find back or find it back

I lost my purse on the bus, which took me the whole afternoon to find back.

In this sentence, could I say "...find it back?"

I do not think that to find back is a correct turn of phrase.
I am not sure a person can find anything BACK. To find something means to get it back.

Not a teacher. (Added by moderator. See post #6.)

Both "find back" and "find it back" are unnatural. In other words, no native speaker would utter either of them. As @Milanya said, just use "get it back". That being said, your sentence leaves a lot of unanswered questions. For instance, how did it come about that you eventually recovered the lost purse?

So,

1. I lost my purse on the bus, which took me the whole afternoon to get back.
2. I lost my purse on the bus, and it took me the whole afternoon to get/find it back.

Are both sentences correct?

The main problem with both sentences is that, as written, "which" refers to the bus!

If you want to keep the general order of words, remove "which" and replace it with "and it" in sentence #1. As you've already been told, #2 doesn't work because of "find it back".

@Milanya, please read this extract from the forum's Posting Guidelines:

You are welcome to answer questions posted in the Ask a Teacher forum as long as your suggestions, help, and advice reflect a good understanding of the English language. If you are not a teacher, you will need to state that clearly in your posts.

neb090 said:

I lost my purse on the bus, which took me the whole afternoon to find back.

Click to expand...

The words which and back in this sentence are wrong. Is this your own sentence or is it from that awful Sanmin book?

I would say: "I left my purse on the bus, but I got it back."

We usually don't say we lost something if we know where it is. That's even if in the case of it being on the bus we don't really know where it is.

If you want to say more, try: "I left my purse on the bus, but fortunately I got it back. I went from being sad to glad."

Also possible: "I left my purse on the bus, and it took the whole afternoon to get it back."