Okay.. so somehow I stumbled across this website and landed right on "Mom's question." Call it fate, call it what you will but I just started typing things into Google and here I am... I read through practically all of the answers on here and I couldn't help but imagine that some of this advice I could use myself... I was inspired to write on this "question" instead of starting my own.. one, because I'm new to this, and two, because the people in this particular forum seem to give great advice... I was hoping for the same. I just broke up with my boyfriend with whom I am still very much in love with. We have known each other since we were teenagers. HE had a crush on me then but I wanted no part of him at that time in my life. He was known as a "bad boy" with a bad reputation to boot. And... I had a crush on someone else.(lol) Anyway, to this day he admits that this crush he had on me wasn't a crush. He "was in love." I'm guessing it wasn't so much "love" but the simple fact that he couldn't have me is what drove him crazy. He could have any girl he wanted and I was the first to tell him no. This "crush" went on for years, but to me we were just friends. I never kissed him or lead him to think we would ever be more than just that.. but still he was persistant!! So.. after a few years went by he got a girlfriend and moved to Seattle with her. Over the holidays he would come to visit. One night close to Christmas day a girlfriend and I were searching for something to do. I called him and he happened to be in town. We rushed right over to a party he was at and well... that was the night the tables had turned. It was as if he put a spell on me.. I'm not kidding, I had no idea what came over me but I felt something for him that I had never felt before... When I saw him and gace him a hug a tingle went rushing through my veins as if I had been struck by cupid himself!! ( I know what your thinking... party? alcohol? maybe that's why I was tingling inside... but I can assure you I had not been drinking at all that night)... Anyway, that night was our first kiss... Yes, he still had a girlfriend with whom he lived with and it was wrong.. but it happened... He left a couple of days later... no call... no text.. nothing... After about a week of trying to reach him.. I gave up... Shortly after, I moved on with my life and decided to give another guy I had been seeing (on and off for a few years)another shot. I had totally dismissed what happened between "just friends" ( that's going to be his nickname in this story) and I, and chalked it up as, " it just wasn't the right time." Fast forward a few years later, and I was still seeing this other guy (leaving out his name.. so lets just call him "turned serious". After being together for several years (about 8) I got pregnant and we decided to have a baby. Let me point out at this time that although we had talked about getting married.. he never proposed.. not even after we found out we were going to have a baby. So, in the summer of 2008, I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl... I also must mention at this point, that like many relationships out there.. ours was a bit rocky at times... definitley NOT perfect and at times he was very controlling... After I had my baby I knew rather quickly that I has PPD. And to make matters worse "turned serious" lost his job... Things got worse and worse over the next few months and just after my daughters first birthday "turned serious" gave me no other choice but to move out of "his" house and move back in with my mother. It's about to get complicated...that's if anyone is still reading... Apparently, within a week of this happening "just friends" moved back into town after breaking up with his girlfriend a few months prior... He happened to see me on facebook and asked me to go to lunch with him, and I did. All the feelings I had locked up and thought I had forgotten came rushing back... Now I know that may sound crazy but I just couldn't ignore it... Believe me I tried. (I have a feeling I could keep going on forever so I'm going to try and wrap this up....) Anyway, I went on trying to ignore these feeling for him and tried to work things out with my ex.. for our daughters sake... and well... I loved him. It didn't work. And just before her second birthday we split up again... Then, who do you think appeared once again... "just friends." Fast forward to just about eight months ago... "just friends" and I were in a relationship. He got close with my daughter as well as the rest of my family rather quickly... after about a month of dating he needed a place to stay and my mom said it would be fine if he stayed with us for a while.... a while turned into about 6 months... His true colors shined through after about four months of absolute bliss... things turned sour after a few times that he chose to go out with his friends and getting drunk/high. I thought he had cleaned up his act long before we atarted dating... but it wasn't long until his "addiction" problems shined through.... One night after he decided to go out with his friends he never came home... the next morning I got a call from his boss and he told me that Mark had done this before and that this was the last time.. he was fired... I was at work myself... and had no idea where he was.. dead or alive? I left work because I was so upset.. My daughter was with her father... and I just sat there and waited for him to come home... I spoke with his mother and his boss... called a few friends and nothing... no one knew where he was.... At about 3 in the afternoon ( after I had packed up all his stuff in garbage bags) he strolled in like nothing was wrong... Clearly I could see that he had been up all night drinking and doing drugs.... that was it for me! I kicked him out! He of course pleaded and pleaded with me to give him another chance... I told him he had to go... he lived on the streets for about a week before he decided to get on a plane and visit his friend in New York. I took him to the airport... and he promised me he was going there to change his life around... for him... and for us... I believed him.... He can be very convincing!!! So after about a month of very little contact he came home... now he lives with his mother and has been sober for 2 months.... He admitted to lying to me and even stealing from me while he was living in my house... he came clean with what I think is everything but you just never know... and that's the whole point... after a month of me wondering,crying,not recieving hardly any phone calls while he was away... he now asks me to forgive him...... It took me two months (from the day he came home until just last Thursday) to finally break up (officially end it face to face) and tell him that he is not well.. and that he needs to continue to stay clean and sober... get his life back on track... and then maybe we can revisit this again.... I am still deeply in love with him even after all he has done and put me through... we have such a long history of being friends and then in this realtionship... I miss him so much and pray like crazy that he gets better... but I just don't know.. I'm sure it sounds crazy but I feel like if I truly loved him "for better or for worse" I should have stuck by him and supported him... but I had do separate myself and more importantly my daughter from him... He is the most intelligent, charming, sensitive, storng, lovable man I have ever met... and I LOVE HIM dearly,... I have been so sad,.. I thought for sure after all we had been through,.. he was my forever..... Believe it or not but I did leave out a lot, and as perfect strangers, or outsiders looking in... what I did was the right thing... BUT I still cannot seem to convince myslef of that totally...