Advice please - DP gone AWOL due to ex partner’s tragedy

[Arrivaycida]

I’ve been dating a man (DP) since April. Everything was going really well. We were exclusive and have mutual friends, so I thought everything was above board.

About 3 weeks ago one of our mutual friends told me that my DP’s ex-partner of 10 years (who I knew about) had suddenly lost her teenage daughter in a freak accident in the UK and was coming to the UK to deal with funeral stuff and admin and the body. Obviously I was very empathetic - as much as you can be for somebody you have never met. Mutual friend also told me that DP’s ex had always suffered from poor mental health and she believed that this event might actually now tip her over the edge.

I mentioned it to DP who seemed extremely affected by it. His ex had already called him. Everything then happened so quickly. DP and I were not living together but had been seeing each other and staying over at my house once or twice a week and at weekends. He has continued to see and speak to me everyday, kept in regular touch, called me most evenings, but as far as I know he has spent every night that she has been in the UK, with her, at her house (which she has here but doesn’t live in.)

According to him and mutual friends, they are not having sex or back in a relationship, they are just spending time together and she is crying and on the verge of suicide, and he is helping her through it. He also knew her daughter well, was a surrogate father to her, and so this is profoundly affecting him as well. Apparently when she returns abroad (she is going back and forth) she has a partner who she has been with since they split.

I’ve tried to be really empathetic and understanding about this while at the same time withdrawing myself. He has now not stayed over at my house or slept with me for three weeks. Every time I ask questions about what’s going on and what he’s doing, I get a defensive response - as in I “should know exactly what he is doing” - “pulling her back from the brink of suicide.” Even our mutual friends have the same attitude.

As a result, last week, I politely ended things with him, stopped answering his calls and texts and asked him to give me space. The result was him haranguing me, apparently heartbroken, that I had finished things at such a “difficult time” in his life and saying that he is confused as to why I have done this and I need to explain why, we need to work it out and and that I am being unreasonable for not respecting his need to take time out and ending things with him so abruptly.

We have gone back and forth over this now for a week. Every night we exhaust the conversation and end up at odds. He does not see why him “helping out a dear friend and ex partner” should impact me so strongly that I finish our relationship. I can’t believe that he is so ignorant as to not see the affect this would have on me and our relationship.

He talks in gory detail about the death and all his ex-P’s feelings and suicide threats as if they should shock me into realising why he is doing what he is doing. I presume the result he wants is that I feel guilty for even suggesting there is anything else going on. As much as I empathise, I don’t feel it is right for him to be spending most nights at her house. What are they even doing? Why does he need to stay over? He says he is on suicide watch - but that is not his responsibility.

He makes the point that he and I are still speaking daily and seeing each other, that he has not been unavailable, that the only part of our relationship that is “temporarily” on hold is the sleeping together / sex. Then he reduces it to things like “why are you saying sex is more important than me attending to my close friend? If you love me and care about me, you will understand my need to prioritise.” Or “if I have to choose between sex and helping out my close friend - I choose helping her out.” It’s like a way of making me look like i’m being unreasonable.

Late at night on Friday after i’d gone to sleep I found he’d sent me a few sex texts - presumably to keep me roped in or to prove that he still sees us in a romantic relationship. But he was probably at her house?

When he doesn’t hear from me he calls and texts me incessantly about how unfair I am being for giving up on him because of this. Mutual friends who I have spoken to are agreeing with him saying it is only a temporary thing and she will soon return, after everything is dealt with, back abroad again.

Apparently their split was mutual and happened four years ago.

What the hell is going on?

[DonnaPaulsenSpecter]

What the hell is going on?

You're behaving like a vile human, that's what.

Oh I so hope he is rid of you for good, you sound horrendous.

[saraclara]

@Joe2019 maybe he called OP hoping for some emotional support, but got her whinging about him not coming over for sex, instead.

[DonnaPaulsenSpecter]

@Joe2019 Um their relationship is insanely short and judging by her attitude, I doubt she is one to give a damn.

Furthermore, he's grieving with the person he shared 10 years with, who else would he do it with?

Goodness, the few of you who are agreeing with the OP give a good idea of what sort of person you are.

[Moreisnnogedag]

Are you taking anyone’s opinion on board? Because you dont seem to be. He thinks you are being harsh, your friends think you’re being harsh, complete strangers think you’re harsh.

Essentially you’ve pulled the rug out from under him because you object to him staying at an ex’s house. You cant seem to see past that to what seems like a great guy supporting an ex going through what must be the most awful time of her existence, one which none of us who haven’t been through it can even begin to fully comprehend the devastation.

Fuck me that’s pretty cold.

[DonnaPaulsenSpecter]

@saraclara Ha, exactly. She doesn't come across as empathetic or understanding or even caring at all, whinging about sex at such a time, fucking hell.

[category12]

It really depends how receptive OP really was, Joe2019: Obviously I was very empathetic - as much as you can be for somebody you have never met. < doesn't sound particularly encouraging to me.

[Drum2018]

I doubt his relationship (emotional) with his ex will end here. They will no doubt be in contact going forward and rightly or wrongly that will probably be an issue for you. Given you've only been together for 6 months it's probably best to make a break now and let him do whatever he needs/wants to do for his ex.

[StealthMama]

@Arrivaycida in your last post you suggest she is asking him to stay over, but I don't think she is, is she? He's doing it because it's an awful situation and he's petrified she might kill herself.

You say it's not his responsibility to be on suicide watch .. then who's is it? She doesn't live in this country anymore. Everyone should step up and help when someone feels on the edge, and who can blame her - her daughter just died tragically and suddenly.

This man sounds amazing. It's exactly this type of behaviour that should make you love him even more. I don't understand at all how you have made this situation about your relationship with him, other than you are incredibly insecure. In your shoes I'd apologise for 'having a moment' tell him he has your full support and you'll get back on track. If you really do love him, of course.

If you can't get past these feelings then walk away, but don't put the blame on him.

[FizzyGreenWater]

He is not behaving unreasonably overall.

However, I'm not sure you fully deserve this pasting.

If he's not remained in touch with this ex OR her daughter, then no - it isn't the same as losing his own child. If what you say is right, the person who has passed away is possibly someone he would actually never have seen again. Not the same at all as losing your own child. The responses in that sense are very over the top.

I can also see why you are thrown by, and are asking questions of, the length of time this intense period is taking and how your partner seems to suddenly fit into this role. Yes, they were together a long time and have a long shared history with the daughter as a focal point. But, the ex has a current partner who she is presumably close to NOW, without the 'ex' aspect - why is she not instinctively turning to this partner who knows her 'now', why is the partner not here supporting her, what about his shock and grief? You say the ex has been with her current partner for four years, since she and your ex split - that's a long time too, presumably during which time HE has been in the role of step-father and who knows/knew her daughter far more recently than her ex. So yes, this is odd and I too would be asking questions. I wouldn't for a moment be thinking that they had started any sort of relationship but I would be utterly thrown by this being the situation rather than, say, your partner spending a couple of days with his ex, devastated, but quickly retreating when her current partner could make it to the UK to support her, or for the ex's wider family to make it to her side. That would be the norm.

I also note that you've been taken to task along the lines of 'He's lost a child and all you can think about is sex' - err, no. Read the OP. He's the one who has set up that particularly unattractive straw man. Nice bit of deflection which places OP right on the back foot - very crass, unbearably so, but he's the one being so, not her. Nothing in her post suggests she's remotely thinking about sex, but questioning what is going on when he has spent the last three weeks living with this person, seemingly in place of her actual partner who unlike him did actually have a current relationship with the daughter who has passed away. It's him who - as OP puts it - brings it in as 'a way of making me look like i’m being unreasonable'.

I am not getting the impression that OP has walked away because this man isn't turning his back on a friend who has been through a terrible tragedy. I get the feeling she's walking away from what she sees as a distinctly odd situation where she's been put in a position where the nature of what's happened has put anything he chooses to do beyond reproach and makes any questioning on her part not possible.

OP, have you been able to get a straight answer from him on where his ex's current partner is, and why he isn't in this support position? Does the ex want your (ex) bf there as he was around during more of the formative years of the DD's life? I'm still just not quite able to square that circle what with him not even having seen the DD for four years though - a long time in the life of a teenager.

It looks like I am a lone voice on this thread by the way - I'm not sure you've handled this well either but I can certainly see where you are coming from. I also feel that if you'd posted less- clinically - the responses would be different, as woudl they if the subject matter weren't so absolutely tragic.

[Gazelda]

Someone who had been important in his life has lost a child. The child who he'd been a surrogate father to for 10 years. The parent has poor mental health and those who know her are concerned that she may attempt to end her life.

And you dump him because he's spending time with her and not shagging you.

He has honour and is grieving.

You are being selfish and heartless.

[FizzyGreenWater]

whinging about sex at such a time, fucking hell.

This is exactly what I mean. Read the OP. It isn't well written perhaps but that isn't what's happened. When OP has 'asked what is going on and what he is doing', he has brought in sex as a way of making her sound crass and unreasonable and used it as a way to shame her. And then he's the one sexting when she finishes it.

[FizzyGreenWater]

OP, if you are still here - what is the situation with her partner and wider family?

[GoodGriefSunshine]

I think he's dodged a bullet. You are appalling. Instead of allowing his need to grieve and share this time with the mother of his (practically) step daughter, you are making it ALL ABOUT YOU. If the death of this poor girl isn't enough for you to put something or someone before you then nothing will be. He should run. Fast.

[aSofaNearYou]

I can't believe people are telling you you are being selfish by breaking up with him. People can break up with someone at any point for whatever reason they choose, I sympathise with his situation but for a relatively new relationship he has suddenly become a lot more complicated and if you want to walk away from that then that's your right.

As for whether he has behaved appropriately, if nothing is going on then technically yes what he's doing is ok, but as your partner he should not have been defensive and rude to you in his explanation, he should have understood that staying for weeks with his ex is a bloody big ask for his partner to be fine with, and apologised genuinely to you but said it was just something he had to do.

He is going through a tough time but he has not been a reasonable partner to you and at this stage in your relationship it isn't worth it.

[readitandwept]

When OP has 'asked what is going on and what he is doing', he has brought in sex as a way of making her sound crass and unreasonable and used it as a way to shame her.

No... at that point he told her he was looking out for a suicidal friend.

OP mentioned that she has discussed with the mutual friends about whether or not he's sleeping with the ex. OP said very quickly that he hadn't slept with her.

Then he reduces it to things like “why are you saying sex is more important than me attending to my close friend? If you love me and care about me, you will understand my need to prioritise.” Or “if I have to choose between sex and helping out my close friend - I choose helping her out.”


I've no doubt that OP was first to bring up the hit on their sex life.

[betternamepending]

It's a short relationship. It wasn't his child, it also wasn't his surrogate child, he hadn't seen her for 4 years! I think the problem is that he isn't including you in his emotional life at the moment, and that is wrong. He should involve you in what he is going through because you are his partner.

Oh, and you can end any relationship for any reason if that is what you want to do.

[FizzyGreenWater]

readitandwept - I've just read the OP again. I'm not getting what you're getting, but fine.

[j3mz]

Wow! Just wow!

[Arrivaycida]

Thank you for your replies. Fizzy Green Water - this is exactly how I feel, and maybe I did not express it well enough.

Instead of explaining exactly what is going on and giving me an idea of what I should be expecting from him, he is hitting me with extreme sound bites about the death and shaming me about sex/wanting to spend time with him/wanting some kind of reasonable explanation as to what is going on and how long for.

I don’t lack empathy about a mother losing a child, but with very little information to go on, I don’t think I am wrong to withdraw from a relationship when the other half has all but moved in with another woman.

I also, in my gut, do not believe that they are not sleeping together. It’s just a gut feeling but a strong one. So I don’t think in this sense I am wrong for drawing back.

And it’s not that I ceremoniously dumped him or refused to discuss anything. He is calling me night after night and getting upset that I am withdrawing and not end of the phone. I am asking, with compassion, the same questions - with very few answers or inconsistent answers from him. He does not need me emotionally, what he wants is to know he is still has me.

[Drabarni]

I don't believe you are a parent OP, because you'd have more empathy, unless heaven forbid you do have kids. in which case you should be even more ashamed of yourself.
Narcissists are bad enough without being parents too.

[AlexaShutUp]

He sounds like a kind and caring man. It's right that he should put his friend/ex first at a time of such acute need. If you're unable to support this, I guess he'll conclude that the relationship is not worth pursuing.

[jessicafletc]

I think you have dumped him to focus the attention back on yourself and have him chasing after you when he should be grieving for a child he had in his life for ten years. Honestly shameless! There are times in life when you have to put your feelings to the side to help a Person you love but obviously you don't seem to care about anybody but your own selfish, jealous needs. Grow up a mother has lost her child!

[timshelthechoice]

Fucking hell, when the fuck did it become the norm to deem anyone you date for more than 2 seconds a 'partner'. He's a boyfriend you went out with for a little while, it's not a bloody marriage. You're clingy beyond belief. Just let him go and block him on everything, move on with your life and learn not to be so damn needy you call every boyfriend a partner and load the relationship with all the kinds of trappings that go with real life long commitment.

[FizzyGreenWater]

Oh fgs!

Drabarni, what's your definition of a good parent? Because if it doesn't include 'not actually seeing a child for four years or keeping in touch' then it kind of rules out this guy too.

OP, it sounds like you were right to back away. And if he honestly is using graphic descriptions of the way the child passed as ammunition in your discussions, then that is disgusting and would make me seriously question the depth of feeling he actually has here. A normal person and certainly a bereaved parent-figure wouldn't even be able to bear to articulate it.

Where is her partner in all this? Has your ex put you in the picture with it?

[readingnc]

"all but moved in with another woman" and that's all this is about. The last thing on her mind will be randomly shagging her ex behind her partners back.

You don't have to stay with him. But she's not just some random woman and these are not normal circumstances. If this had been a cousin who he had not seen in 4 years but had lived with them and their child for 10 years you wouldn't give a shit. You'd be supportive