Got him back from OW. What happens now?

[Controlleroller]

Our marriage had the same unresolved issues for a very long time which frustrated and exasperated me so much that we separated. It was 100% my call, he was desperate to stay.

Immediately he gets with someone else. This relationship is so intense and so accelerated that he is moving in with her and her twin girls within 4 weeks of meeting. This sets me off into a deep spiral of anger and hurt - that I feel I want hime back home to try again. He agrees. He is home - all is calm, order is restored. Both of us have committed to working hard at it - we are in week 2 of marriage recovery.

But I am obsessing so much about the OW and their relationship that it is sucking the life out of any progress.

Will we get through this?

I know that we need to focus on what the issues were that broke us up and not the short relationship that somehow has brought us back together.

Was the OW a real wake up call to me to see that I had made a mistake - that I should try to mend it, not end it etc

I look back on the issues in the marriage - all documented here over some time on MN - and think was I over reacting? - was I being unreasonable?

Is this a cliche? - a script? - ie the xW - fights tooth and nail to get him back?
A woman scorned etc.

Cant work out it my motivations are jealousy, hurt, control etc or real love that I am trying to rekindle? He is my best friend and soulmate - but let me down by not stepping up to his responsibilities and contribution to make the marriage work -- and I need to compromise also.

I think the fact that you managed well and meant the split to be permanent speaks volumes. Your only wobble came when he met someone and it looked serious.
I think you need to be really honest with YOU.
How would you have felt after 6 months had he not met anyone?
Would you have wanted him back? Hard to say but I doubt it.
It was all about a door being closed- and you not being the one with your hand on the handle!

If you both need parenting support there are lots of good coaches and parenting organisations that can help- by phone if you are not near to them. Enrolling yourselves on those as a couple might be one option.

But you need to sort out what you want- it still seems to me like you asked him back because you felt he was not available any more.

what you have posted has lots of contradictions.
On the one hand you said it was 6 months apart with an agreement not to date, then your most recent posts say this:

Sorry pink frocks I was not clear enough in my PP - when we separated - there was absolutely no going back in my mind - he and I were free to do as we pleased. I had taken a very long time to get to that point

so which was it?

If I'm confused then I can see why your DH was.

I've not posted on here before, but had to comment on this as this is almost identical to my situation 2 years ago!
My then husband moved out, after much pushing by me, and started a new relationship within a week!
A friend of mine saw them together and told me, I was initially...Great, some other mug for him to cling to...BUT, after about a week, I literally started to boil with anger, bitterness and I thought not jealousy, but looking back now...it was!
I am not proud of what I did, but as I knew him so well (13 years married) I started a campaign of destruction for him and her. I cut down access to our 3 children, saying it was confusing them to see him so much, I had been letting him see them every other night, and a whole day at weekends. I cut this right back, almost convincing myself it was best for the children. I even called him at times I knew he would be with her, pretending one of the children was sick and crying for him. I knew this would cause him huge emotional guilt, and looking back, I can't believe what I did. I am a control freak by nature, I admit it! I now know, my sole motivation was to prove that I could get him back....no matter what, and I was the one he wanted. He came begging back, as couldn't bare to be away from me and the children (probably and honestly, it was probably the children)
We had a wonderful sex filled, 2 months. Like the beginning of our relationship again. Then I started to realise that actually, now he was back, and the Other woman was gone, I wasn't sure I had made the right desicion.
I think you know the truth already, the fact you have posted this is very telling.
Your username also sort of confirmed it to me....controlleroller!! As someone just said, initially you weren't jealous....really! Is that the feelings towards someone you love?
You seem to want to cling to the very few posts that tell you, you are doing the right thing. I can relate to this so much.
Trust me, you are doing it for all the wrong reasons!
We eventually separated, again! It was hugely painful and horrid, and also turned out he went back to the other woman within a few weeks of us getting back together, when I thought it was all wonderful.
I also wonder if he has been with you every night since, as you are keeping him on a lease to stop him straying back to her!
You have my sympathy and total understanding, but REALLY THINK HARD!
What are you trying to prove?
Apologies if this is long and I haven't used all the abbreviations, I only joined here recently, actually to look about info in my new relationship, with a man, strangly enough, who I met on line!!!
Good luck.....you are going to need it!

I think your post is incredibly helpful, Marryme, it's extremely perceptive.

Sorry that I have still not been clear enough. When we separated there were no conditions etc - the 6 months no dating is what we have decided to do now whilst trying again. Panic and hurt was the emotion that rose when he said he was moving in with her - maybe that was jealousy in disguise - maybe it was love or control - I don't know - maybe it is all of them. Marryme your post has been really helpful and outlines a path that terrifies me - we do not need to all go through this all again - however that is only one option - other posts have outlined other paths - and at this point that is very much the way I want to be headed. Our intensions are very very much wanting this to work. He knows what he has to do and so do I for us having the best chance of making it work.

My ex very much wanted it to work, he was desperate. The thing that still hurts now, is that during our get back together time, he went back to her. I couldn't believe he did, we were, I thought, in an amazing place. Just watch it. If he has gone there before, and only left due to you inviting him back, she may not have closed the door on him. It's natural to obsess about her at the moment. I watched her on Facebook (she had no privacy on!) just for any clues if she was seeing him, or in hope she would be with someone else. That is really tough!

I actually think, in your heart of hearts you know the answer to all of this. I did, and was kidding myself.

Thanks Marryme

In my heart of hearts I am really desperate for it to work - I was so desperate for the marriage to work that I look a very long time to get to the decision to end it, I tried and tried - probably for too long and too hard - he was not taking me seriously and didn't step up. I have made it clear that we are not going back to that dynamic he/we have to make changes.

I am really sorry that your xH cheated on you when you gave him another chance. I have been anxious that he will go back to her - Relate warned that that was a real possibility - but I am trying to trust him (no reason to doubt him - he has never been unfaithful) and I do not want to hung up/pre-occupied by that possibility as that is just eating away at the energy we need to salvage anything. He has said that the relationship was to bury the pain of separating - and that it was not deep, GF was accelerating the move and he was worried he was sleepwalking into something - so maybe naively I am giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Possibly naive, but we have all been there, you only have his word as to what happened in that relationship, and can only go on what he tells you. Just don't over compensate and bend over backwards to try and stop him straying. As they say...If you love something, set it free, if it comes back it's your, if it doesn't it never was!!
Relate have seen this so much. I went there actually on my own, as my head was in a spin. They see this behaviour regularly and I would listen to their advice carefully.
Again good luck, reading your thread, has bought back so many feelings and reminded me of probably one of the worst times in my life.

Thanks marry me - I have been going to relate on my own for over a year now - to process the run up to the break up and the weeks after. Only time will tell where we will end up - the truth will out - feelings will evolve - right now we want it to work so badly.

I can't help but wonder who/where all these women are who are so desperate to 'steamroll' men just out of a relationship, into a fast moving seemingly intense new one, as I have never met one. Yet my ex seems to meet them ever so easily just at the 'right' time, and apparently so does your DH. I don't know, maybe I'm just cynical and I certainly don't think you should judge your own relationship on my experiences, but as I said up thread I really do think you should be cautious. I hope it works out for you.

theendof....She was lied to. She the first person to email him OLD. He told her that he had separated a few months before (i.e. not in the last 24 hrs) but that the marriage had been dead for over a year. He tells me he wanted a distraction from the pain of separation so really threw himself into it (could have been anyone) and he was surprised that she responded so intensely to his easy charismatic dating persona.

I think you really are being a bit naive here Controlleroller, do you think that he didn't enjoy what he was doing with her, if they were looking at moving in together, he obviously acted it very well. Which makes me wonder how much truth is there in his side of the story if he can lie to another woman so well, it all sounds very convenient for him!!
It also sounds so familiar!!
Be very careful.

eerrmmmm

His pattern is to tell people what they want to hear.

And you!!!

He sounds bloody awful, Controlleroller, worse with every post in fact. If he can lie to her, he can lie to YOU - he let her down and he'll let you down as well. You post as if you think you have control, you don't, he's doing exactly as he wants and you're glossing over the bits you'd rather not focus on because you're desperate to keep him. He isn't desperate but is biding his time.

As Marryme says, "Be very careful".

His pattern is to tell people what they want to hear

^ this is not good.

In terms of the frank and honest discussions I posted about up thread. How do you know if he is being honest?

In the grand scheme of this I don't think his lie about being so newly separated is that important. It's what loads of men and women would say. It was part of his plan to find someone when he felt rejected. I don't think it means he is an out and out liar. If anyone ought to be angry with him then it's his ex GF. At least he wasn't looking when you were still married- which is what plenty others do.

Turning your marriage around OP is going to be like turning a tanker around- you have 30 years to put right. It's not going to happen overnight or even in 6 months.

What worries me is that you were fine during your separation but once the GF was on the scene you backpedaled. That doesn't bode well- that it took jealousy to make you want him.

If the kids are a source of disagreement then maybe together you can work through this kind of organisation
www.theparentpractice.com/

and hopefully go to couples counselling rather than you at Relate on your own.

Gosh, he sounds very weak.

That wouldn't float my boat.

He moved in with a woman and her kids after WEEKS because he tells women what they want to hear?

Righty-oh.

I think that's a bit unfair on him and off the point.

Any woman with half a brain would soon tumble to when he actually did move out- she'd ask questions- and if she didn't want him to move in then she had the choice to say so. I'd say as she had DCs the onus was on her to slow the relationship down. He'd only move in if he was invited.

Thank you pinkfrocks for the parenting support link. It will be very helpful.

I think Marryme has some good points. Your dh did what a lot of people, both male and female do when a relationship ends and they don't want it to end - they go out and immediately try to replace it. I also think, with all kindness and understanding, that what you are doing, controller is what we on this site slate a lot of men for - leaving someone, then reeling them back in when it seems the 'safety net' is threatened, then leaving them again once the 'safety net' is back in place. Think what we'd be telling your dh if he were female. Try really hard to put your perspective back to where it was when you asked for the separation and try really hard to work out if you genuinely do want him, or just to make sure your safety net is still there.

What worries me is that you were fine during your separation but once the GF was on the scene you backpedaled. That doesn't bode well- that it took jealousy to make you want him.

I think this is important. You were fine, you were happy & coping fine with the DCs. then the evil eye of jealousy rose, & you thought "mine". But that aside, forget the jealousy. he is back, you both want to try. OK
Personally, I would say there is a zillion % chance of him becoming the person he hasn't ever been. Men/People just do not change
Focus on him behaving as he maintains he can.
I fear you are headed for a fall. again.