A
female
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:my boyfriend and i have been dating for 1 year. he has two children from two different mothers. the oldest, his daughter, is 4 years old. Her mother passed away 4 years ago, 11 days after the now 4 year old was born. When this death occured my current boyfriend has told me that he woke up to find the mother of his daughter dead in the bed next to him. she had a bloodclot from complications during the birth. He has told me that it was really hard on him but yet a little less than a year later, he started dating another girl. After they got together she got pregnant with their son, who is now 3 years old. They were together for about two years. I'm not quite sure how long they had been apart nor when they broke up before he met me, but i am having a hard time handling all of this. At first, all of his baggage didn't bother me but it does now, and i don't know what to do. i'm jealous because he still talks about his daughter's mother, visits her grave (brings the girl flowers and candles) "talks to her", keeps notes and pictures from her in his dresser, and he still has the red t-shirt that the paramedics cut off of her dead body in the top drawer of his dressor from the morning he found her. I understand that people need to grieve but is this normal? it has been four years since she died. Is it possible that he moved on with his son's mother so fast that he never truly had the chance or enough time to get over the whole tragedy? If not, when he tells me he loves me and wants to be with me forever is that just rubbish talk on his part? He has me promise that I am never going to leave him and stuff too, is that also just insecurity? I don't want to be another 'filler' for the gap left by some other girl. I want someone to love me for real that's all. Sometimes when he looks at me I start to wonder deep down if he wished I were his wife of four years ago . Am I being rational? Please help.
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female
reader, anonymous, writes (27 April 2011): I know exactly where you are coming from. I dated a guy whose wife died suddenly. He explained they never stopped loving each other but she was taken from him. It is totally devastating for him and I couldn't cope with the situation. I always felt he chose her and met me because she died. I would advise to take the pressure off yourself and see how things go. You have no commitment to him. It's horrific what happened to him but this is first and foremost about you. I am not being harsh I just understand as I have been there. Every relationship has its problems and we all bring a different selection of baggage to each one. I really believe that time will tell on this one. I think what also worries you is his behaviour on meeting someone else so quickly that you worry he is a person who cannot be alone.
A
reader, anonymous, writes (27 April 2011): Well if this is hard on you then, imagine how hard it must be on him! Ok firstly, your boyfriend is never going to get over this. It will just get a'lot easier as time goes by. Not only has he had to deal with the fact of losing someone he loves, he's also got to come to terms with the the fact that it was the mother of his child, aswell as knowing she died in bed next to him. I simply carn't imagine what this must be like to go frew. It a real life tragedy.Well everyone is different, so it all depends on the individual on how long it will take to heal. He might be having trouble, coming to terms with it and could be indenial. Maybe, he doesn't want to, move on Incase he feels like he will forget parts of her so. He could be clinging on to the past or maybe he doesn't want to let go. Only he knows, what's truly going on in his head. I think with the other mother of his child he probably moved on to fast and maybe that's why it didn't work out. He probably wasn't in the right frame of mind. It obviously wasn't meant to be though!He's probably being genuine with his words to you. He's already lost someone he loves, so if hrs feels like you might leve, it could provoke feelings off loss in him.Well i think it would be unfair to not expect him to keep, stuff of his late wife. That's all he's got to remind him of her and he's never going to see her again. That is a big deal! The thing is, if you have a child with someone, then it's a big thing. Me and my ex didn't get along but i will always have care for him. He was a big part of my life and still is. Not to mention the fact that, my baby would not egzist with out him and be made her together. Even when i still meet someone else, it will not stop me caring about my ex but that doesn't mean to say i won't love the person I'm with. You need to decide if he's the one for you. It doesn't matter if you promised him you wouldn't leve. You are not responsible for his happiness, so don't feel obliged to stay, because he's had a time.He's not a cancer in aastrology by any chanse?
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A
female
reader, BettyBoup  +, writes (27 April 2011):
 I understand how difficult this must be for you. You have feelings for this guy and really care about him, and I can appreciate that it must be so hard knowing he loved a woman who died and he is still thinking of her.
I don't think you need to be concerned though. I don't think 4 years is a long enough time to fully move on from something like that. I don't think the issue is that he still loves her, as such, just that her death affected him greatly. You and he both know this woman sadly passed and nothing is going to bring her back, so for him to hold on to her memory as more than just that, would be futile. He cannot still love her romantically, although he may well always love her and have a place for her in his heart as she died so tragically and was the mother of his child. It sounds like he did move on too fast with the previous woman, and they could well have split up due to this issue. But I don't think you need to end things. I think you should give the relationship a chance. I don't think he sees you as a filler at all. He wants to move on and he really wants you to be the one who he can be with and start a fresh with. But he cannot forget about his ex, because he is still grieving. He will probably always visit her grave as she was a loved one who passed. They were still together when she passed and it was such a tragic way, he might even feel guild around the event as she died from complications after the birth of his child. A death like this is not something that a person can just "get over". The woman and event will always stay with him and be a part of his life and relationship with his 4 year old daughter. He also has the responsibilty to keep her mother's memory alive for her sake, and keeping the Tshirt might be part of this. It is ok to keep memories of her, he may want to share this wuth his daughter when she is older.
I know this is a massive piece of history for you to deal with. But try to remember, there is no way he can realistically be romantically in love with his ex. That would be irrational. 4 years is enough to move on from that and start a new relationship. The love he feels for her is completly different. It is like the love for a deceased loved family member. He will always love her, but is never going to be "in love" with her. He has shown that he wants to be in love with you and wants to make it work. He is capable of loving you for real and I feel he is serious about you. But you will have to accept that he comes with this baggage, so just try to be as understading as you can be, and don't think that it has anything to do with you. You could try to talk to him about her and share the memories and grieving process with him, and help preserve her memory for his daughter to hear one day.
Good luck
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