Backstory: We've known each other since high school. Got married after a long time not seeing each other. I ended our marriage after 9 years, following a year of couples therapy. We were a mess towards the end. There was a flirty, emotional affair on my part that I knew would go nowhere with a mutual female friend, and a very physical and real affair on my ex-wife's part... to be honest, it completely shattered me and broke my heart. I intercepted her text messages, "watched" as she made plans to meet this guy for sex several times over the course of a month, and caught her making plans to leave me and introduce our two kids (16/F & 9/M) to her affair partner. I said nothing for weeks as I knew this information, and built my case for a lawyer. In the end, I dropped my threats and we agreed to "work it out", but in my heart, I didn't think there was a way we could recover.
After a year of therapy I realized her affair wasn't something I could get over, and that we had not been good partners for each other even before our respective affairs (her alcoholic-like traits, our lack of passion/respect for each other, among other reasons). So I told her I was leaving, and I moved out a couple months later. There was no legal battle, we went to mediation and worked out a coparenting situation that was somewhat fair to us both. We were separated for a year and the divorce was eventually finalized.
Now: Three years later, I'm happy with a new girlfriend who makes me feel much more loved, cared for, and supported than I did in my marriage. My ex-wife has had a string of boyfriends since I left, maybe 4 or 5 at this point. We go through periods where she is nice to me, which usually coincides when she has a boyfriend. When she is single, she starts to get a bit bipolar and issues arise, and we get nasty with each other.
Lately, she has been inviting me over to make dinner for the kids while she's at work, or some other reason to get me over to her house. I feel it's a bit of a ploy. I don't want to go to my old house she still lives in any more than I have to. Bad memories. I don't want to make the kids think we're getting back together.
She has admitted to my sister she is still in love with me. My sister warned me, of course. This past weekend me and the ex-wife got into an argument after she was unnecessarily nasty. Started accusing me of not inviting her to special occasions/holidays with the kids/etc... I disengaged because I'm learning to not deal with her when she's like that to me. The next day she stopped by to apologize and to talk. She basically told me she is still grieving our marriage and her anger comes from a place of pain, that she will never find someone like me again, and made it pretty clear she wishes we were still together.
I've moved on. I feel bad for her, I wish her happiness, but I've come to realize we were not good partners to each other and dissolving the marriage was the best thing for us both. Is there anything I can say or do to help her come to this conclusion and start moving on like I have? I don't want this to start impacting my relationship with my girlfriend, who has been pretty gracious so far but she'll have a limit eventually. I'd love to be able to be friends with my ex-wife and successfully coparent, but this is getting in the way.
TL;DR! We split up 3 years ago due to infidelity, now ex-wife is emotional and unstable and wishing we were still together. I just want her to come to terms with things and move on. It's hard co-parenting with someone who is still in love with you.
Submitted April 01, 2019 at 09:52AM by zimbobbadoo https://ift.tt/2WHTlvY
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