I dated a man in my late 20s for a year (let’s call him Stevie) but we typically only saw each other once every two weeks, as he was busy with his band. Toward the end of our relationship I had expressed being upset that he didn’t initiate plans more often. We got into an argument (all via text). I felt hurt and insecure, but looking back I think he was, too. We stopped talking. I decided to try to move on and date again. 

Right before Covid shut the world down, he texted me telling me he missed me, still thought about me, and was sorry for the way he acted. I was guarded. I had never felt this way about anyone. From the moment we met, I felt like I had known him forever. 

We texted and called during lockdown for three months, but I worried he just wanted a penpal and was scared of getting hurt. Meanwhile, I was also texting with a guy I had gone on a first date with when Stevie and I weren’t speaking. I didn’t like this guy on the first date and never planned to see him again, but in texts he said all the right things, and I thought maybe I misread him and should give him a chance. He asked me on a date and I went, but I was still waiting for Stevie to initiate plans. When it didn’t happen, I cut things off, feeling weird about dating both at once. 

This second guy pursued me hard and I thought that was how it was supposed to be, reaffirming that Stevie must have not felt the same way about me that I did for him (now I know I had been love bombed).

Now I’m years into a relationship with this second guy, who became a different person once I became pregnant and we moved in with each other. He is likely a narcissist (a word I don’t use lightly).

Stevie recently requested me on Instagram and I accepted him, so now he knows I’m in a relationship, but he doesn’t know I never stopped thinking about him and I would have left this relationship long ago if I could. Stevie isn’t someone I’m daydreaming about as an escape, but he is someone who I miss deeply, and who, after doing the work on myself, feel it would be different the second time around. I wouldn’t reach out to him until things could be done and settled with my current partner, but even then I worry about all the explaining I’d have to do.

Would it be wrong to reach out to him in the future, or is it too complicated now?

– Complicated