Where to begin... I was your usual happy-go-lucky girl who went about with friends, shopping, going to parties and such... until I began seriously dating a man with an ex-wife and a daughter...

I met a wonderful man almost a year ago now through work. Thought nothing of it until he did his big approach to me months after we became good friends. I knew things wouldn't always be smooth sailing being with a man with a past - at that point in time he'd been separated for some time after his wife had kicked him out of the house and told him that there was no use in staying together for the sake of their daughter. One thing I never imagined was that his ex-wife would be so demanding... or that he'd be so easily manipulated by his ex-wife using his daughter as her pawn.

I can't comprehend the thought that anyone who ended their own relationship would be so angry with the fact that the person they didn't want, had moved on with their life; or so angry at the new partner - in this case: me. The other part that I am still yet to grasp is that he still want's to avoid things and continue to agree with doing things his ex-wife's way, just so as not to play 'her game'. He tells me that he'll deal with things like telling his ex-wife that I'll be picking up our daughter whenever he can't make it there in time... so that it's easier on me, but months on that's still yet to be shown and it's gotten to the point that he's agreeing with his ex-wife on the transportation of our daughter and alike.

I know legally I have no rights. I'm not in their Custody Order, I'm nobody, just his 'girlfriend' 'temporarily'. Not a wife, not a soon-to-be-wife, and with that, I'm not a Step-mother, a Step-mother-to-be, nothing.

There's been so much that's happened to-date, it get's harder every day... every day I realize that little bit more that he'll avoid any type of conflict regarding her, causing that much more of a void between him and I.
It get's pushed on me more and more that, at the end of the day, his past is not regretted and he'd never do anything any other way, other than to ensure the happiness of his ex-wife and his daughter.

It makes me wonder... what with all this talk of love and such, where do all his actions, or lack-of, leave me? What does it mean for our relationship? Does everything we have, and plan to have, mean nothing to him at all?