Trapped between 2 men and can’t see a way out

I will don my hard hat here and ask if you have considered living with your ex on a co-parenting basis, as friends, so that a romantic relationship is off the table? You can both be free to see others. That would seem to be a reasonable solution to the situation. It’s unusual but I think it can work for some.

I would also say listen to your son, for the sake of your future relationship. He may not be putting it in palatable or adult terms, but there is a message there about what is important to him. He needs to feel that you hear him and continue to hear him.

Finally, what about the amount of time and life-energy that you are spending on all this relationship turmoil! Your ex, your new man…what about other things in life? Friends, work, hobbies, study, projects…Whereas you seem to be completely consumed by your romantic life. Perhaps being single for a while and focusing on being a mother, friend, family member, employee and first and foremost a person would be beneficial too.

If you go back to your ex it will fall apart again.

op you need counselling- you CANNOT make everyone happy and it is not your job to make your ex happy. Do him a favour and stop it now.

if you can’t deal with the time apart from your bf then you need to finish that too.

Honestly - You sound like you need to be single, and work on building yourself a life. Don't go back to your ex, thats a terrible idea - you've told us why he is an ex - and whilst your kid may want his parents together, it would devolve into a toxic mess that would damage all 3 of you.

New partner is a non starter - you both have responsebilities(sp?) that are never going to align.

Take some time, build yourself a life of friends and independance and co-parenting in a healthy way tih your ex!

@Ihatebeingme0 so you’ve only been with your new partner 6 months?

That is what you need to decide and stick with it the right decision for you.

The thing is with parents relationships staying/leaving/getting back together all carry risks and all can have in different ways negative and positive impacts on the children.

what is needed is a clear decision - no uncertainty and no hope and one which is taken in the knowledge it is the right thing to do for YOU

You can’t get back into a miserable relationship simply to appease your son. Honestly i think your son is pushing his luck trying to pressure you. Put a stop to that. He doesn’t need you two to be together to have a relationship with his dad.

Gently OP, I do remember your earlier threads and how your new partner reacted to your pregnancy (so sorry about that, hope you’re healing). He doesn’t sound like a good man.

I agree with previous posters that now is the time to leave all men alone for a bit and concentrate on being the best parents you can to your children, separately. And take the time to work on you and the issues you have been facing. Make peace with yourself before you try and meet somebody.

Try not to be so hard on yourself, everyone will be fine, but you also need to make sure that YOU will be ok, and I think you can only do that by making peace with being single for a good while and learning to know your worth.

Your son doesn't understand what kind of monkeys curse his wish would be. He doesn't have the emotional maturity to understand what the effect of forcing his incompatible parents together would mean, especially to you. Maybe this is a time in his life when he can start to think about that sort of thing. Start very simply discussing his boundaries and feelings and how they can change using examples for his life. Explain how that is the same for you

You also could do with a bit of a think.
You seem to be saying, "I want something I have thought about a lot, planned for, actioned and rearranged mine and my families lives for, something which took a great deal of time, effort and undoubtedly anxiety over..not to be real?"

You are just in the "buyers regret" period. It will fade. You know it will. If you go back you are just going to have to go through all that again. But worse because people wont believe you mean it next time and you will have thrown away a relationship you don't know how will turn out so that you can do it.

If you are lonely make more of friends / relatives, anybody, just stay away from the martyr bonfire, that will not help.

Then you need to stop it.

your son and your ex have hope and hope in the worst. You need to be clear and start the process of divorce

OP trying to force a dead relationship is NOT going to make your DS happy in the long term. It will confuse him and model a terrible example.

your marriage is dead. Trying to tolerate it to make others happy WILL FAIL. And the fall out will be worse as everyone is going to feel that you should just keep trying. You would be giving false hope

yes DS is upset but this is not going to be solved by sacrificing yourself at the alter of misery and despair. You will become increasingly resentful and probably find your ex repulsive sexually.

is there any chance your DS may also be asd? Only asking as it may be extra difficult for him to navigate the change in set up. Chopping and changing would make it worse

Maybe. Maybe not. But this isn’t a reason to go back to an ex who is not affectionate (possibly explained by his ASD) and whom the OP is not attracted to nor in love with.

Start the divorce.

Have you actually said to him it is over and it is final? Because all these mixed messages no wonder

The person you have quoted IS the OP. That's why her post is green. She's asking another poster if she has children.

You have been in an unhappy marriage. You are not the cause of the upset.

Going back to the ex is a huge mistake and will make you unhappy. You don’t want to be that mum who is on/off with their dad.

Your dd doesn’t want dad back in your household and her feelings are as important as your ds. Your ex should be moving out of his house share so he can have ds live with him, not acting like a big child and wait for you to come back. You need boundaries so that the kids as well as you can move on with a clean break- forcing yourself to hang out with ex to make him and your son happy is cruel to everyone and delaying the inevitable.

If you feel too guilty to date new man then that is fine but stay single (or look for a man who you can see more easily), don’t go back.

in fairness i think you want you to be happy.

Nothing wrong with that but you need to own it.

Stop stringing your ex along, as really unfair on him and and your son, as you are giving them the hope you that you can be a family again.

You need to accept situation with "partner" isnt going to change due to distant and his kids situation, plus lets be honest he's probably quite happy with current set up.

I think that’s just being used to him - or more of a platonic love, which isn’t a good basis to be in a relationship with someone.

Your reply makes me think even more strongly that you need to let him go and work on a co-parenting relationship only.

You left ex for a reason and it isn’t fair to him or DS for you to go back to him just because you are lonely. Especially if you are in love with someone else!?! Cut them both lose focus on you and your DS and work on building you life without a bloke.