To think maybe its not normal to want your dp/dh to love you the "most" out of everyone they've ever been with

[WarholsLittleQueen]

Inspired by the tattoo thread

I want to be with someone who loves me "The most". I don't want to date or anything because pretty much every man my age seems to have multiple ex wives / children .....how do I know that if I got with someone he wouldn't have loved someone else more?

ExH is older than me and wasn't long out of a long marriage when we met. And he ended up going back to her briefly in the beginning of our relationship then came back to me. But I didnt know at the time, It only came out a few years down the line, we were married with 2 DC by then but then poisoned the whole relationship, I tried to limp on for a while but In the end couldn't deal. And it finally ended a while back for that and other reasons. But Even before I found out about his deceit I always felt second best as he had been married before and everything we did together in the back of mind I knew he had done it all before with someone else.

I should have met someone at 18 and got married and stayed that way....but then I would only worry that he would wonder what it was like to be with other people and vice versa.....

Do people love differently? I loved ExH the "most" out of the few relationships I had. I just wish someone would one day feel that I am the best thing that ever happened to them and every one else pales in to insignificance.

Does anyone else feel like this? Its probably not normal is it :(

It's not about an ex being better than current DP is it? It's just that they are different and from a different time.

I have an exDP who I believe is the love of my life. I adored him and he me. It went wrong for a variety of reasons. Some of them his fault, some mine, some circumstantial. I think I'll always love him.

I have a new (ish) DP now who I also adore now. He is so so different from exDP. In every way and our relationship is different. Not better or worse, just different and totally right for who I am now and where my life is. I don't compare them, I don't think one was better than the other. They are both wonderful people.

No he didn't, but would that make a difference?

It would make a difference, I think.

It would certainly explain how he could have gone back to his family in the middle of being caught between two relationships.

Also there is often a massive competitive element in getting a man to leave his wife.

But it's irrelevant here.

But I kind of feel nothing will ever be quite like it was with her.

Well hopefully not.

That relationship sounds horrible.

Strong feelings don't equal good feelings.

Oh yeah I see what you mean Doingit ....I was his first proper relationship after they split up though, they had been split up about a year iirc when I met him. He had also dated a woman at his work for a few weeks but it fizzled out. Funny enough she doesn't bother me, I know her and she is nice.

And this is so true isn't it :( strong feelings don't equal good feelings

Oh god my use of the present tense in my first paragraph says it all doesn't it

I was his first proper relationship after they split up though

Hmmm

Just throwing it out there, but I can see how the first "proper" relationship after the marriage ended might have scared the shit out of him.

It could be that until he met you he always sort of thought in the back of his head that he could go back.

Falling properly in love with someone else means a whole new future.

One away from his family.

It's easy to see how instead of embracing that future with you straight away he had to give his old future one last try.

Especially as there were children involved.

Given that he came back, it seems that he actually did specifically choose you over his ex wife.

Which is not true for most of us.

I can see your issues around the lies and all the other people who knew.

And I presume there is more to this.

But I don't think this is a story where you were ever his second choice TBH.

I think you have made a massive mistake, in leaving your marriage.

He went back to his ExW, after he had been seeing you for a few months. A FEW months. Because he was missing his children, and was scared of ExW withholding contact. He would have been on an emotional roller coaster, at that time.

He stuck it out for a few weeks, and then he realised that you really were the love of his life, and he came back to you, even knowing that could risk contact with his children. Surely that is proof enough that he DID (and does) love you the most. You were worth risking everything for.

You say that he is the love of your life. You say he still wants to be with you. I just cannot understand what the problem is here? What a waste.

Fwiw, my first Husband did the same to me. 6 months in to our relationship, he told me that he thought he may still have feeling for his Ex. He went back to her and I was devastated. He lasted one day, then came crawling back to me. We married 2 years later, had 2 DC and the relationship lasted for 20 years. I left him in the end, for entirely different reasons. His Ex never impacted our relationship whatsoever, to me she was of no consequence, once he chose me.

I absolutely adored my first feel boyfriend. Full on teenage angsty love, complete adoration. It was not healthy. We fought all the time but kept falling back to each other because we were so in love.

I have never felt that brand of love obsession since and not would I want to. I have an incredibly loving, solid and tender relationship with Dh. I know I can count on him. We have been through a lot together and many, many years. That in itself is special. I still find him handsome and fancy the pants off him. I saw ex a year back and he was no great shakes.

We all change, relationships change, we grow up and need different things at different times. Just enjoy who you are with now if they are good for you and don't compare.

I agree with husky. I think you've made a big mistake as well

It's easy to see how instead of embracing that future with you straight away he had to give his old future one last try.Especially as there were children involved.Given that he came back, it seems that he actually did specifically choose you over his ex wife*

Thanks for your message, Doing. It does make sense, what you are saying

It would not work me taking him back though, because what he did has killed what we had. Because I cant deal that there was ever a better option, no matter for how short a time ......Maybe that means I have a massive ego, I dunno. Is it that wrong to have wanted to have been the only option?

He stuck it out for a few weeks, and then he realised that you really were the love of his life, and he came back to you

He says that too but how could I have been for him to risk losing me? And to even think that what he had before was better?

Is it that wrong to have wanted to have been the only option?

When he was leaving a marriage with children, yes I think it was.

Of course staying with his children was a serious option he couldn't cast aside without being certain.

Even if he knew he wanted to be with you more than his wife, he had other people to consider whose needs mattered more than any of the adults.

It was very wrong of your exH to lie about his fidelity and continue to do so until you were married with DC.

But YABU to compare your relationships and partners' love with what you imagine partners had with others, and seek assurances.

It would not work me taking him back though, because what he did has killed what we had. Because I cant deal that there was ever a better option, no matter for how short a time ......Maybe that means I have a massive ego, I dunno. Is it that wrong to have wanted to have been the only option?

I don't think it means you have a massive ego OP. But from your posts, I do think you would benefit from counselling/therapy.

Wait, you're divorcing him because he got back with his ex wife for a few weeks whilst only being with you for a few months?

I think you're making a mistake or you're very immature, especially if the reasons he got back with her are true (withholding access etc).

He says that too hmm but how could I have been for him to risk losing me? And to even think that what he had before was better?

What he had before WAS better, because he was with his children. Which is where any dad worth the title should want to be. He put his children ahead of a very new girlfriend....Wouldn't you like him to do that with your children? Will his next girlfriend not meet your children for several years, will she expect to be above them in his eyes after they are together for 5 mins?
I hope for your children that his next partner is less selfish than you.

Onion I think that if he had been honest with me at the start when we got back together about what had happened, I then would have been able to make an informed decision about whether to get back with him and if I am honest I think I would have run a mile.

Its an actual piss take he thought he could just get me back and think he could get away with hiding this massive, deal breaking secret from me. And asking me to marry him and have 2 dc while taking me for a complete and utter twat. Nah. Unforgivable in my book :(

Not sure what is immature about not wanting to be married to a liar.

Is it possible that he kept the secret from you precisely because he knew how badly you would react to him choosing, briefly, his children over a new relationship with you?

Lying to somebody because you don't want to give them a chance to make a choice about the truth is cruel and unfair.

You don't get to blame your dishonesty on other people.

A fundamentally honest man woukd have told his new girlfriend why he was leaving her.

Not kept her as a reserve option.

The decision now is whether his selfish lying is something that is an ongoing character trait.

It's certainly not one I would be prepared to accept in a life partner.

Is it possible that he kept the secret from you precisely because he knew how badly you would react to him choosing, briefly, his children over a new relationship with you?

This. Sometimes people lie to you because you make it impossible for them to tell you the truth. If he knew you expected to be put before his children, he knew there was no reasoning with you.
I think you both made a mistake, him for marrying someone who expected to be put before his children, and you for expecting it. And for not knowing where he'd been. A mess from the start.

Sometimes people lie to you because you make it impossible for them to tell you the truth.

He wasn't in Stalin's Russia.

He just wanted the option of going back to his new girlfriend if things didn’t work out with his wife.

It was absolutely possible for him to tell the truth.

But he was happy to deceive the woman he supposedly loved in order to get what he wanted.

Of course she should have had the option of dumping a boyfriend who ditched her for his ex.

Not giving her that choice was very deceitful and disrespectful.

And no part of it was about love.

So you say. But you don't actually know anything about it.

Of course she should have had the option of dumping a boyfriend who ditched her for his ex.Not giving her that choice was very deceitful and disrespectful

Thank you !!! This is what I mean.

Your reason for ending your relationship doesn't sound immature to me.

Some of the other things you've said - sorry - do sound rather less than mature, though. Feeling second best because he'd done it before with someone else. And thank fuck that not everyone shares you opinion on dating widow/ers, or I'd be doomed to a life of loneliness.

The best way I can think to describe to you what it is like to have a second love of my life is by comparing it to children. When you had your first, did you think it was possible to love a second child with your whole heart? I remember worrying about that when pregnant with DC2. And then he was born and BAM! I loved a second baby every bit as much, without losing any of my love for my first child. And the love I feel for my children is equal in importance but not identical because they're not identical and neither is my relationship with each of them.

The difference with falling in love romantically is obviously that romantic relationships aren't concurrent. I still love my late DH, and always will, and miss him so much that it hurts. But I have just as much love to give (actually, more than I would had he never been in my life - 15 years of loving him and being loved by him gave me more capacity for love, I think) to my fiancé. And comparing it would be impossible because they're different so the love is a bit different too. But still just as significant and important.

Sorry for your loss Somerville

What this thread has taught me is

a) A lot

b) That I am not ready to date, definitely not...and honestly at this moment think that I never will be

c) I need to maybe seek counselling of some sort so I don't fuck up any future relationships

d) I am not over exDH

e) That it is going be extremely shitty when DH starts dating again

f) And maybe I should have started a different thread in Relationships about how to deal with the break down of my marriage rather than doing it the way I have done

FFS :(