Moto Nomad 1250 hi,

Reading your post makes me feel angry with some SOs. How can SOs take their partners for granted in such a way that jeopardizes their marriages? Particularly if at middle age when people start examining their lives…might feel like having a rotting corpse at home when the SO becomes boring and neglectful of themselves. Sorry, if I’m blunt…

Seeing a therapist is a good start. If you don’t have children, it’s time to re-think your marriage, or confront your partner with the truth, the truth that you’re bored. I think that would get her startled and make her react in a positive way and probably try and go to therapy with you. If you have children things have to be handled more carefully if thinking of divorce. If you want to keep the marriage you’d have to start doing things together, lots of sharing hobbies. Togetherness… taking dancing classes, cooking lessons , swimming, maybe back to school at night classes for different hobbies like painting, sewing, DIY etc. That’s what me and my SO did at all times when we were younger; we even went for a spiritual journey! We were always investigating new things to do together. TV was not one of our hubbies, they were all outside activities, home, we cooked together. We even went gliding but I chickened out. We went for rides to other states checking museums, historical parks, anything of interest, the forest etc. My God, so many things to do with your SO, and the telephone and TV are keeping people locked up! Well my SO is very active, I’m a slow poke but I got to move and do things together or get bored to death. I get bored easily. After I’m rested from one thing I have to start something new next time around. I always took care of my body and looks, hair, nails , clothes etc. I still press my SO to be shaved and neat all the time. We feel alive! And we’re married 46 years now! Still looking good, except that limerence hit me last year for an old bf. But I’ll get over it, or I’ll die trying!

I noticed you’re smart and willing to try new things, so all is going to be ok . And don’t be afraid to be alone. We are how many billions now???

Good luck and best wishes for the Holidays.

Hi MotoNomad1250, thanks for sharing your story here! I can see a lot of similarities with my own story. I’ve also been with my SO for 20 years and have been limerent for a coworker for the past year, and had a year-long LE with another coworker a few years ago (they’d be LO3 and LO4 in my lifetime). And all of the things you mentioned played big roles for me – boredom with my own life, boredom with my SO and her apparent lack of interest in doing anything, decreased attraction to my SO, and being attracted to LO’s exciting lifestyle in case of LO3 (LO4’s life is actually a bit more boring than mine, so that’s not a factor this time)

I’m curious about your SO and your life together. Have you spent the last 20 years being bored with her never wanting to do anything while you always wanted to be more active? Or did she used to be more active and something changed in her recently? Or did you used to be like her, content with a slow-paced quiet life, and now in midlife you feel like you want more?

In my case it was a little of all of that. At the start of both of my last two LEs, my SO was really languishing – I’d leave for work with her still in bed and come home to find her laying on the couch half watching tv while playing on her phone, and that’s basically how she spent the majority of every day. Meanwhile LO3 was single with an exciting life with lots of travel, exciting experiences, a big circle of interesting friends, and life with her just seemed so much more exciting than life with SO.

Eventually I realized a few things. I realized that my SO had not always been like that, and that she was going through an episode of pretty bad depression, and she needed help and support, not scorn and betrayal. And I also realized that I’m actually a pretty quiet introvert who likes spending a fair amount of time at home and values time alone or just with my SO, and while LO3’s lifestyle seemed really appealing to me, deep down I knew it would have been really exhausting and unsustainable for me to try to keep up with her, because that life just isn’t for me. But of course the fantasy of this exciting life with LO3 seemed vastly superior to the reality of life with SO at that time, especially with my mind fogged by limerence.

So I’m really glad that you’re starting therapy for yourself before making any big decisions that can’t be taken back later! You are very wise for doing that. In my case, I’m now seeing a therapist, my SO is seeing a therapist, and we also have a couples counselor. And it’s helping a lot! I’m dealing with a lot of my feelings like anxiety, insecurity and midlife restlessness, my SO’s depression is significantly improved and she’s back to being a fun person who’s interested in doing a lot more stuff, and we’re enjoying our relationship a lot more now too. (It hasn’t eliminated the limerence for LO4, but at least I’m happy with my marriage now and I’m not seriously considering crossing any major boundaries with LO4, which is a major improvement compared to a year ago!)

I’m also curious – do you have many friends? Or has it mostly just been you and your SO over the years? For me, I tend to not have a close circle of friends and my SO was pretty much my main activity partner for most of my life, so when she got depressed and withdrawn it really affected my ability to go out and do fun things, much more than it would’ve affected me if I’d had a big circle of guys friends that I routinely did stuff with. Reading your posts, I get the impression it might be that way for you too?

I’m sorry, MotoNomad1250, it’s hard when your LO is more interesting than your SO. Will your SO allow you freedom to pursue your interests? Mine lets me do fun stuff even if it doesn’t interest him. Wanna hear something funny? My SO started running because I love running. He is getting good at it. I think he was motivated because some of my running friends are attractive males. My SO decided he should keep himself involved. He attends all of my races and he is the best pit crew anyone could ask for. If you start pursuing your interests, your SO might surprise you and join in.

Limerence can cause a person to devalue their spouse. You might be going through a temporary phase of devaluing your spouse. It would be unfortunate if you made permanent changes because of your limerence.

2020 and pandemic have had some heinous and long lasting effects on a lot of people. Before the pandemic started my wife and I would at least take a weekly date night. Sometimes go out more than once a week. Of course when the pandemic started we had to abandon that. But for a while we still spent time together. Go get carry out and eat in our bedroom together for a “date”.

In the ensuing years my wife has gotten more agoraphobic. I can rarely get her to leave the house. And if she does it’s because we need to go to the store and she’s the designated driver. I’ve actually knowingly drank when I know we need to go to the store just so she has to take me. Even if it is to the grocery store, we get to go out together. So I very much understand you. This is one of the longest running lows she has been in due to her bipolar.

Now SHE was ever the energetic and driven person. We too were co-workers. Though she has since left leaving me in NC. Which is a good thing.

Since HER departure I have been trying with small things one at a time to get my wife more motivated to do things. I don’t try to push her, but just gently nudge her from time to time. I have also engaged our youngest son playing online video games with him in the evenings after work to pass the time. So maybe my wife will see us having fun together and get motivated to engage herself.

Best of luck to you MotoNomad. I hope that your wife and you can connect again and be a couple. It’s really scary when you start seeing them as a room mate and not your spouse.

Thanks for your message.

Yes, I definitively need to discover (and rediscover) new hobbies. The thing is that it’s sad having to do them alone because my SO doesn’t have to drive to do anything other than staying at home.

I now I shouldn’t compare my LO with my SO, but through this I have realized what I’m really missing from my SO. I feel jealous of all the things they do.

Another problem is that my physical attraction to my SO has been fading over the past weeks and I barely feel the need to fix our relationship.

The only reason I haven’t broken up with her is because of my fear of being alone, hurting her or regretting it in the future.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to see my therapist. Hopefully he can help me.

Welcome MotoNomad1250! I’m so glad you joined us. Let’s talk about a few things from your post…

You held hands with your LO? What were you thinking?!? Okay, I got that out, now let’s move on.

You are bored. You need a new hobby. I will suggest a few. My LO2 loves hiking and backpacking. My LO3 loves motocross, basketball, strength training and distance running. Lost in Space does triathlons. Adam likes to go for walks and play video games with his sons. Mila recently started running. I think Speedwagon plays guitar. I love distance running. You could say that I am addicted to it. I am recovering from a 50-mile ultra marathon so I can’t do long runs right now. It makes me sad when I think about it. I can do long bike rides and hikes. I can also do aerobics without a problem which is kind of weird. Anyway, does any of that sound fun? What do you like? Oh, I almost forgot to mention that my SO loves to sing (his voice is incredible), do home projects and ride his bike. What do you like? It’s time to try something exciting. Maybe beekeeping? Do you like bees?

My favorite things that make me happy are gratitude, sunshine and exercise.

I hope you find something you like.

Our connection has grown deeper over the past year, transitioning from colleagues to close friends. We share daily routines, coffee breaks, lunches, and engage in personal conversations during and outside office hours, even on vacation. We occasionally engage in playful teasing, and my messages may have a flirtatious tone, which she seems to enjoy.

During our company’s Christmas party, we had a bit to drink, danced together, and even left the party holding hands, although we didn’t cross any boundaries. The next days were literally hell for me. After arguing with my partner about unrelated matters, I got very very close to considering ending the relationship. My limerant brain obviously telling me that in that case me and my LO were finally able to get together.

However, today at lunch time, something in my mind just clicked. My LO really is into travelling and explained to me all the different trips she has done with her partner. At that point I realized that she is very happy with him and isn’t interested in anything but a sincere friendship.

So I started analysing why I got limerent for her and realised that I’m extremely bored. My partner doesn’t really enjoy anything but staying at home watching Netflix. She’s not into travelling, we don’t have any hobbies together, not even shared friends. The most exciting thing we do is going out for dinner once or twice a month.

Realising that my LO isn’t available and that the root cause of my limerence is my unhappy relationship, dissipated a lot of my limerence. I felt like I did when I discovered the concept of limerence here. Having identified the cause at least gives me the chance to address it. Although it has always been in front of my eyes, I just realised today.

I’ve got an appointment with my therapist soon to begin addressing this. Maybe I can fix my relationship or find the courage to start a new life chapter.

Sorry for the long post, I’ve tried to keep it short. I just wanted to share this because just writing it down and sharing it with other people feels therapeutic. Hopefully it also helps others the overcome their limerence.

I’ve been sufficiently over my LO for a couple of years now and found a lot of purpose and flow in my work + having a great relationship, but in the recent months works has become more at more frustrated as I’ve been getting close to burnout + there have been some relationship issues.

At the same time, I’ve gotten in touch again with my LO on social network when I noticed her due being contacted by a common friend. I haven’t had the desire to contact her while things were going well for me.

I feel I have done the same – it’s like an awakening in some way even after going through so much pain I feel I really appreciate the simple things of like what you said, just being alive and connecting to the world around me. Well done on your road to recovery xx