afraid its too late

[jaskat1919x]

I (27, nb) have gone through a lot of big changes this past year. Ive found something I am extremely passionate about, good at and has helped grow my confidence immensely as a person. I also ended up meeting someone (27, m) a little over a year ago and fell madly in love with them.
They currently live halfway across the country from me. I have struggled a LOT with being able to balance my passion and having an LDR but when we would visit eachother it felt so perfect. Ive been through a string of awful abusive relationships ever since I started dating and have a lot of familial trauma. I for the first time not only was with someone who made me feel safe, treated me well and felt like they genuinely loved and cared about me, I also felt for the first time in my life a desire to have a family and potential child. I cant imagine having that with anyone else.
He has 1 child currently and we started dating while he was still going through a rough breakup with the mother of his child who was extremely manipulative and abusive toward him. I helped him heal from that relationship and he told me time and time again how much he has learned to trust and communicate and be happy again, how he has also never been treated so well and wants a family and to spend the rest of his life with me.
He came up with the idea of wanting to take his daughter and move out here and we talked about it for months. He is the primary caregiver of his daughter who is 3, and helped raise a child the mother had from a different man who is 5. The mother takes care of the 5 year old. It became increasingly difficult to balance my extremely busy and draining schedule with an LDR and I got frustrated with how it didnt really seem he was making any steps to come out here despite saying he wanted to. He talked about it with the mother a couple times with varying responses and then talked to her a third time and she said no she is not comfortable so he asked me if I would be willing to move with him. I said no and was frustrated because I have a lot going on here and a lot of ties and responsibilities regarding my passion we ended up talking less and less until finally I said I dont think I could do it anymore and didnt want to put him through anymore stress and not getting the attention he deserves.
He agreed and we "broke up" but still clearly had feelings for eachother and would go between not talking and talking again and feeling like nothing had changed.
Eventually, about a couple weeks ago, he talked to me about how he had started having feelings for his childs mother again that he thought might be reciprocated (she just dumped the guy she left him for) and that hit me hard. I ended up crying and we talked on the phone for hours about how we still love eachother and it felt like we might work things out.
A week or so goes by and I get extremely busy again and dont talk much. He messaged me a few times and I didnt respond due to mental and physical exhaustion (he knows what I do is a lot) and finally while im out in the middle of something he texts me again about his confused feelings. I end up saying "I dont want to hold you back go be with her" essentially being very emotionally overwhelmed. I regret that and later ask if we can talk on the phone. He says hell try to call me later but it doesnt happen.
Fast forward to this saturday, we hadn't talked since then and I go through something incredibly ed up and traumatizing. I witnessed a shooting and man dying out on the street and it sent me over the edge. I spent a day completely numb and then the next night I let it all out. I have a breakdown and cry for hours thinking about how that could have been me and the trauma of the past year and what ive been doing catches up to me and I realize I cant keep going like this. I want a family. I NEED a family. And I still love him. I text him I miss you while extremely upset.
I need to talk to my best friend and my love and get comfort and tell him my outpouring of emotions. He responds with "I miss you too... But I should let you know I talked with childsmother and we both agreed to try things out again slowly and see where it goes."
That sent me over the edge and I asked him to call me because I was hyperventilating at some point. He did and didnt really know what to say and just made sure I could calm down a little and not have an asthma attack. He said "I know youre going through a lot recently" and I said "I dont want it anymore I just watched someone die!" He I guess had unfollowed me on FB to get over me and had no idea that had happened till I said that... He had to take care of his daughter and I felt like so I let him go.
We ended up texting more and I explained to him how much that ed me up especially him not telling me until I am in a LOT of pain even though he didnt know at the time. We ended up talking more and I basically told him that when I texted him "I miss you" I was going to tell him I want to be with him and Id be willing to sacrifice my life here to do that. I dont have a lot tying me here and I can continue my passion where he is. He had no idea of course and now its this ed up situation where I feel like a homewrecking piece of and he's confused again.
I asked to talk on the phone one more time because I NEED to get this off my chest. If he is done with this I will respect that but I need to tell him how im feeling and why. I need to know if theres a chance. I want a family with him. In afraid now because of my own dumb inaction and inability to process my emotions due to constant stress and mental illness that chance is gone. What would you do? How would you approach this? How wrong am I for pursuing this?

TLDR my LDR partner and I broke up due to unfortunate circumstances despite still loving eachother very deeply and I recently had an intense moment of clarity and am willing to sacrifice moving to him and make it work but he has now initiated a relationship with his ex who is the mother of his child

[elaine567]

Whatever is going on with you is actually immaterial as on his end he has got renewed feelings for his ex who is the mother of his child.
You can't change that and as there is a child involved, who needs it's Dad, then why would you want to?
You had your chance it didn't work out. 
Now your head is messed up, you NEED him.
That is no basis for a good relationship.
You need to get your head back on straight, get professional help to deal with the traumatic event you witnessed, and move on.
He is no therapist, just a guy who will probably grow to resent you for splitting up his family.

[ExpatInItaly]

What does it mean when you say he was "going though" a break-up with her when he started dating you?

Was he over-lapping relationships? That's what it sounds like, I'm afraid to say. It's not a good starting point for any relationship because it tells you he had unfinished emotional business with her from the very beginning. 

Consequently, the relationship between you two always had an expiration date on it. 

[Wiseman2]

52 minutes ago, jaskat1919x said:

 (27, nb)

constant stress and mental illness 

The best thing to do is make sure you are getting care and follow up for your mental health from your doctors and therapists.

If you witness something and have severe traumatic stress, you need to go to an ER.

A long distance cyberpal who's in another relationship can't help you with this.

[jaskat1919x]

1 hour ago, elaine567 said:

Whatever is going on with you is actually immaterial as on his end he has got renewed feelings for his ex who is the mother of his child.
You can't change that and as there is a child involved, who needs it's Dad, then why would you want to?
You had your chance it didn't work out. 
Now your head is messed up, you NEED him.
That is no basis for a good relationship.
You need to get your head back on straight, get professional help to deal with the traumatic event you witnessed, and move on.
He is no therapist, just a guy who will probably grow to resent you for splitting up his family.

I want to be clear at no point was there any plan of separating him from his child, ive developed a relationship his daughter that I value very much and he is the one who talked about moving here with her. The mother wasnt in the picture for a while and now that has changed.

[jaskat1919x]

1 hour ago, ExpatInItaly said:

What does it mean when you say he was "going though" a break-up with her when he started dating you?

Was he over-lapping relationships? That's what it sounds like, I'm afraid to say. It's not a good starting point for any relationship because it tells you he had unfinished emotional business with her from the very beginning. 

Consequently, the relationship between you two always had an expiration date on it. 

They were broken up when we started talking but still living together. It was not a great situation.

[ExpatInItaly]

49 minutes ago, jaskat1919x said:

They were broken up when we started talking but still living together. It was not a great situation.

No kidding. 

He wasn't done with her. Next time, don't bother with men who are still living with their exes. Huge red flag. 

[elaine567]

59 minutes ago, jaskat1919x said:

They were broken up when we started talking but still living together. It was not a great situation.

Seems to me you got into a LDR with an attached man, who when the chips were down decided to stick with his supposedly "crazy and abusive" ex and their children.
You were the "other woman" and he fed you a whole load of BS to keep you hanging around until he ran out of options...

[Mystery4me]

There's no 'unfortunate circumstances' that caused you to break up. It's the fact that he wants to be with the mother of his child as opposed to with you.

Sounds like he never truly broke up or got over her, and you were a rebound that made him realise he still wants to be with her.

You are wasting your time with him. Next time don't get involved with someone who is not completely moved on from their past relationship, let alone still living with them!

[stillafool]

I agree with Mystery that he wanted to be with his child's mother and probably never got over her but was trying to move on through you.  Even if you had accepted his first offer to move there something would have come up on his part to prevent it.  He probably didn't know that his ex wanted him back then but does now and he wants her back.  You probably should block him also so you can move on.  I think a therapist would be of great help to you.

[ShyViolet]

You're in love with a man who is not available.  He is getting back together with his child's mother and he's halfway across the country.  I know you feel that you need him in your life,  but it's really not up to you.  You have to face the situation for what it is.

You sound like you are in a very emotionally unstable place right now, and that does not bode well for making major life decisions.  You need to get into therapy and deal with all this trauma and mental instability before attempting to make huge life decisions or entering into a serious relationship.