If her having 2 children is a deal breaker for you WHY did you start dating her? I do not care if she is the hottest woman on earth, if she has a deal breaker do not date.

Amy is right about your selective memory, it is will keep you from getting involved with anyone else and it all this positive stuff you dwell on will cause you to compare all the flesh and blood women in front of you negatively compared to your fantasy ex.

Remember the reasons you broke up. Then sit down and decide what you are looking for in a woman and do those single moms a favor and don't date them. They have enough on their plates, they do not need to date men to whom their children are deal breakers.

I wrote down everything that was happening to my last relationship that turned it south. Everytime I started longing for it, I re-read the diary. CURED!

Worthita hit it on the head: if you have a dealbreaker, it's counterproductive to date a woman who possesses that quality. Your dealbreaker obviously wasn't. Fair enough if you thought you could accept a ready-made family and found you couldn't, but you need to have a good long think on what your real dealbreakers are. From my limited knowledge of your situation, it seems likely that the debt and baby-daddy issues that were a big part of the problem. I also recommend finding out early if any moms you date are open to more kids. If you're really, really sure you don't want a woman with kids, then by all means don't date any, but it might be that the issue is you're afraid she might change her mind on having kids with you. I'm not trying to guilt you about not being into women with children; this is just something to chew on.

Bottom line: Revisionist history does you absolutely no good, so focus on the present and the future and only think about Past Girl when looking at what mistakes you made or what you don't want to happen.

pbjammin has the right idea too, LW. Write down everything that was a deal-breaker in your previous relationship, and every time you think you want it, read your list. Excellent idea!

I too wonder why you have ever entered into a relationship with someone who had a couple of ready made deal breakers hanging off her hip. It makes me wonder if these are just elaborate reasons not to commit to anyone. If you want to stay single, that is okay. People are doing that more and more now. Just be honest with yourself and then maybe you can let the memory of this other woman go.

Great idea pbjammin! Maybe more people should do that!

pbjammin's idea works perfectly. Unless of course you look at the reasons and realize they were irrational and/or silly. Then what do you do besides kick yourself?

This letter made me see red. LW, I could understand the debt and baby daddy drama being problems. But if a woman has children and that's a dealbreaker for you, don't waste her (or their) time to begin with. Especially, don't fool yourself or her into thinking you have a "deep love" for her right before you dump her.

And then there's what you did to her children by abandoning them - or didn't you ever bother to connect with them to begin with? You say you want children some day. Well, there were two little people right there whom you might have loved if you'd let them into your heart. You might be happily married to their mother now.

OK, happily married provided you dealt with those other issues. But you didn't list those other issues as dealbreakers - only the kids. And you didn't say the kids were little monsters or anything, you objected to their very existence. Did you even give them a chance? Or did the fact that they aren't biologically your children mean you refused to give them a chance?

Did you let them and their mom know they were dealbreakers for your great love for their mom? Bastard.

Wow, rm! I have to disagree. I have a couple of girlfriends with kids who literally wait till the third or fourth date before they even reveal they have kids! I've pointed out how unfair this is to the guy. One had a really nice guy that decided to keep going because he though maybe it wasn't a dealbreaker after all because they got along so awesomely. But then the other stuff (she had a good bit of baggage in addition to kids too) made that unworkable for him. She was crushed when he left her and the kids were understandably unhappy too but what did she (and you) expect him to do? Stay when he was unhappy? People don't need a "good" reason or a "dealbreaker" to leave someone when they are unhappy and it's not working out. Would you be seeing less red if he had left out the kids as dealbreakers and used the baggage instead? Just saying it isn't always as black and white (and red) and you seem to see it.

Blech. LW sounds like a real catch.

You want a family, so you could 'never marry her' because...she has a family? Oh, you want a family "someday" (i.e. in your imagination, not in real life - or, they must be your own perfect progeny, not someone else's). Right.

You'd do well to find some lass with low self esteem pronto, before you get too old to qualify for women who don't already have "baggage." Unless you are a millionaire, in which case take your time wasting other women's time, some young gold digger will come along eventually.

This reminds me of a guy I met who wants his own family someday. In the mean time he dates women who are infertile in some way. When he breaks up with them he says, "I love you but I want to have children." The last time I heard of him saying this he had just turned 60. BLEEECH!

I never dated him but saw this happen three times.

LW it is time to grow up and decide what you want and go after it. You better hurry because the longer you wait the harder it will be to find a woman who does not have children. While you are at it, take a look at your own baggage compartment and clean it out.

"I have a couple of girlfriends with kids who literally wait till the third or fourth date before they even reveal they have kids! I've pointed out how unfair this is to the guy."

If she kidnapped him, ravished him, forced him to fall in looooove with her, and then shamelessly revealed the existence of her two kids, he has a case. But strangely, he made no mention of it.

And if she did, he must not have minded too much, because he hung around long enough to think he was in love with her. He didn't say they had three or four dates, he said they were in love. Unless he falls into this famous deep love in 24 hours or so.

"People don't need a "good" reason or a "dealbreaker" to leave someone when they are unhappy and it's not working out."

He is the one who used the term "dealbreaker" to explain what happened. I didn't ask him to explain it. He could have just as easily written "I'm having trouble getting over my last girlfriend". Period.

Sounds like HE thought he needed to justify his behavior. Oh yeah, because of that deep love he had for her. Deep love my foot.

I agree with the responses from those who don't say what a terrible person he is for not wanting a woman with kids, but the fact that he stayed with her even when he found out that she had kids.

Perhaps the person with the deal-breaker should lay it out on the line during their first date. I would consider his particular "deal breaker" to be a pretty significant issue. Important enough to address on the first date. LW owed it to his girl friend to put his "deal breakers" out on the table, so that she has the opportunity to stop wasting her time with him and move on to someone else. Had he laid this information out at the beginning, but she still elected to pursue this, she deserves precisely what she gets. But LW denied giving the opportunity to But instead, he allows her to develop a "deep love," then drops the bomb. "Yeah, that was pretty hot, wasn't it? Too bad you've got two deal breakers"

What a scum!

If what you have always contains deal-breakers, then you always have a built-in excuse. That is all.

You want a family, so you could 'never marry her' because...she has a family? Oh, you want a family "someday" (i.e. in your imagination, not in real life - or, they must be your own perfect progeny, not someone else's). Right.

***

This isn't fair. I think it is perfectly reasonable to want your own kids. There's a reason people mourn when they find out they're infertile or sterile, even though adoption is a perfectly valid way to start a family.

In any case, I only know of one person who has a great, parent-like relationship with their stepfather.

I do agree with the people who said he should have been up front about it.

Re: Selective memory

Before my divorce, I went to a state mandated class (which had about an hour of great information "packed" into three hours.) One thing the presenter stressed was the dangers of selective memory and how some relationships improve when you aren't around each other all the time.

I look back at my journal and some emails in the last five years of my marriage and it makes my hair stand on end. The emotional abuse was intense and yet the pain has become abstract, for lack of a better word.

"If her having 2 children is a deal breaker for you WHY did you start dating her?"

Aw c'mon, be fair, he's a man, I'm guessing 'the sex was good' or something like that.

Or, maybe he initially thought he might find it OK, and then realized it was too much of a problem.

Or a combination of the above.