And I agree with everyone, that you have to think things through.
The relationship progressed very quickly, which can be a red flag. Also there is her temper and even more so, her inclination to be unreceptive to your point of view.

At this stage in the relationship, people are still on their best behaviour. This includes you, of course. The intenseness is concerning.

Just have a moment every day to think things through and try to look at things as if you were your aunt, giving you advice.

I am trying to not hold onto drama in my mind and let her be grumpy when she is tired etc.

I discovered she changed her phone pun in last 24hrs so now I am feeling paranoid about what was the real reason for the random sabotaging drama

Are you going to do anything about this?

I raised it. She wants to keep her privacy.

I am going to offer her mine and let her decide.

What is reasonable alternative - I can't demand it.

No, you can't demand it.

If she is keeping her friendship going with her ex in private, can you accept that?

No

Then this may be a huge red flag. Maybe you shouldn't get back together?

You are probably right

On the plus side though she is not hiding her phone, is happily leaving it out in plain view, not hiding her screen when I come past or near, and even offered to show me the recent SMS history with him which I declined because of the song and dance she made about how important her privacy was to her.

We spent most of the day together and she is not making any effort to hide her use of the phone, go into other rooms etc so it seems like there are no other obvious red flags on that front.

I would prefer to be free to check with her permission when I feel uncomfortable about her behaviour but I guess the current state is a reasonable compromise.

It's hard to know how to respond to your posts, because, once again, you haven't really asked a question.

Are you happy with the way the relationship is now?

We are spending lots of time together and she is being very affectionate

But the ex has msg this morning with a derogatory joking comment about me which she showed me and said she was going to ignore.

I challenged her as to why would she accept and not challenge herself and she said she feels she has caused enough pain to him by leaving.

😕

So another red flag that she still wants to be in contact with her ex. Do you see this?

Yep. I was processing this still while we were shopping; that if the communication was supposedly over she could tell him to bugger off. Or if they were just "friends" why not share the news that everything is going great with us?

Not just silence.

He had msg'g about her son's first day of high school.

Then he had msg'd about me calling me " drama guts" or something like that.

That was the msg she showed me and was going to ignore.

So I was letting it sit to see if I wanted the drama of challenging further. I really just want her cut off of her own accord. I honestly feel that she genuinely wants to be with me but I just can't not feel annoyed and anxious about their contact.

Anyway

While we were shopping he tried calling her twice!!!

Something in me just snapped and I just walked back to the car. I realised that I was not going to have any peace while ever that [censored] is still hanging around.

When she came to the car I explained that leaving the SMS un answered made me uncomfortable and that while ever she allowed communication with him there will always be drama manifesting with us.

She asked what I wanted her to do? I said I did not think I should have to explain or ask for her to create the appropriate disconnection from him;
irrespective of whetherr she was trying to be kind to him, she was damaging our relationship and my trust everytime she prioritised him.

She responded to his msg that we were together and had taken her son to school together.

She said she did not want to cause anymore drama for us and then blocked him on her phone so that I could see.

I am happy with that albeit I wish she had manifest that unilaterally as a basic respectful courtesy before it had caused so much suffering.

She later acknowledged that the blow up leading to me leaving was partly her fault; something she had not admitted to me before.

Now I just need to find a way to get her to consider reading the books 😕

Last few days Things have been going Ok but I am still feeling un easy about her phone secrecy. She has blocked ex and has told me that any future contact regarding arrangements with the kids will be done while I am present.

I am still feeling uncomfortable. Is it acceptable for me to ask for her to show her SMS and call history? Or should I just give time for the feeling of trust to grow? I have given her my PC password and phone Pin but she feels strongly that her privacy is important and that I should trust her.

I feel like there is two competing requirements - I want to trust her and for her to feel trusted. On the other hand I feel like she breached my trust by choosing to maintain an inappropriate emotional connection with the ex. Even though she has acknowledged that it was disrespectful and hurtful to me, she is maintaining that she intends to honor our understanding of acceptable contact, is not doing anything wrong now, and and shouldn't need to give up her privacy.

I don't want to fall into trap of making selfish demands and disrespectful judgements. However This seems a bit impossible - I can try to follow the POJA ask her how would she feel about allowing me to periodically see her phone and SMS history? I can do it in a way that gives her the freedom to say no without a consequence but it will infer a judgement she cannot be trusted and will of course have a consequence that I won't feel as trusting. Kind of a catch 22.

Maybe there is no real answer other than to decide what I am willing to accept or not accept. If I choose to accept her privacy I can ask her the question and then hope she perceives it as a request and is willing to consider my feelings; but I should be prepared to move on if she is not willing to provide that.

Absolutely correct. You should both be freeloaders at this point with neither of you putting in any effort. Sounds as if she has this right but that you are trying to turn her into a renter.

Unfortunately it is tempting to take things too quickly if you have been married before. You have to fight that.

The freeloaders analogy is blurry though as she is expecting a complete commitment (emotional and financial) from me to support her, the household and kids etc. I initially tried to keep an initial financial separation but every attempt by me to clarify financial costs and who pays what etc, has been construed as a nit picky money hungry attempt to have my cake and eat it.

This is partly cultural as she is from Philippines where the male is expected to be the provider but I feel like she is expecting a "husband/father" behaviour from me but freeloader freedom from her.

I thought they weren’t his kids? I think the easiest way for the kids to see him if they are not his and he’s more like a big brother figure is to have some day a week he picks them up from school and drops them home. If he was any kind of youth coach, parent phone calls is really minimal, one call to notify the schedule for the season and that’s pretty much it. How would that sound?

If they’re old enough he can even drop them at the ball field and they can walk home. Think how would it work if he was another youth volunteer would not be calling in the grocery and all this just make it a simple routine the kids will like that better too.

That's right, he is not the father but the kids have a relationship with him and his own adult children.

The kids have been enrolled in schools just a short distance from where he lives whereas we are a 30 min train ride away. So he is provides a handy location for them to hang out after school etc as well. This was all arranged before I met her in October.

Unfortunately it provides an on going opportunity for him to have an excuse to keep trying to contact her.

Dr Harley uses the term freeloader to mean uncommitted which is somewhat different from its conventional use. He advises everyone to be uncommitted in the early (the first six months) of a relationship. That means no effort, each of you should be exactly who you are. She has this right; she continues to have contact with her ex as her backup plan and at the same time asks for your emotional and financial support. All these things are healthy ways for her to show you who she is.

You, on the other hand are not being a freeloader; you are far too committed. So the relationship is an effort for you which it should not be. That is why the people here suggested you move out and date her casually. Had you done that in the first place, you would have saved yourself (and her children) a lot of trauma and heartache.

The relationship does not need to end, it just needs to be casual and fun. You must move out.