I'm In Love With My Older Coworker But Can't Get Over His Sexual History

Q: I just got out of a 3-year long relationship 6 months ago, 2 years of which were long-distance due to COVID. The relationship got extremely rocky towards the end due to a lot of conflict and self-centeredness. A week after we broke up, I drunkenly made out with a colleague from work who is 5 years older. We've been inseparable ever since and have been dating for the past 4 months. It's perfect. I feel like we're perfectly matched in emotional and intellectual compatibility. We're very understanding of each other and there's a lot of strong feelings involved. I think this is the first time I've been in love. And it's been equal parts euphoric and frightening. I wouldn't change it for the world.

However, sometimes I get carried away by thoughts of his past. I have never and will never judge anyone's sexual history. And I know it's silly to think about anyone's past when they've made abundantly clear that they love me and the sex is so fantastic. But I do find wonder about his past sexual partners, of which there have been many, compared to my two. And I think about his feelings for his ex and I burn knowing he's loved someone before me, that other hands have touched what's mine, kissed what's mine. And I guess I feel insecure because I'm younger and have little experience and worry if I'm good enough. I'm not a jealous person at all. And am usually very emotionally stoic and reserved. This man has changed me. It might be the limerence but we're obsessed with each other and spend every moment possible with each other. So how the heck do I stop my mind from going to places it has no business going?

A: I have some thoughts about this situation that might not be fun to hear. You’re not doomed if you don’t listen to me. If you ignore all of what I say and label me an Enemy of Your Perfect Love, that’s fine and probably in a few months your fixation on your partner’s past will go away on its own, or at least die down to a candle whose scent you don’t really like rather than a raging house fire of insecurity. It can be hard to want to stop and take stock of something that feels so intense. It’s much nicer to trust those feelings and get swept away than it is to listen to someone on the outside be like, “Let’s maybe not drive the new car at 94 mph on a side street?”

That said, there are some things in your letter that stood out to me as warning signs. The beginning of a relationship is chock-full of adrenaline and delusion and feel-good hormones. (You even said the magic word: limerence. It’s also known as the infatuation stage.) Somewhere between 18 months and three years, that lustful fixation will change; no relationship is exempt from that. That’s when a deeper, more complete version of love comes in. Ultimately, as corny this sounds, love is about actions, not feelings. It’s not obsession, anxiety, or euphoria as much as it’s making someone’s mom laugh in the hospital or taking the dog out in the rain because you know your partner hates doing it. It’s a lot of showing up for the boring and hard moments of life and trying to make them better.

Almost every single sentence of your letter deals in absolutes, which work fine when you’re making rules for a kindergarten classroom or giving a lecture on construction site safety. They’re not as useful when you’re describing a partnership. A relationship isn’t like a pair of jeans where you can evaluate the whole as a discrete entity and declare it “perfect.” It’s more like a house you’re building with someone by hand, and neither of you is a carpenter or contractor. A relationship is not a fully-formed thing you opted into when you started dating; it’s what you’re currently doing. Together.

You cannot tighten your grip on another person and hope that results in stronger love. Ownership is for cars and air fryers.

Which is why it’s not possible for your bond to be perfect. Nobody’s is. I have no idea what your relationship is like on the inside — I’m sure parts of it are truly wonderful. I just want you to crack some windows and let other things back into your life. It seems like you jumped from one person to the next without stopping at all to discover what you are like on your own. Without the excitement of love or the tension of conflict from your past relationship. You seem like you enjoy highs and lows, and for sure they are thrilling, but they’re also consuming. They have a way of blotting out every other part of your life: your friendships, your hobbies, your career goals, your creativity, your family.

Where are you in all of this? Not you as a partner, but you as a person. Using words like “euphoric” and “frightening” suggests to me that a huge part of the attachment you feel to this relationship is predicated on anxiety. We often mistake that feeling for excitement. Huge surges of adrenaline are hard to live up to, even when that energy spike comes from fear — fear of messing things up, fear of this ending, fear of it being too good to be true. And I’m sorry to say this, but the early surges of emotions can block you from seeing things that are important. I’m not saying you’re missing some major bad information about him, nor he about you, but I do think you’re missing some level of truth or realness about one another.

You’re not seeing each other as whole, flawed, authentic people and instead seeing each other as perfect partners. You haven’t gotten to see the full picture of him yet, nor is he getting to see the full picture of you. I think that might be part of your insecurity about his past. If what you’re offering someone is constant contact, and a life built around only you two and very little else, of course the outside feels like a threat — but that’s not healthy (nor is it sustainable). It’s not going to make for a good life. I’m sure it might not sound like it, but a life that’s exclusively about you guys and no one and nothing else will become lonely and likely dissatisfying. Think about why some people have weddings — it’s to include their loved ones because life is more full when it’s shared. You two have to stop feeling threatened by the world outside your love bubble.

I beg you to stop thinking of your partner as yours. As someone who belongs to you. I know the idea has merits and romance to it. The way you write about him, however, speaks less to belonging and more towards possession, which never pays off. You cannot tighten your grip on another person and hope that results in stronger love. Ownership is for cars and air fryers. It’s not healthy, it’s not generous, and it’s not kind — it’s limiting.

You are sharing a life together, yes, but your lives are not meant to devour each other’s. You both require outside passions, friends, responsibilities, and experiences — not because this relationship might end one day, but because you’ll both benefit from full, flourishing lives. Also, you two were drawn together (I presume) because of what you saw in each other. Isn’t that essential spirit worth nurturing?

No one person is enough to build your life around, not even Zendaya. The more you time you spend savoring your own life — chilling out with a glass of wine and an adult coloring book, watching your favorite bad TV show with your sister, signing up for weird workout classes with your best friend (trampoline bootcamp, anyone?) — the more secure you’ll feel in your relationship. The temptation to compare yourself to his past will soften. You’ll come to realize it actually has nothing to do with you.

Your job is not to figure out whether his love for you will ever wax or wane. Your job is to be here now, to discover the truth of each other slowly across the long days and hard years and fun trips and bad investments. Enjoy the present, but don’t lose yourself in the process. Get to know yourself — outside of this relationship — and work to love that person.

It’s A Pleasure appears here every other Thursday. If you have a sex, dating, or relationship question, fill out this form.