11 years 2 kids thought I wanted it over but now I want him back?! Or do I?

[blueyedbabes23]

Got out of an 11 1/2 year relationship back in Nov, 2010 because I wasn't happy anymore. Met my ex the day after I turned 17. Have two beautiful children, a son who is 7 and a daughter who is 3. Never married. And never had the most solid of relationships until about 7 years into the 11 1/2 years. Probably around the time I became pregnant with my daughter. Bought our first home in November of 2008. Only true relationship I had ever had.

 

I left in November for many reasons. I didn't feel happy anymore. He still acted like he was 21, smoking pot, drinking about 50-60 beers a week, and I was past that point in my life. Hated when he wanted to touch me cause he only bathed every 2-3 days, teeth were turning black from lack of care, like all I could see were his faults and I cringed when he wanted to be intimate with me. I was also having an affair with a co-worker for the prior three months and felt like he had all the qualities I was looking for and feelings were starting to develop. I started having the affair after I begged and begged for my ex to please change, stop the bad habits, have better hygene, i would cry and cry. I started turned to a co-worker and friend and then we started having an emotional affair which turned in a physical one from it.

 

When I left my ex kept begging for me back that he would change. But we busted up before and I went right back, over the same reasons, and he would change for a few weeks but then right back to the same stuff. I told him I needed proof that he was changing and we needed to take time to make this right. In the meanwhile I was growing closer to the other man and developing feelings for him. After the first of the year, we split our bank accounts, I took my name off the utilities, and I seperated bascially everything we had except for the mortgage on the house which we are unable to currently do. I was trying to move on with my life because he wasn't changing, he was still partying and I couldnt live that life anymore.

 

In February about 3 months after the seperation, we split all the furniture, and moved everything I wanted out. He begged me even then to come back and I wouldn't. He told me I would be making the biggest mistake of my life and I didn't see it. Shortly after this, maybe a week, my ex had a serious breakdown. He was commited to the ward at the hospital for 4 days. Begging me to come back. I would go see him everyday and took him there and brought him home. When he came home, he begged me again please come back. I told him I would start seeing him once a week, we would do a family thing, us and kids and take it slow and see what happened. Within a week, he was smoking pot again, drinking and wrecked his car I believe from drinking. I threw the towel in completely at that point. I told him to forget it. I was done, to move on and let it be.

 

Then middle of March comes around. After I pushed him away so much he finally started to change. Gave up the drugs, cut back on the drinking, started going to church on the weekends with the kids, joined a support group and more. He was finally doing everything I had begged him for so long to do. He joined an online dating forum and met a woman with 3 kids. When I found this out, all of a sudden my whole attitude changed. I wanted my man back. I had a long talk with him about the man I was seeing. About how this is what I wanted all along, but he made it clear he had moved on. He was past trying to get me back and was tired of how I treated him when he needed me the most. I was broken. I became very depressed. I started to pull away from the guy I had been seeing, I didnt know what I was feeling or doing. A month has now gone by and he is still seeing this other woman and I am seeing my other man, but I can not stop thinking about my ex. I want him back so badly, the new man, the man I wanted all along, but he has been seriously progressing with this new woman in his life. She is spending the night in the home we owned, sleeping in the bed we shared. They spend every chance they can get together, she is having dinner with my ex and my children and he is introducing her to his friends.

 

Why is it now that I want him back? OR do I even really? He is happy with this new woman, even though its only been about 6 weeks. Hes made it clear he is over me. It has been 5 months since our break up. I can see ive given him plenty of time to move on. Is there any hope that I can get him back or have I done all the damage and need to accept it that hes changed and he will give the man I wanted him to be to another woman. I would walk away from the man I am seeing in a heartbeat because what I have with him will never compare to what I had with my ex. Will my family always be a broken home, I really dont know what to feel or do. I am so torn. I am so bitter to him since hes met this new woman and slammed the door in my face. Though I slammed it on him for 4 months I guess now I realize what I must have been making him feel.

 

Sorry so long, my head is all messed up. I think about everything around the clock and I am just looking for advice on what to do. Get over my ex, start a new life with my new boyfriend, accept the fact Ill have my children during the week and not on weekends, and accept hes now a changed man. Or do I figure out a way to get him away from this new woman and make this thing work? Ugh, I just dont know!

[carhill]

My best advice is to continue to be single, being with this BF if you must, although I personally feel it's healthier to heal alone, and then re-evaluate in a year. Your ex isn't going to change his elemental psychology, the one which impelled him to drink and use drugs, overnight, in a week or by meeting a supposedly wonderful lady. He's just in the honeymoon phase and those drugs have supplanted the external ones.

 

Is your BF aware of your feelings for your ex? Would you like it if you were all-in and he was pining away over an ex? My exW divorced me over a similar type situation. I respect her for that. I hope you respect your BF enough to be straight with him.

 

Read the thread in my signature for tips on how to heal. Remaining engaged emotionally with your ex, tracking his moves and social interactions will end up delaying your healing. Yes, you must co-parent, so confine your focus to that.

 

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