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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

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Original poster

Have you ever got back with an ex/someone you dated?

23 replies

DaisyChain08 · 18/05/2016 11:51

I dated a guy for a few months, we had a wonderful time getting to know eachother....he was absoloutely lovely, treated me like a princess, we talked everyday, wanted to see me all the time ect..

However he was in a relationship from the age of 17-24 and he has been single less than a year. He said he isn't ready for another serious relationship right now and also he doesn't know what he wants to do career wise so says he needs time to work on and be by himself. Although he said how perfect I was blah blah...

Has anyone had a case of right person but bad timing? Has anyone reconnected with someone in the future when both people have been in the right head space?

We have been no contact since...

OP posts:

MagicMoonstone · 18/05/2016 13:06

I have tried but it was never right the second time round.

I have heard of instances where it has worked out well though.

Didn't want to read and ignore. I'm certain someone with more useful words of wisdom will be here shortly though :)

ILoveAGoodBrusselSprout · 18/05/2016 13:17

I have!

DH and I met very young and had quite a fiery relationship (immature power struggles, neither of us ready for a grown up relationship). We argued a lot and, although we loved each other, it all got too much. He broke up with me and I was devastated.

We did keep in touch, we thought we could be just friends, but that didn't work for me.

Eventually I met someone else, and I thought that'd spur him into coming back to me. It didn't! I split up from that man and was single for about 6 months. DH was single throughout much of this time too.

One day, about a year later, we met up and it all just fell together again. We'd been apart and both been single long enough to get over each other and 'find ourselves' again. So we decided to try again, and took it slowly.

It's very tempting to fall back into old habits, but we worked really hard to make a brand new relationship and it worked. We've been married 15 years now and I couldn't be more in love with him.

SoThatHappened · 18/05/2016 13:22

Yes i did. I realised the i need space was code for i met someone else.

Didnt work a second time and he left again for someone else

Original poster

DaisyChain08 · 18/05/2016 13:32

Aww I'm happy to hear it all worked out! Yes I agree 'finding yourself' is so important. If you don't know who you are or what you want on your own - how can you go into a relationship, bringing all that confusion and uncertainty into it?
I think its necessary to be happy by yourself too. Something ive realised I need to work on!

Who initiated the meet up a year later? Were you not in contact any of that time?

OP posts:

blindsider · 18/05/2016 13:37

Nah - didn't work the second time (or the third, fourth or fifth)

telesoftware · 18/05/2016 13:39

What blindsider says. It was hard to break the habit, but I did eventually.

whitershadeofpale · 18/05/2016 13:43

I did. It hasn't worked for similar reasons to your ex. I thought when he wanted to get back together it many he was ready for a relationship. It didn't, he just missed someone fun to do things with (we did have an amazing connection like that), when things got too intimate again, he needed to run away and hide in his man-cave again.

I do think it sometime works but for me it was a hard lesson. I was gutted when we split the second time, but not because if him, because I felt I'd let myself down by going back and thought everyone would think I was foolish.

ILoveAGoodBrusselSprout · 18/05/2016 14:05

Yes, we'd been in contact at first. To be honest, he wanted his cake and eat it. But that played with my head as I still loved him.

After a few months I stopped contact. It was in the days before Facebook, etc so we didn't have the pressure of seeing each others every move. He'd call me every now and again for a catch up, nothing flirty, although towards the end of that year, our conversations were all reminiscences and almost like falling in love again.

I was so wary that he wanted a friend with benefits situation again and couldn't deal with that, but no, he didn't. He just realised that his life was better with me in it! Haha

Sukebind · 18/05/2016 14:15

Not myself but I know someone who married a high school boyfriend. In between breaking up he had lived with someone several years and she was engaged to someone else. They have been married over ten years now.

Another friend got back together with her former fiance years later when they both had marriages behind them and were now in their early fifties. They are married and very happy.

Missrubyring · 18/05/2016 14:35

I have.
Me and DP went out for a couple of years, had DD, broke up, matured a LOT and eventually got back together after 3 years apart. We've now been back together for 2 years, have had DS and love each other very much, so I absolutely believe it can work.

MiddleClassProblem · 18/05/2016 14:38

My IL were childhood sweethearts who got back together in their late 40s

LaPharisienne · 18/05/2016 14:47

Similar to ILove - first time around me and DP were young, stupid and generally disastrous. I mean, it was great, but it was awful ...

Ten years later and one marriage (to someone else!) down, I am 8 months pregnant and we are very happy. It's still great, just no longer awful!

I wouldn't say it was right person wrong time first time around, more not right person yet.

Lethimbloodygrowup · 18/05/2016 16:08

Me and my partner where together for about 2 years, split up for anout 4 months, now we are back together, been around 9 months since we got back together, and things are going great, took her to rome on valintines day for the weekend and popped the question, now we are buying a house!

It does happen but 9 time outs of 10 it doesnt work out

MsAdorabelleDearheartVonLipwig · 18/05/2016 16:44

I had a lovely boyfriend when I was 18 but he went away to college and it didn't work out. Fast forward a year and we stayed in touch and he told me he'd always loved me and we ended up back together. That was twenty years ago, we've been married for eleven and have two children. I could quite happily wring his neck sometimes, naturally, but he's always been the only man for me.

AntsMarching · 18/05/2016 17:17

What I would find concerning is that you split not because of problems you were having but because he wasn't ready to be in a relationship again. To me that screams he's not that into you. I wouldn't hang onto hope that this might come good later. It might but I'd always be bothered that he wasn't interested enough the first time.

MiddleClassProblem · 18/05/2016 17:21

saying I'm not ready for a relationship yet to you is his way of saying he won't be in a relationship with you IMO. It's been nearly a year, he might just want to be able but if you were the right one I doubt that would be the case.

Sorry but if you are looking for something more I think it will be elsewhere

Hydroshield · 18/05/2016 17:28

Did he leave you with some hope that he may one day be 'ready' to be with you, or is this something you're thinking?
Either way, I'd try to put this one out of my head and move on. Find someone who wants the same thing as you!

UmbongoUnchained · 18/05/2016 17:34

I married my husband when I was 17. We split up when I was 19 and I was another man for 2 years, had a baby and then we split up. I then bumped into my husband in a bar just after Christmas and here we are! It's always been him. Always will be.

Original poster

DaisyChain08 · 18/05/2016 18:08

He gave very mixed messages...

When he broke it off with me he was crying and saying he didn't want to lose me and that he was probably going to regret it. He said I was perfect and that he'd never been with a girl who treated him so well...
He said he just couldnt commit and needed to sort his head out.

He then messaged me saying 'who knows what the future will bring when the time is right' but then also told me to move on and let go of him! He said he still wanted to chat but I said I needed space and to contact me in a month... he said was speak soon and that I will hear from him again...

Well the month is up and I havent heard from him.

OP posts:

MiddleClassProblem · 18/05/2016 18:26

Move on, might not be easy but this will either drag on or be nothing.

Re couples that get back together, when they get back together there doesn't tend to be one of them pausing it for a bit first.

MsAdorabelleDearheartVonLipwig · 18/05/2016 22:58

Actually, having read your last post, I'd be tempted to say sorry but I'm not wasting my life waiting for you to decide whether I'm good enough for you. If he loved you he'd be with you. I think he's taking the piss, sorry. He wants to have his cake and eat it. He definitely isn't ready to commit, or grow up, and I'd give him a wide berth, sorry.

lavenderhoney · 19/05/2016 00:08

It's very sad for you, but he has told you- he wants to be free.

Give it another 30 days and it's not a vacation- go out, get fit ( if that's what you want) and have fun. Even date. Then when you do text him hello - and you might be too busy by then- you won't feel so powerless. And you might feel so good about yourself you'll wonder why you even comtemplated waiting for him. He isn't waiting for you.

SoThatHappened · 19/05/2016 07:45

When he broke it off with me he was crying and saying he didn't want to lose me and that he was probably going to regret it. He said I was perfect and that he'd never been with a girl who treated him so well...
He said he just couldnt commit and needed to sort his head out.

Oh ffs my ex a few years ago said exactly this. Guilt as he had met someone else. So has yours.

Can they not think of anything else to say.

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