My husband and I are new to polyamory. He recently broke up badly with a gf that I came to regard as toxic to him. I always 100% supported his relationship with her and had compersion and compassion for them. However, as their feelings for each other escalated, he began treating me cruelly and caused me pain repeatedly in some of his actions.
After each hurt like that, I made my needs known, I told him how each action/behavior made me feel, but he continued. I believe, based on what I was learning about his gf, that she was manipulating him for her own gain. Last week I discovered that he had begun to fabricate things he'd and places he'd been when he'd actually been with her. And then when I asked him about it, he lied. I finally got him to admit what he had done. I don't know why he was doing it and neither does he. I never put any restrictions on him and was always supportive.
When I found out he had moved to the level of lying to me, I did something I never, ever wanted to do in our new poly life: I told him I would leave our relationship if he kept seeing her. He broke it off. Then he said he wanted to be friends with her on a platonic level to prove to himself and to me that he can. He had been superficially friends with her for 15 years before they became romantically involved, but all those 15 years, they were physically attracted to each other.
I am very worried about him doing this. I think it's a terrible idea and I've told him so. I've given him many reasons why I think it's dangerous territory, but he says he is still going to do it. Is it a good idea for him to re-establish a friendship with her?
No, I don’t think that sounds like a good idea. I don’t think his reasoning - “to prove that he can” - is sound, and I don’t think he’s being fair to you or honest with himself. But it ultimately doesn’t really matter what I think. It’s unlikely that your husband will change his mind based on the ref call of an anonymous internet person. You clearly think it’s a bad idea, and all you can control is yourself. You have to decide whether you’re willing to be in a relationship with someone who is doing these things - the lying, the inability to admit his true intentions, the refusal to honor your requests, etc. You can’t choose his actions, you can only choose your responses to them.