Lara - my daughter is 4 1/2. My xabf (not her biological father) was in her life since she was an infant. I had no problem leaving her biogical father while I was pregnant, went through my pregnancy alone and was happy. He and I have a great parenting relatinship now that is very healthy for our daughter. He wasn't much of a drinker but one night he came home after drinking, punched holes in my wall when I was pregnant, pushed me and I had to call the police. I walked, never looked back, not for a second and told myslef this will NEVER be a person I'll give another chance to. No way. No how. Conversation over! He's a great dad. Maybe that was a slip up and again, he's not much of a drinker to begin with so it was surprising but regardless, never gave him another chance to prove me wrong. This is the father of my child and it was easy to walk.
I'm writing about this because my sister last weekend says to me "you used to be the strongest, the most independant woman any of us have every met. what happened to you..." referring to what she's watched me put up with as far as my axbf of three years that walked into my life when my daughter was 18 months old. In walks the addict. Never in a million years would I, my family or a single friend of mine believe that I would go back to this person as many times as I have. Why? I still don't have the answers. I still feel like I have PTSD when I think back to the things that I put up with that I never would have with anyone else.
Our stories are similar. We are both single moms, I'm close to your age, our children are almost the same age. All I can tell you is that I wish I would have listened to the advice of all the wise SR members. So many times in the last three years they were right. I too had a long period of no contact last year and was foolish enough to reach out. It turned into 5 months of pure hell. He wasn't even doing as many drugs as he was in the past, but was still relapsing constantly. Our relationship was worse on so many levels. Each make up/break up cycle adds to the dysfunction of most relationships I think, even ones where no drugs are involved. You add drugs, lies, manipulation, distrust, etc to it, it's just too dangerous.
Trust me, I feel your pain. I haven't slept good in the last several nights and am trying to shake this off once again becuase we've broken up so many times due to drugs. I'm just remembering how good I started to feel after months of no contact and remember that I will get there again but I will never be able to get there as long as I have contact with him.
Please remember your child. My child is 4. I chose to not allow my ex to go on vacation with us and that's what ended things a few weeks ago. She can remember that vacation with she and I laughing, having the time of our lives, with no drama, no stress, no anxiety. She's old enough to start remembering things now and so is your child. It's hard being a single mom and I think that's part of the reason I got so sucked in. But it will be much harder to watch my daughter have issues when she's older because I let an addict in her life.