What on earth shall I do now?

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I will try and be breif and keep this to the point. I went out with John for three years. I had massive insecurity issues and so we argued a lot, but because I was ashamed about how I treated him, I made him out to be the bad guy when we argued, so my friends and family think he treated me awfully. He wasn't perfect, sure, but most of our rows were due to me and my mis-trust. He had an ex with whom he had a daughter. He is also 18 years older than me. Anyway we split four months ago, and I was heartbroken. I felt empty. I went to Africa for a while, and now have returned to the same town and got a job. I have been feeling like I am empty, have no purpose, and that I have ruined my life entirely. I found out last week that he is back with his ex, and I felt even worse. I was always so worried about him cheating on me with her, and there he was, back with her! Anyway, I got a new job which needed my ex's vetted due to security clearance. I got in touch to ask him to fill out these forms, and email after email passed. He told me he was still in love with me and is just back with the ex because of loneliness and that he couldn't get over me. We met for coffee, and had a good chat and laughed a lot about our past. Obviously I did not do anything with him as he is with the ex and I respect that. But He has emailed after our chat and said he wants me back. I don't know what to do. I am utterly in love with him, and have worked on my issues. I know I can trust him, but it hurts so much to know he is back with his ex, and they have a little girl; the last thing I want to do is break up the family, but he says he would leave her anyway as she doesn't make him happy. And my family and friends think he's wrong for me. I'm in love with him, what do I do? Any advice appreciated.