Does this sound extremely toxic and unhealthy to you?

[FenBee]

Sorry it's a bit long.

I’ve been dating a guy for two years. When we met, he was married but fully separated, though he hadn't initiated divorce yet. He shares a 5-year-old son with his ex, who lives in another country. Despite being separated, he continued paying the mortgage and some of the bills for their marital home and even renewed the mortgage term for another two years after attempting to sell the property, which his ex refused.

During our relationship, we’ve gone on several holidays together, and he has been nice overall. However, we’ve broken up four times so far, the most recent being in May. I feel like he takes advantage of these breakups - right after, he went to see his son and then on a lads’ holiday to Marbella, then to Tunisia with his family, and later his friends joined him there. He also took several other city breaks during that period with his friends. Before this recent breakup, we had been stable for about seven months. During that time, he deleted his Facebook and Instagram and even put a symbolic picture representing us as his WhatsApp profile photo - illustration of our eye colour.

One of my other concerns is how he reacted when his ex applied for child maintenance last year. He was really angry and, interestingly, posted our first official picture on Facebook just five minutes before picking up his son from her/their house after he had made the first payment. Three days later, when he was about to leave for a long business trip, we broke up, and he immediately removed the picture, replacing it with a sad breakup quote. We got back together a week later, only to break up again for four months. After getting back together and whilst on our makeup holiday, he finally filed for divorce and quit his well-paid cooperate job as he couldn't afford to pay child maintenance and the mortgage. He’s currently working as a delivery driver (cash in hand), but he says it’s only temporary until the financial settlement is finalised.

Now, he frequently changes his social media profile pictures, and he seems happy. I don't know how to feel about the whole situation. I know I'm silly for going back and forth. I wonder if he ever loved me..

For reference, I'm 31 and he 35.

💐 for you OP…

Once you’ve had a bit of time It’s worth reading some of the threads on hear about about “how did you know” or “what was it like when you met you DH”

it is very frequently a “quiet love”
with my DH I clearly remember thinking spending time with him was “really nice” (sounds lame but it wasn’t), it wasn’t dramatic or difficult. it was easy to find time to meet up even though we were busy… I never felt nervous or had butterflies or felt sick or wondered he why hadn’t replied.
the overarching feeling was “it was easy”
this is really common.

Thank you very much for this helpful advice. I need to work on my self-worth and learn to expect better for myself. I've really let myself down over the past two years.

No no no. He is not properly supporting his child. Run.

Thank you for sharing your experience with me, and I'm sorry you've had to endure toxic behaviour for so long. I need to focus on letting go of my anger and seeing the positive side - we don't have children (thank God) or any major ties like shared finances, house etc. It's a relief that I can walk away without massive complications.

Kindly, do please grow up and block and delete him on all socials. He sounds pathetic and juvenile. Once you are over him (I promise you one day you will) you'll kick yourself for being so caught up over this cunt.

A huge red flag that I completely overlooked. I believed he was making an effort because he was paying the mortgage and attempted to bring his son over, but his ex refused. Even then he was hardly visiting his son nor speaking to him which is so wong.

You mentioned that he causes the major arguments as summer approaches? Is there a pattern of him causing arguments when a holiday is approaching? If so, could he be causing these break ups on purpose to ensure he’s always single when he goes on all these holidays?

If you’ve blocked him how are you managing to see his activity??

You both deserve more than he is giving you. Emotionally, commitment, a proper partnership x

Don’t waste time on this poor excuse of a man - immature actions and unwilling to support his child, what a catch?
You know you deserve better. Dump and block, he will not change.

I have blocked him on WhatsApp but can still see his DP. Regarding other platforms, I tend to block and unblock him quite frequently, which I realise is quite silly.😖

I assume it's so he can do whatever he wants without interference from me, and his argument is that since he's/was single, he's free to act however he pleases. He follows girls he meets on holiday (on socials).

He is a prick and you deserve better.

Delete his number out your phone