I (28M) used to be married to an amazing woman (24F). We divorced 2 years ago, and we were dating for 1 year, married for 3. She was & still is the love of my life and our divorce is my biggest regret.

My mother was a nightmare MIL. I stupidly let her involve herself in our marriage, & mistreat my ex wife by constantly criticizing her. I never called her to complain about my ex or sided with her against my ex wife, but I should have enforced strict boundaries with her as soon as I realized she was going to be a problem for us. I did go no contact with her twice, during my ex wife’s miscarriages because I didn’t want her to have added stress. However, during our 2nd miscarriage, my mother found out by reading some texts off my sister’s phone and went ballistic (she found out it was the second one from the texts too). She turned up to our home, and instead of turning her away instantly, I took her into the living room and tried to explain things to her while my ex wife who was upstairs resting was unaware of her being there. My mother pretended to calm down, but when I went into our backyard to bring the cats inside, she went upstairs and woke my ex wife up. She screamed at her for ‘ruining’ my relationship with her and made some horrible comments about her being ‘barren’. By the time I got upstairs (five minutes later because the cats were not very happy with me bringing them inside) my ex wife was in tears. I kicked my mother out immediately but that was my ex wife’s final straw and we split up a month later and agreed to remain friends. We acknowledged that we still had feelings for eachother, but that this relationship wasn’t beneficial to her anymore. We lived in the US, but my ex wife’s dad lives in the UK so after our divorce, she went to go spend some time with him and ended up getting employed by one of his friends.

I was devastated by the divorce, & I immediately went no contact with my mother and put myself into therapy. Therapy helped me understand that my relationship with my mother wasn’t healthy, and I learned some good strategies to keep communication with her healthy so I’m now low contact with her. We only speak during family events. My siblings have told me that she still doesn’t see what she’s done wrong so I definitely won’t be advancing beyond LC for the foreseeable future.

I’ve not moved on from my divorce, and I think I’m even more in love with my ex than I have been before. I’ve not seen anyone new, and she’s constantly on my mind.

During the first 6 months of my ex-wife living in the UK, we didn’t speak. However, on our wedding anniversary she sent me a text that read ‘Happy un-anniversary {insert a nickname that she used to call me}’ followed by ‘I thought we agreed to stay friends, loser’. For the rest of her 1st year away, we texted eachother every now and then, like on my birthday, her birthday & my brother’s birthday. For my brother’s birthday, she sent his to my house and I gave it to him for her. Before the MRA’s get here, my brother is gay and they have been friends since they were children. He set us up on our first date so I don’t want any crazy DMs.

During her 2nd year away, we fell into a more typical friendship, and I told her about the therapy I had after she asked me if I had ‘cut the umbilical cord yet ‘. She told me about two men that she had dated and about how both relationships ended. I wasn’t weird about it, but it made me think about how much I missed her and how much I still loved her. My thoughts kept me up that night, and I couldn’t stop hating myself for ruining things with her. I still have both of our wedding rings and her engagement ring.

Due to recently world events, she hasn’t been able to come visit anyone here in the US, but she’s moving back in October. I was actually the first person she told about that. Everyone’s pretty excited, and my brother is organizing a home-coming party for her and I’ve been invited. It’s probably going to be hosted at my house (our marital home) because I’m the only person in our circle who lives alone. However, my brother asked me if I’d hanging out with her by myself at some point. I wasn’t planning on asking her to, but now that he’s brought it up it’s all I can think of. They are best friends, so some part of me is thinking she might have put him up to it just like she did when she asked him to set us up together in the first place. I asked my sister for her input, but she said that I shouldn’t ask her to meet up with me and I should wait for her to ask if wants to. I think she *might* still have feelings for me because when she was telling me about one of her breakups she said ‘none of the men over here can handle me like you can’ but her humour is generally flirtatious so I can’t be sure.

I would love an outside perspective on this, would asking her out be the right thing to do? Thanks for reading.

Mini update 23/08/22: Y’all have convinced me to ask her now instead of waiting for October. It’s late in the UK right now, but I will call her tomorrow! Thanks for all of the encouragement.

(I’m using the British style for the date because I plan on showing this post to my ex if everything goes well tomorrow. She’s originally British and moved to the US at ten when her parents split and she liked it when I used her british-isms. I will be removing this edit before I show her the post 😅)

Edit 1: I wanted to clarify what I meant by LC since I know everyone has a different interpretation of it. The LC I have is only saying happy birthday to eachother in the family groupchat, we’re never the first to say it to eachother and the conversation doesn’t advance beyond that point. Whenever she comes up to me at family events which isn’t often anymore, she usually asks how I am and for updates on my life. I give her one worded answers and gray-rock the rest. My therapist calls this method ‘Civil NC’ which I think is more accurate.

She freaked out about no contact when my ex wife first left, and regularly blew up my phone. LC has been more peaceful. I am aware this will change if my ex wife and I get back together and I’ll be working with my therapist to create a plan for every possibility. I plan on returning to NC after the phonecall tomorrow, and I want to make it as safe and peaceful as possible so if a tiny bit of conversation is what it takes, I’ll do it.

Edit 2: I’m logging off now because this is making me anxious (in a good way don’t worry!). Next time y’all will hear from me is after our conversation đŸ’ȘđŸ»đŸ’ȘđŸ».

26 comments

  1. Let her know you’re interested. See what happens. Don’t stay silent and regret it.

  3. Bro she asked if you cut the umbilical cord that’s literally what she was waiting for, I think this is going to go well for you i can’t wait for the update

  5. I would avoid going straight for the asking for a date. That’s too many steps at once. I would ask her to meet up with you and maybe make an evening of it, but skirt the “date” theme and just try and reconnect. If it seems appropriate, and I mean read the room, explain how you feel about her, how you never really got over her. Go from there, measure the response, talk to her. She’s the only one who knows how she feels about you, you need to find out from the source, but do it with enough deniability that you can withdraw if you’re way out of line. And by that I don’t mean be hesitant, but allow some dignified withdrawal room for you both in case you’re just shitting in the pool. If you get a “We’ll see”, I’d consider that a win, and proceed with tact and care.

  6. You should ask her. Dont wait for her to bring up anything.

    But be very clear about how things will be different this time. Dont just go to her and ask – make sure you have a plan about how you have solved your mother problem and how she wouldn’t have to harassed in the future.

    I would also implore you to be cautious and think about all the possibilities. There may be a possibility that she doesn’t want to get back with you, or even tjat maybe she met someone else in UK. Please mentally prepare yourself for that too.

    I wish you all the best. Please update us

  7. Ask her! This is your chance to win back the love of your life! You made a mistake and learned a lesson. It is going to take time to earn her trust back. Be patient, learn from your mistakes and always put her first. Let her take the lead on engaging with your Mom, never force it at family events. If she tells you to go without her, don’t, not in the beginning. Go get her and make beautiful new memories together ❀ I wish you the best of luck and many years of happiness.

  9. If you don’t ask it wont happen. If you do ask the worst she can say is no. If by some miracle, if you do get a second chance don’t mess it up again. If she gets any hint of how it was before she will leave again and not come back. Put her first and fiercely protect her, especially from your viper of a mother.

  10. OP all these signs honestly point to her still wanting to give you a chance. And worst case scenario: she doesn’t feel the same. So you’re either without her without trying to get her back, or without her knowing you did everything possible to get her back. Idk man it’s worth the “risk” in my eyes. Life’s too short, tell her you are very LC with your mom, you’re in therapy, and you’d love to take her on a date. Peruse her again, woo her again, date her again. Remind her how important she is to you and help her fall in love with you again (she clearly still *loves* you even if it’s not *in love* ). Maybe ask your therapist the best way to give a full, well grounded apology. I’m sure your therapist knows the full situation so they should be able to help you structure something. Maybe even write it out in a letter and when you have a second alone, read her the letter out loud. Just say I didn’t want to get anything wrong or leave anything out. Just try! Don’t live with more regret

  12. here’s the whole thing about getting together with an ex: you have to be able to let them know very quickly that you’re aware last time around was toxic enough to cause the split, and this is how you’ve grown and why the pattern would be different this time around. If you can’t recognize why it didn’t work before and how you’re going to fix it this time, don’t even bother.

  13. If you two are single, go for it. I would actually preface it , and say something along the lines of, now after I have cut the umbilical cord, and gone to therapy, I realize how I treated you, and how I messed up our marriage that is the only regret I have, and if I ever get the chance again. I know exactly what I would do differently. This way you are saying you want a chance, but also understand if she does not want to give you one.

  14. You have a lot to talk to her about. I might even suggest you talk about doing therapy together to help her heal from your r/JUSTNOMIL hell.

    Don’t put any pressure on a meetup. Ask to get together to talk about your progress and being low contact with your mother. Talk about the progress you have made, and don’t worry about saying that you are just as in love with her if not more but that you respect her choices as being the right ones for both of you at the time. Show her how much you have changed and grown a shiny spine because of the situation.

    You won’t lose anything by being honest and open here, you seem to be friends still so work with what you have.

  16. Ok for starters, your mother is an absolutely awful human being and likely has some sort of diagnosable personality disorder. She is next level toxic and she will NEVER change.

    You need to talk to your ex-wife and be open about your feelings for her and that you don’t want to live without her any longer. She clearly still loves you from the sounds of it and if you explain to her about everything you opened up about here and reassure her that your fucking psychotic mother has been put in her place and will not be a problem for the 2 of you anymore I would be stunned if she didn’t give it serious thought. Tell her EVERYTHING you opened up about here. Acknowledging that you were introspective about what happened previously and will do whatever you have to for the past not to repeat itself will likely go a long way in reassuring her and making her much more open to getting back together.

  17. No secrets, no hiding; only honesty. If you’d like to develop a healthy, adult relationship with her; you’ll need to start over from scratch.

  18. Cut out your mother completely and get back with the love of your life. Make your mother choke on humble pie until she understands how horrible she was.

  19. If you have cut the chord. You need to tell her it’s been cut, tied, and disposed of in the biohazard bin. Then tell her exactly how you feel and start dating her again. Keep your mother far away and never ever allow her to be toxic again. If you need to interact be strong, firm and unrelenting in supporting your ex and yourself no matter how manipulating she gets.

    Part of your initial break up was because she felt she received no support from you.

    Best of luck

  21. Just ask her out for dinner, with no expectations. That you’d love to at least catch up.

    The worst thing to happen is that she says no.

  22. I would get your hopes too high but I do feel there is still reason to hope. You’ve grown a lot. And she has been privy to your growth. It could be she wants to reconcile or to see if there is still that spark. I think you should be honest with how you feel once she gets there but make her aware you don’t expect anything from her and you will be content as her friend.

  23. Yes!! Please ask her. I sincerely hope you will both give your marriage a second chance. She sounds like she still loves you. Update us!!

  25. As someone who would give anything for my ex to make the changes that would make “another try” a possibility
go for it. Just make sure to be clear that you understand how you screwed up the first time, tell her about the work you have done in your own life so that you won’t waste another chance
and tell her that she’s still the one.

    I think we are all rooting for you, please update!

  26. This is probably not helpful but I’m just over here really hoping you get back together 🍿💕

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