Obiwan-I agree with you about persons not necessarily giving up if their advances don't get them anywhere.
We had a teenager for a neighbor that was very free regarding her sexuality. She made advances toward nearly every man in the neighborhood, and seemed to find married men a special "challenge".When she zoned in on my husband, I tried to ignore it at first.She came from an abusive home situation, and was trying desparately to boost her ego with her affairs. I've had women pull this before, and I've learned that usually, if you just don't overreact when they hit on your partner, just look at them with amused detachment, the game tends to be not so entertaining. She, on the other hand, would not only have benefitted from a little therapy, she would also have benefitted from a little discipline. She was, in short, a spoiled rotten brat, used to manipulating people and getting her way.And if she didn't get results, she would try even harder.
I spoke with my husband about this, and told him that I understood if her behavior flattered him or tempted him. I told him I realized that just because we were married doesn't mean that we wouldn't at times be sorely tempted by other people. I asked, him, though, to imagine how he would feel if I were the one being pursued. I asked him to think about how he would feel if I gave in.He said that he made a promise to remain faithful and he intended to keep it (It wasn't such a hard thing for him to imagine, I later learned, as a much younger aquaintance of his had TOLD him that he intended to "take" me away from him. The man had indeed made advances toward me, which I rejected.I had no idea at the time that he told my husband beforehand that he was going to try it.
Unfortunately, that didn't prevent her games, and he was getting irritated by it. We finally had to tell her that she would not be permitted in our yard, and if she did come on our property, we would charge her with trespassing. I explained to her that her behavior was very inappropriate, and that if she continued it, she was likely to suffer physical and emotional consequences.I encouraged her to seek therapy to deal with her issues.She said some choice words to me and stalked off.
She tried to approach my husband a few times in public, but he made it very clear that he was not interested. She didn't think of sending him any articles in the mail.Or maybe she did, but since she was aware that I was the one that checked the mail, she didn't think it would be effective. Eventually, she gave up and started pursuing another man.There was a collective sigh of relief in the neighborhood when she moved.
The girl had told her former boyfriend that she had herpes (hence,her choice words on departure, I'm guessing).The poor guy didn't know about her proclivities until she started playing her little games while dating him (he had broken up with her quite a while before the episode with my husband).My husband told him about her advances toward him, and the man felt that he should tell my husband about the herpes, in case they had had relations.
How do you shield yourself? I don't think you can entirely. Humans are sexual beings, period. We have to live and interact with other humans, and we may find ourselves attracted to them, or them to us. Sexuality and attraction aren't "good" or "bad", they are just feelings. What we choose to DO about those feelings is what engenders closeness or causes problems.What I think helps is to think about the situation beforehand and lay down some guidelines for ourselves if we end up in such a situation.And I think (as painful as it might be) it helps to explore what the ramifications of infidelity may be-how could we handle things if our partner does have sex with someone else.
Some things we need to know is how important is sex to ourselves and our partner, and do we feel that we are giving and receiving satisfactorally in our relationship, or is there room for improvement?Realizing that sex has many facets helps. Sex can be engaged in for a variety of reasons, even within a relationship. We need to recognize and celebrate both the sacred and the earthy aspects of sexuality.
We need to explore the same thing regarding meeting the emotional needs of our mates and ourselves also, as it is often the lack of an emotional connection that causes one to stray-both women and men need to feel that they are sexy to their mate and loved by their mate.We need to be very careful of certain life passages, where this connection can be tested, like pregnancy, the death of a loved one, dealing with issues of aging, conflict over childrearing or money issues, the close of a business, loss of a job, etc.
We need to be honest and respectful. One mistake I no longer make is to think of my mate as being "taken". He has made a choice to be with me, but that isn't set in stone. I have also made him aware that this fact is appropo to me( a hard lesson for a man that was raised in an extremely patriarchal family to learn, especially with a wife he could routinely boss around when she was a JW -with the full approval of her religious leaders)!
We have, as a couple, discussed what we think would happen if either of us cheated. This came about because of a very unfortunate experience we lived through earlier in our marriage (not infidelty, but way too close for comfort). We both have different methods for handling infidelity, and we have made the other aware of it.
One thing we have learned from past mistakes is to not get complacent about our relationship. Relationships are living things that require constant nourishment. But there is also a need for us to pursue our individual interests. We have learned that we don't have to be attached at the hip, and that when we spend time away from each other pursuing hobbies that we like and the other person does not, we are much more appreciative of our relationship (absence makes the heart grow fonder).
We have also discussed how to handle our relationships with our workmates. There are certain situations we have agreed we will not get ourselves into to cut down on incidents of the sort described. For our relationship, we have decided that neither of us will take a business trip where the other mate is excluded by the company. This occurred once regarding my husband's workplace. People, all I can say is, if they tell you your mate can't come with you, even if said mate arranges for their own travel and goes at their own expense, BEWARE if they offer no explanation!! He quit that job when the boss asked him if he planned to be a family man or a company man.Both of us would quit any job if there is an environment of extreme sexual harrassment.
We will also not take trips longer than two days, or attend functions where alcohol "flows a little too freely" without our mate present. And if someone does start "coming on" to us, we make our mate aware, without naming names or giving gory details (which we've found for us leads to feelings of jealousy and is not productive).Just by the act of letting the other person know that it's occurring, we are able to reflect and be sure that our marriage is meeting our needs, so we can weather the storm.If we are at a point in our marriage where we don't feel like telling our mate about it, that's a major red flag that we need to work out whatever is wrong with our relationship at the moment.
Fortunately, since the above incident, neither of us have had any "stalkers", but both of us have encountered a couple of people who have tried initiate affairs with us this year. Usually, a simple "I'm not interested" does suffice. As the guys who are searching for a casual relationship can attest to, there isn't a sea of Bimbos and Himbos, lol.
