wonders if the connection is mutual and what the feelings mean for their marriage.
Understanding the crush
Psychotherapist Mark Vahrmeyer said: “It’s a romantic idea that once we have found the right person we should only ever desire them. In reality, that’s not how desire works. You can love your wife, value your marriage and still find yourself drawn to someone else. The existence of the feeling does not in itself mean your marriage is failing, or there is something wrong with you.”
Vahrmeyer added that a crush “can be harmless and even enjoyable. It can feel like something private within the constraints of a committed life. The difficulty begins if you start feeding it, seeking signs that it is mutual, creating more contact or treating the fantasy as though it were already a relationship.”
The risks of acting on it
Vahrmeyer noted that the “imagined relationship” is “largely untested. You know this person only through limited, favourable circumstances, not through the demands and compromises of everyday life. They can become almost anyone you need them to be. Infatuation can make the unfamiliar seem vivid and the familiar seem dull, but that does not mean the unfamiliar would survive reality any better.”
He advised: “You do not need to deny the feeling, but nor should you test whether it is mutual. Seeking signs, creating more contact or disclosing your attraction would begin to turn fantasy into action. The task is not to repress the desire, but to contain it: to think about what it may be telling you while taking responsibility for the boundaries that protect everyone involved.”
The advice concluded that starting a relationship with a trusted “other” at the child’s school would have deep and long-lasting effects, particularly for the children.
