Dear Therapist,
A couple of years ago I married a wonderful woman after living with her for a few years. I am a man in my 70s, and my wife is a few years older than me. She has an older sister who is on her third marriage and has a reputation in my wife’s family for being flirtatious and extremely manipulative. She has been living far away from us and visits three or four times a year.
My sister-in-law never paid any unusual attention to me until my wife and I married. But after that, every time she visited, she would single me out for compliments, saying I was “cute” and trying to find reasons to touch me. For example: “Your hair is so pretty. Let me touch it.” That progressed to putting an arm around my shoulders and then coming up to me and putting both arms around my neck while facing me. I never gave her any encouragement or positive reaction.