Can second time round relationships work?

[ImABadGirl]

ex-DP and I want to give it another go, we got stuck in a rut before and split about 18 months ago....anyway after having quite a steamy reunion one afternoon, the spark is still very much there, so can it work?

Thanks in advance

Why did you separate last time around?.

Unless you have both fully sorted out all the issues that led to you separating before, then a second go may well become bogged down with the same problems.

Hysterical bonding (whether delayed or not) is no indicator of whether a reconciliation is achievable.

You need to look very closely at why you split up in the first place. Have things really changed in those areas?

On the basis of sparks and steamy reunions? Be careful. As my best friend tells me.... 'when your fanny's on fire your brains go out of the window'. So engage brain and park the fanny.

Not in my experience. I got together again with ex-H so many times. Just the same shit, different day.

Yes I think they can work if the issues that caused you to split are resolved. Well, I know they can because DH and I split for 6 months after 18 months together, and got married 4 years after that. Now been married 3 years. Anyway, don't base it all on the 'spark' still being there, whatever that means. You need to talk through and resolve all your previous issues and agree on what you both want for the future.

Thank you for your replies, we didn't really have many issues apart from him being in the army and me feeling like a non priority, he has got a posting closer and says he has grown up and wants to be a proper family

I know some that have and some that haven't. It really depends on how much the original problems have been resolved.

It didn't work for me...

Only way you'll find out is to give it a go, while being prepared to cut and run at the first sign of trouble.

When you say he wants to be a proper family, do you have children? If so, I wouldn't let him anywhere near them until he's proved himself.

No!! Please see my post I just posted this evening: I'm a fool for love (lust?)...

I thought it could. Turns out he's exacly the same as he was 20 years ago :( x

It never did for me. He kept promising he'd change and every time I bumped into him we'd give it another go after an extremely passionate reunion, but he'd be just the same- mean, foul mouthed and abusive.

It didn't work for me. He was even worse second time around.

Well totally going against the grain here but 24 years ago my boyfriend in university and I broke up because he got posted overseas (also army incidentally, but the Canadian one).

Flash forward 10 years and we were both completely by coincidence living and working in the same foreign city. 6 weeks after I moved there we were dating again and the rest is history.

Last week was our 12th wedding anniversary.

ella we have a DS together...it's good to hear some success stories, I think the only way is to try and see, take it very slowly and have a little more patience with each other

It did for us too.

Engaged, about to pick a venue for the wedding when then DB got cold feet and called it off. I discovered a week later that I weas pregnant, he went mad, didn't want to know and we didn't soeak to each other for the most of my pregnancy. gradually we started t talk again, and he used to come and stay with us when DS was a baby. Visits got more frewuent as DS got older, and then we went on a "family" holiday and got back together the weeknd after we came home, when DS was 2.5. After a few more months, he wanted us to move in with him, in another city. OK said I, but not without the security of a wedding ring. We married just after DS's 3rd birthday, have just had our 8th anniversary and have two more DC.

Buuut, the issues that caused the split - mainly his reluctance to settle down and cold feet - resolved over the few years when DS was a baby. I think if we had got back together immediately I discovered I was pregnant, it would have been doomed to fail.

It didn't work out for me, but I was glad we had tried. It put the relationship to rest once and for all.

We had a DC together and I am glad we did everything we could to make the relationship work, even though ultimately it didn't work out.

My DP and I split up for a couple of months a while ago. Get back together and we're expecting our first DC in November. It works sometimes, but you both have to really, really work at it :)