tabitha83 Posted September 30, 2007 Posted September 30, 2007 I posted a week or so ago about my ex. We split in January, I had his baby 5 weeks ago and the first week he was seeing our son we got on like we used to; messing around, laughing, flirting, it was lovely. And he was great with our son AND turning up every day for 3-4 hours before work. Then one Tuesday (about 3 weeks ago) he got jealous over my male friend coming over a lot. He accused me of sleeping with said friend, and acting the typical jealous male. I said something like "well I'm sure you're seeing someone" and acted all jealous as well. Playground, huh? He then said "I know you have feelings for me" (true), when I asked why it was that when I get jealous of who he's seeing, he assumes I have feelings for him, yet he gets jealous of my male friends but it doesn't mean he has feelings for me. He replied "I do". Then nothing more was said. After that day he suddenly went very cold on me, only spending an hour with me and the baby before work and not always turning up when he said he would. This went on for a week, with him denying he'd changed and saying "ok so I was wrong" when I asked why he thought I had feelings for him. I've since found put that the change was down to another woman, who my ex had been out with once in the week that he'd backed off from me. I found this out last Monday, when we'd arranged that my ex would come over and see the baby after he'd finished work. We'd arranged it on the Sunday, then on monday when I called to confirm it he said he'd made other plans. He flat-out refused to change his plans which made me trhink there was a woman involved; and he eventually admitted that yes, he had "a date" with the woman I mentioned earlier. I was so annoyed that she came before our son, called him and he put her on the phone. She told me to "move on". Patronising cow The next day, my ex was back to normal! He came over at 11am, I asked about the woman and he said he'd realised it wouldn't work between them and wasn't going to see her again. He said she "didn't do it" for him, but although he keeps making excuses whenever she asks to meet up again, he won't tell her he's not interested. He just ignores most of her calls and text messages. We spent 5 hours together that day getting on really well like before, flirting, joking around etc and then I mentioned I'd been thinking about moving away. My ex said "shall we go away, just the three of us? be a happy family". I thought he was joking so I said we could never be happy, but he kept bringing it up and asking if I'd move away if he asked me to, then even asked "do you think we'd argue if we were together?" I said yes, he asked if I meant that and I replied that I did. The next day I asked if he'd meant it when he talked about moving away with me and the baby and he said that he had, I also asked about feelings and at first he said "put it this way, I've got more feelings for you than I have for (the other woman)" then when I said that I was finding it hard to be just friends with him because of the feelings I have for him so I start arguments as a way of dealing with them, he said "I like you...and if we didn't argue I'd like you more". He asked me to bring the baby over to his house in another town on Monday (24th) and said I could stay overnight, so I took all the baby's things and we ended up sleeping on the sofa together with the baby in his travel cot beside us on the floor, he seemed like he was trying not to get too close to me (we were clothed, by the way) but the next morning we went for a walk inthe park with the baby, came back and I had a nap on the sofa. My ex came to lay next to me and cuddled up, putting my hand on his with his face really close to mine. Then he turned to face me and started umm...pressing against me, saying he'd had to really work not to do that the previous night (I was sure he was lying, as he didnt seem to have any trouble keeping his distance!). I got up, and after that he was really sexual and I felt really unconfortable. He openly stared at my backside, slapped it one time and even put his hand just underneath the top of my t shirt and felt my breast! Supposedly checking to see whether I was hot... I was in shock athis behaviour, and had no idea why he was doing it, but laughed it off. He's not usually THAT pervy. Things went so wrong after that, and this week I started so many silly arguments to avoid my feelings and because I was sure he'd said all that stuff just to string me along. I asked him and eventually he said that the reason he'd saif those things was to "keep the peace" and "because it was what I thought you wanted to hear". Since then I've asked him to stay over at my house one night; he kept saying he wanted to but then made excuses not to, and he finally came over last night. He said he'd sleep on the sofa and refused to share the bed with me when I asked him to (I wanted to share fully clothed, so he could help out with the baby) and when I asked him why he wouldn't come upstairs, he said "I just don't want to". I put on my arrogant hat at that point and said I knew that I could get him into ned if I wanted to, to which he replied that I really couldn't and that he'd never sleep with me again, saying it was because "of the way you are" (just before that we'd got into a row and I'd slapped him, because he said something really horrible about me). We haven't spoken since, and now I'm confused. I was convinced he had feelings for me or at least was attracted to me, now he says neither is true. Why was he acting the way he did; why did he say all those things about having feelings, moving away with me etc and why cuddle up to me on the sofa on Monday?! Any ideas? Was he just stringing me along? PS - at one point this week he also said he had "bits of feelings" for me. I asked what that meant and he replied "friendly ones". WTF?!
lindya Posted September 30, 2007 Posted September 30, 2007 The two of you sound pretty young. It's worrying that when he met someone else, contact (ie between him and the baby) fell by the wayside and only seemed to pick up again when the relationship with the new girl ended. It also sounds as if contact between him and the baby provides a bit of an excuse for the pair of you to play "do you still fancy me?" games with eachother. If you want to focus primarily on your kid's interests in all of this, then it would probably be helpful to tell your ex that contact sessions are an opportunity for him to spend time with the baby, and should be used only for that purpose. Otherwise you're looking at creating quite a bit of chaos and confusion for your child. If the notion of a confused, distressed baby doesn't upset you, the notion of a very angry, hard to manage teenager 14 years down the line might. That's what you're probably storing up for yourself if you don't start focusing on doing what's best for your kid rather than getting caught up in prolonging this on/off flirtation with your ex.
Author tabitha83 Posted September 30, 2007 Author Posted September 30, 2007 I totally agree with you, but in a weird way knowing what my ex is thinking or why he was doing those things will help me deal with him. He's complicated! Anyone else think they can hazard a guess as to what he was/is up to?
Trialbyfire Posted September 30, 2007 Posted September 30, 2007 Don't hang your hat on someone who doesn't know what he wants or is gaming you. Treat it like a business relationship. He's the father of the baby, so you do need to have contact but keep it at arms-length. Cool but distant. Make sure he understands the ground rules.
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