Why, last night I let him think that we are OK when I know we are not? Why do i fear him so much, just like I fear my mother?
Lupita, sweetie - you just gave yourself one big clue in these questions.
M is not your mother. Even if he does some things that remind you of her... your relationship with him and your boundaries with him... are still different. M is not your mother...
Part of our brains know this; but we have another part that doesn't. It's the part that can be so frightened because it mistakes a stick for a snake; our flight - fight - freeze reflexes. I've come to know how that part of my brain works; I think everyone's is unique and so just a bit different. In my case, total intimacy with another person - like my own Mhubby - can send me to that total fear zone. It's because that part of my brain mistakes hubby and our relationship - for the inappropriate boundary intrusions and projections and self-soul-pain that level of intimacy evoked in my relationship with my mother. It's like I have intimacy PTSD, you know?
It happens more than I want it too, even now. It happens with lots of other situations and people, too. But the more I learn about how my own system works... the more in control of it I am... and the less likely I am to take the old pattern of relationship with my mom and superimpose it on someone else. I've learned that that "reflex" - or learned fear experience - is mistaking a stick for a snake; and sometimes now, that is even true of my interactions with my mom. (My boundaries with her are stronger now; I'm "training" her sort of... with mixed results.)
The result of working on and through this is - the level of intensity of all feelings I have about boundary issues decreases; I'm able to look at what's going on in a relationship or misunderstanding or situation a tad more objectively than I used to; and so I've convinced myself (right or wrong) that I'm making more informed, cleared, decisions. One thing I know for a fact: I am never completely a blameless, helpless victim in these situations; only in that ancient, engraved on the fear brain, old situation was I helpless. I always find things I could've said or done differently that would've prevented issues or been more true to expressing what I really wanted. I know now, that I'm a part of the problem too.
The reason I think you might be doing something like this too, is that you've said a couple of times that you felt abandoned. I'm sure that's true of your experience with your mother... but M is not your mother and spending time with his other family members isn't abandonment of you... unless you're expecting (with part of your brain) to replace that previous family and all his other relationships and make him into a substitute for the mom who really did abandon you. After all, you left him - right? And doesn't it "take two to tango"? Maybe you unconsciously gave M the message that it was OK with you or that you didn't mind him spending time with his children and ex? (That's a big maybe that only you will know the answer to, sweetie... I'm just guessing.)
Poor Lupita, I wish I could explain this better and make it all better. I know how awful and confusing and painful that place is. But CB is right; if you look at what you yourself are saying in your posts - you'll also find the clues to understanding what's going on and healing that place and changing it, to your gain in wisdom about this and yourself. Read your posts as if someone else wrote them. It'll help. Do a complete de-briefing on this whole relationship and how you were feeling and are feeliong now, with your T; it'll help.
I hope you don't misunderstand and think I'm "blaming" you, either. I'm only trying to use my experience of discovering how I actually helped create the situations that brought everything crashing down on me... to help explain some of what MIGHT be going on with you, too.
I know I could be completely wrong and if you persist in trying to understand it yourself, you might very well come up with a completely different explanation.
Hang in there, sweetie.
