I Am in Love with a Married Man, Now What?

You didn't plan this.

You didn't wake up one day and decide to fall for someone who's married, emotionally unavailable, or in a relationship with someone else. You didn't choose the anxiety, the secrecy, the waiting, the wondering if this time will be different.

And yet, here you are.

Maybe it's not the first time. Maybe there's a pattern you can't quite shake, a pull toward people who can't fully meet you, who keep one foot out the door, who offer just enough to keep you hoping but never enough to feel secure.

If this sounds familiar, please know: this isn't about weakness or poor judgment. It's about what your nervous system learned to recognise as love and what it's still trying to heal.

When Unavailability Feels Like Home

There's something about unavailable people that can feel magnetic. The intensity. The longing. The way your entire nervous system lights up when they text, and crashes when they don't.

This isn't love in the way we're taught to imagine it. This is your attachment system activating: searching for connection in the only template it knows.

For many people, especially those who grew up with inconsistent caregiving, unavailable love feels familiar. Not safe, but known. Your nervous system learned early that love comes with conditions, distance, or uncertainty. That you have to chase to earn it. That closeness always comes with the risk of withdrawal.

So when someone shows up offering partial availability, married, emotionally distant, ‘not ready for commitment", your body doesn't register danger. It registers recognition.

Ah yes. This is what love feels like.

The child part of you whispers: This time will be different. This time, if I'm patient enough, understanding enough, perfect enough they'll choose me.

But here's the truth your adult self needs to hear: You're not chasing them. You're chasing the hope that this time, you'll finally be enough.

What Draws You to Someone Who's Already Taken

Let's be honest about what's happening beneath the surface.

When you fall for someone who's unavailable, whether they're married, in a relationship, or emotionally closed off, it's rarely about them specifically. It's about what they represent to your nervous system.

Unavailable people offer just enough to keep you hooked: intermittent warmth, stolen moments, the promise of “someday". This mirrors intermittent reinforcement, the same pattern that makes gambling addictive. Partial, unpredictable rewards keep you reaching, keep you hoping, keep your dopamine system activated.

Your brain learns: If I just try harder, they'll finally be fully present.

But there's something deeper happening too. Unavailable people allow you to long without risking true intimacy. You can fantasise about what the relationship could be without ever having to face the reality of sustained closeness, which, if you've been hurt before, might feel more threatening than yearning from a distance.

Ask yourself:

What does this person's unavailability protect me from?

Am I more comfortable with longing than I am with being fully seen?

Does the distance feel safer than vulnerability?

These aren't accusations. They're invitations to understand what your attachment system is trying to navigate.

The Stories You Hear (and What They Mean)

If he's married or in a committed relationship, you've probably heard some version of these explanations:

“My marriage is over in everything but name."

“We're staying together for the kids."

“She doesn't understand me like you do."

“I'm going to leave. I just need time."

These narratives serve a purpose: they make the situation feel less like betrayal and more like inevitability. They position you as the solution to his unhappiness rather than a complication to his existing commitments.

Here's what matters more than his words: his actions.

Is he actually taking steps to address his marriage, through honest conversation, separation, therapy? Or is he maintaining the status quo while telling you a different story?

If he's not being honest with his partner, what makes you believe he's being fully honest with you?

This isn't about judging him. It's about protecting yourself from a pattern where words promise one thing and actions deliver another, a dynamic that might feel painfully familiar if you grew up learning to trust promises over presence.

The Weight You're Carrying

Being the "other" person comes with an invisible burden that people rarely talk about.

There's the secrecy, the way you can't share your relationship openly, can't post photos, can't be acknowledged. There's the waiting, for his time, his attention, his “someday." There's the guilt; knowing that your happiness is tangled with someone else's pain, even if you didn't create the situation.

And there's the loneliness. You're in a relationship, but you're also profoundly alone. No one knows the full story. Friends might judge. Family might be horrified. You become isolated in your own love.

Over time, this takes a toll. Many people in these situations describe feeling:

Emotionally exhausted from the highs and lows. Ashamed for staying when they “know better". Disconnected from their own needs and values. Stuck in a holding pattern that prevents them from building a real future.

This isn't sustainable. Your nervous system can't rest in partial commitment. It needs to know: Am I safe here? Can I trust this? And when the answer is perpetually “maybe," your body stays in a state of chronic activation: anxious, hypervigilant, always scanning for signs of reassurance or rejection.

What This Pattern Is Trying to Tell You

If you find yourself repeatedly drawn to unavailable people, your attachment system is trying to tell you something.

It might be saying: I don't believe I deserve someone who can fully choose me.

Or: Being chosen feels more dangerous than longing from afar.

Or: Love only feels real when I have to fight for it.

These aren't conscious beliefs. They're templates laid down early, when your developing brain was learning what relationships look like. If love came with conditions, distance, or withdrawal, that's what your nervous system learned to recognise as “normal."

The pull toward unavailable people isn't a flaw in your character. It's your attachment system trying to resolve an old wound using a familiar strategy. You're reaching for the love you needed then, hoping to finally receive it now.

But here's the painful truth: you can't heal a childhood wound by recreating it in adulthood. You can only heal it by learning what secure, available love actually feels like and allowing yourself to receive it.

If this pattern feels familiar and you're trying to understand why you're drawn to intense or unavailable connections, this article on limerence explores how attachment and the nervous system shape attraction after trauma.

Moments of tenderness can feel deeply real, even when the relationship itself cannot fully hold you.

The Harm We Don't Always Name

Let's talk about something uncomfortable: when you're involved with someone who's married or in a committed relationship, there are other people being hurt by this situation.

His partner. Possibly his children. The life and trust they built together.

This doesn't make you a bad person. It makes you human, capable of deep feeling, worthy of love, and also participating in a dynamic that causes harm.

Holding both truths at once is difficult but necessary. You can understand why you're here, the attachment wounds, the patterns, the pull toward familiar pain and also recognise that staying contributes to a cycle of betrayal and broken trust.

If he's willing to lie to someone he made vows to, what does that tell you about how he handles discomfort, accountability, or difficult conversations? If he's choosing secrecy over honesty, what foundation are you building together?

These aren't judgment calls. They're reality checks. Understanding your own vulnerability and pain doesn't erase the impact on others and recognising that impact is part of honouring your own values.

What You Actually Deserve

You deserve someone who can choose you fully. Not in secret. Not “someday". Not in the margins of someone else's life.

You deserve someone who doesn't require you to shrink, hide or wait. Someone whose presence doesn't come with guilt or shame. Someone who shows up consistently, not just in stolen moments.

You deserve a relationship where your nervous system can rest, where you're not constantly scanning for signs of withdrawal, where closeness doesn't feel like a threat, where love doesn't require you to perform or prove your worth.

This kind of love might feel unfamiliar at first. It might even feel boring compared to the intensity of unavailable connection. But that's because your nervous system has learned to mistake anxiety for passion, uncertainty for depth.

Real love doesn't demand that you chase it. It meets you where you are and stays.

If abuse or unavailable relationships have distorted your sense of what love should feel like, this article explores what safe, mutual connection actually looks like.

Moving Toward What's Real

If you're ready to break this pattern, here's where to start.

Create space. Distance yourself from the unavailable person, not as punishment, but as protection. Your nervous system needs room to recalibrate, to remember what safety feels like without the constant pull of longing.

Get support. This isn't a pattern you can think your way out of. Work with a therapist who understands attachment wounds and can help you identify what's driving the pattern beneath the surface.

Grieve what you're releasing. You're not just letting go of this person, you're letting go of the fantasy, the hope, the version of love your younger self believed in. That grief is real and deserves space.

Notice what safety feels like. Spend time with people who are consistently available: friends, family, community. Let your nervous system learn that steady, predictable care can feel nourishing, not empty.

Examine your beliefs about love. What did love look like in your family? What did you have to do to earn affection? What happens in your body when someone is fully present and available? These questions can reveal the template you're working from.

Healing doesn't mean you'll stop feeling deeply. It means you'll start directing that depth toward people who can meet you fully, people who don't require you to sacrifice your dignity, your values, or your future for moments of connection.

A Final Word

If you're reading this and feeling shame, please know: you're not broken. You're not weak. You're not foolish for loving someone who can't fully love you back.

You're a person with attachment wounds trying to make sense of longing in the only way your nervous system learned how.

But you don't have to keep choosing this pattern. You don't have to keep hoping that unavailable love will suddenly become whole.

You can learn what secure connection feels like. You can heal the part of you that believes love requires distance, secrecy, or suffering. You can discover that being fully chosen doesn't mean losing yourself, it means finally being free to rest.

That's the work we do together, understanding why you're drawn to what hurts you, and gently guiding you toward what can actually hold you.

If you're struggling with patterns of choosing unavailable partners or trying to understand your attachment wounds, I offer trauma-informed counselling to support you.

📧 Email: kat@safespacecounsellingservices.com.au
📞 Phone: 0452 285 526