My Wife and I Split Up a Few Months Ago. But People Have Told Us That the Way We’re Acting Is Bizarre.

Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily.

Dear Prudence is Slate’s advice column. Submit questions here.

Dear Prudence,

My wife and I split up a few months ago. We co-parent well and get along great, to the point where we have been told it’s bizarre. We were together for almost 20 years. We got together when we were very young. About six months ago, she told me she wasn’t happy, didn’t feel that spark for me anymore, and wanted to explore what healthy adult dating looked like. We tried a platonic, open marriage for about a week and decided the type of people this arrangement attracted just didn’t work for us. So she proposed separation and ultimately divorce.

I believe this was partially encouraged by some “free-spirited” friends—one married unfaithfully and one single. They didn’t talk her into it; it was more so that they validated a choice she was wrestling with. Whereas her happily married friends were more in our corner and wanted us to fix things.

I realized I shared a lot of the same frustrations, and while I wanted us to fix things, I ultimately made peace with the direction she wanted to take. I respect her decision and am trying to move on and make the best of it, but I don’t accept that this was our only path. We are both dating. She has had a number of unserious boyfriends, and I have a girlfriend I’m exclusive with, and it’s going well.

The main trouble is I miss my wife and my family unit so badly I’ll do anything to keep it. We still do a lot of things together, and are open with each other enough that she has asked me for dating advice. I don’t love this, but I give honest, if brutal, advice that basically amounts to “sink or swim” for whoever she’s dating. I make it a point to never intentionally give her bad advice or sabotage her because, at the end of the day, I want her to be happy. She’s important to me.

I don’t know what to do. I know our marriage needed work and was not in a good place, and I don’t want it back as it was. But I love her, my kids, and what we built together more than anything in the world, and I’m willing to put up with a lot to preserve whatever closeness she and I can maintain. I like that if my kids want to see me during her time with them, she will invite me over for dinner and a movie. I don’t want that kind of stuff to end, but telling her “we are too close; you need to either work on our relationship with me or we need to break off completely” seems like it will cost me what I crave most … the possibility of my intact family.

—What the Hell Am I Doing?

Dear What the Hell Am I Doing,

I applaud you for identifying your feelings about this really tough situation without vilifying your ex-wife or doing anything manipulative to get what you want. I agree that the solution here isn’t giving her an ultimatum about working on things with you or not speaking anymore. I’m more in favor of being transparent about where you are as a first step.

But first things first: Break up with your girlfriend. It’s not fair to her to be in a relationship with someone who is pining for the family he used to have. You’re not doing anything that constitutes infidelity, but there’s no way you’re giving her what she deserves while fantasizing about an entirely different partner and life. I’m sure she can pick up on your lingering feelings for your ex, and is probably trying to be cool about it and support your co-parenting, stuffing down her (correct) feelings that you would much rather be in a different relationship. Even if you’re treating her well, it’s a bad situation.

Next, if you want to give it another shot with your ex, it’s OK to say that, in a way that parallels how you’d approach a platonic friend about having more-than-just-friends feelings for them. You can be honest while giving her an out if she doesn’t share your feelings. What you say to her needs to communicate the depth of your love for her, your deep desire to try again, your willingness to address anything on your end that might have contributed to extinguishing the spark, and a promise not to harbor ill will or make things weird if she’s not interested. Put it all out there and give her some space to think about it.

If she’s not interested, you will need to communicate (fake) cheerful acceptance. Say something like, “I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t ask, but I understand, and I’m going to drop it and switch my focus to co-parenting.” After you’ve shared where you stand,  it will be the perfect time to add that, given your complicated feelings, you probably aren’t the best person to offer her dating advice. Explain that you don’t have enough distance to be objective, and that while you want the best for her, there’s also some pain associated with that. It’s important to be clear that this isn’t a punishment for her lack of interest in you, but a reasonable boundary between two people with a romantic past. Maybe it’s time for her to look elsewhere and consult those “happily married friends” whose advice she didn’t seek out at the end of your marriage.

Dear Prudence,

My girlfriend tends to drop out of text conversations with no warning. It’s an ADHD thing; she’s very easily distracted. At the start of our relationship, I let it go (thought it was cute, even), but three years in, I’m finding myself kind of annoyed about it. Is it worth bringing up, knowing she may not be able to change it? Or is it time to practice acceptance?

—Miffed

Dear Miffed,

I experienced a little moment of panic reading your letter because I’m not sure I knew text conversations required formal sign-offs, and now I’m wondering who I might have offended! In my experience, when it comes to my husband and my closest friends, texts are open-ended exchanges and places to drop ideas and updates from one person’s brain to another’s, with the understanding that the recipient will respond when they’re able. In fact, my dad will sometimes respond to a message with a note that he’s busy and will read it later, or say goodbye and announce that he’s on his way to a meeting, and my response in my head is always something like, “You don’t have to explain yourself to me! Go live your life!”

This doesn’t mean that there’s a right and a wrong way to communicate via this medium. Or that you have to accept your girlfriend’s style. Instead, talk to her about it—not to chastise her for breaking digital etiquette but to learn about her mindset and share yours. It would be fine to say something like, “Hey, I know everyone texts differently, and I’ve noticed you tend to put down conversations and then pick them back up later. Because I love talking to you, sometimes I’m sitting there waiting for a response, and it takes a while before I realize you’ve probably gotten distracted and moved on to the next thing. Is it OK if I double text you to get your attention and say goodbye?”

🥧 Send Prudie Your Wildest Holiday Story! 🥧

For a special edition, Prudie wants to hear about that one holiday where life unfolded like a comedy of errors. Burned the Thanksgiving meal five minutes before all your guests arrived? Took a Santa tradition too far? Discovered the truth behind the family’s secret, award-winning pie recipe? Write in here, and Prudie will share what she might’ve done.

Dear Prudence,

I can’t believe I need to write to an advice column over something so dumb, but my husband, “Brad,” and I are mired in a dispute over jack-o’-lanterns! Brad wants to carve several that have pumpkin guts spewing out of their mouths to make it look like they’re throwing up. I think it’s gross and have said no. Brad counters that he’s not objecting to the way I’m carving mine, so he should have free rein to make whatever he wants. Uh, duh, mine are normal, and people won’t be disgusted by them! What he wants to do is completely inappropriate, correct?

—Puking Pumpkins Prohibited

Dear Puking Pumpkins,

Come on. It’s not like he wants to decorate with a vomiting Santa or Easter bunny. Spewing guts are on the gross side of things when it comes to pumpkin carving choices, sure, but this is a holiday that heavily features blood as a theme, so Brad’s choice isn’t at all out of bounds. Let him do it! Then, after the festivities are over, maybe have a heart-to-heart about the unrelated tension or resentment in your marriage that’s causing you to fight over dumb stuff.

Classic Prudie

A few months ago, my husband uncovered an affair I was having with an old flame. He moved out and initiated divorce proceedings, but in the time since, I was able to convince him that I am truly repentant and to give our marriage another chance for the sake of our children. The problem I have now is that he says that if we are to stay married, he wants it to be an open marriage.