I Fell In Love With Someone After My Engagement

I am engaged but attracted to someone else and that is creating a storm in my life. I belong to a very orthodox family. My sister and I are engaged to two brothers of the same family of our caste. We got engaged two years back. I tried to fall in love with that guy. But I couldn’t; however, the guy loves me.

Slowly I started liking a guy from another caste. I told my parents about him. But they are strictly against it they are not ready to meet him. They don’t believe in love. It was a shock for them that I fell in love with someone after my engagement and that too he is not from our caste.

They are not willing to accept the fact that that I am engaged but I fell in love with someone else. they are saying things like this just cannot happen. It’s unacceptable to them.

I Am Engaged But Attracted To Someone Else

My parents knew that I didn’t like the person they got me engaged to, but they told me to give it a try, and in some time, I would fall in love with him. But I couldn’t.

My parents oppose my falling in love after my engagement because he is from another caste, and also they do not believe in love. They feel there is nothing like love. Love is a feeling for a few days, and then everything is gone. They are entirely against an inter-caste marriage.

Seeing them so upset I had told them that I would leave the guy I am in love with and I am unable to leave him.

I am unable to leave the one I love

I know he really loves me, and I also love him. And the person I am engaged to doesn’t know anything about this. Breaking up the engagement with him will also bring complications to my sister’s life.

Despite that, only my sister is supporting me. All my other family members are against it. My brother, mother and father are still in shock because they never expected something like this from me.

Related Reading: How Can I Fall In Love With Someone Else When I Am Happily Married?

I don’t want to hurt my parents

I don’t want to hurt my parents. It’s tough for them to believe that I have done something like this. I can understand their situation. Being two sisters engaged to two brothers makes the sitaution more complicated.

Is it my fault that I fell in love with someone after my engagement? Is it normal to fall in love with someone else while in a relationship? Is having feelings for someone else cheating? Can you love someone but be with someone else?

What should I do? Please help.

Dear Lady,

Your query has different tangents to it.  I can understand the dilemma you are facing, but you need to look at the larger picture. Let’s take a look at the case from different angles so that you gain some clarity.

Challenges of marrying in another caste

While it is okay that you love everything about the other guy now,  a different caste entails difference in dressing,  food habits, language, behaviour and way of life. Can you adjust with these differences life long?

Four lives are at stake

Your sister’s life is also at stake here. When you knew you are not ready for arranged marriages, why didn’t you put your foot down at the beginning itself? 

Why did you allow yourself to fall in love after the engagement?  Have you done the right thing? Please rethink.

Your parents must be shattered

Now that four lives are at stake,  your parents would be tense. What you have done could have been handled better by talking to them before the engagement.

It’s not about hurting them, and instead, it’s about acting with wisdom and tact.

Is it normal to fall in love with someone else while in a relationship?

To answer this question of yours I would say “yes”. This all goes back to the childhood. If you have grown up with fear and insecurity in your parental home and you have felt unsafe and abandoned it is possible for you to fall in love with someone one else while in a connection .

You might be committed but still fall for someone else because you would feel incomplete and this feeling can be traced back to toxic parenting. .

You tend to build connections outside your primary relationship if you are a people pleaser, or have codependent tendencies.

This is possible but I won’t say it’s normal. Because there is a sense of loneliness, incompleteness that would keep following you no matter how many attachments you get into.

Related Reading: 11 Signs You Are In A Codependent Marriage

Is having feelings for someone else cheating?

If your primary connection is not fulfilling then you can develop feelings for someone else which could be emotional, spiritual, physical and even financial. It takes two to tango. If one partner is not willing to work on the issues in the relationship, the other partner gives up and goes beyond the primary relationship and finds fulfillment.

If there is sex outside primary connection it is cheating. If you develop an emotional connection it is called emotional cheating.

But if your partner isn’t willing to work on the emotional connection with you, then you can have a close connection with someone to keep your sanity. As a psychologist I won’t be judgmental about it.

If you are trying to find serial connections be it emotional or sexual, outside your primary relationship it is a cause for concern.

Can you love someone but be with someone else?

I think most of the people are doing this in their marriages. You are unfulfilled in your marriage and feel stuck in it. It’s a very common thing to love someone and live with someone else.

When you live with a person and meeting the other person for half an hour these are two different things. Unless you live with them you won’t know if the relationship will work.

Even the best of love falters when you start living with them. If you understand your own responses you will be very careful in choosing what you want.

People want the extra marital and their marriage and want to keep it going. As psychologists we are no one to judge them but we show the scenario that could come up if they balance their lives on two boats and then, leave them with their choice.

I can only say that there are people who go through tremendous amount of torture in a primary relationship, then if someone supports them genuinely and helps them out, such a connection is fulfilling. I would not call it cheating.

If it’s a codependent connection, when the need is fulfilled it might lose its relevance. But living with someone and being in love with someone else is a common thing. This happens to almost 8 out of 10 people.

Talk to all people concerned

If you want to ensure that you are with the person you love you have to talk to everyone connected with this event and try to make them see where your happiness lies. It is not going to be easy. But please do this only after understanding what it is you want.

The thrill of romance can sometimes spoil a prospective good relationship. Think carefully.

Good Luck

Kavita Panyam

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