Punished for 'affair'?

We can't have it both ways. We all know this guy would be crucified on here if the same happened in reverse.

You might hope for some bizarre reasons kids end up hating their Dad but from experience of friends growing up in such a situation it's usually the party who quickly brings in a 3rd party in the parental relationship causing the damage between the parental relationship that gets any sort of resentment from children.

The relationship might have been dead but you end things first before striking up new relationships.

Clearly not - or perhaps this poster is of the opinion that marriage should be for life, no matter how miserable you make each other.

She also said that she had been telling her ex that the marriage was over and he didn’t want to hear it. They were living separately in the same house by that time. Hardly surprising that she met someone else under the circumstances - which, by the way, she confessed before anything physical had happened. Now her ex is using his own children as weapons. And you feel sorry for him ?

Have you read the rest of the ops posts?

Op clearly said in her opening post that ex moved out after she confessed she had been seeing someone else.

Read the OP properly. You’re not saying anything ‘how it is’. She was telling her DH the marriage was dead for a long time. He refused to believe it or act on it. They’ve had what sounds like a miserable existence and it took the OP meeting someone else to actually end what died some time ago. She also says she told her DH she’d met someone, before anything happened between them.

Any drama and chaos they have now is entirely of her DH’s making - instead of accepting that he put them through unnecessary misery by not acting until OP found someone else, he’s now using their children to punish OP for the ‘affair’. His children will resent him when they’re old enough to understand. What was OP supposed to do - waste her life in a miserable sham of a marriage for the sake of the children and have them grow up believing that mum and dad’s relationship is normal ?

What makes you a misogynist is coming up with a made up narrative to excuse this man's poor parenting.

If the scenario was that this guy had said to OP - 'look, our differences aside, I am concerned about the impact on dc of all the changes, let's discuss a plan in stages to help them manage the transition, with a view to both dc spending time with me going forward' then the OP wouldn't have needed to start the thread in the first place.

Whatever OP wants to do in her spare time is none of anyone else's business. He should be prioritising his kids.

You're saying it how you imagined the situation actually.

Op didn't have an affair, they were separated but living in the same house.

You have an affair and you are the victim....zero sympathy for you. only sympathy for your ex and your children who have to suffer the drama and chaos caused by your infidelity. Sorry to be harsh but just saying it how it is.

I agree, but the trauma can skew someone's thinking.

@theresyoursalad If you read the OPs posts she does infact complain about not being able to go out clubbing,drinking and dating. We also know that the OPs dc can't handle respite care due to the amount of changes.
Everyone knows how stressful both moving home and a breakup can be and guess what it's even worse for kids with asd. The only way to handle such massive changes without inflicting unnecessary mental harm to the children is introducing the changes slowly and preferably on a one to one basis. I've asked the op if this could be what he's doing but the op hasn't answered, so we don't know.
Just because I'm not willing to automatically assume that a man who is doing something that is the best course of action for the autistic children in this situation is doing it to punish the op doesn't make me a misogynist.

Indeed.
Relationship breakdowns are extremely common, as we are all aware, and overwhelmingly do not result in one or both partners being sectioned and placed in mental health facilities.

@Theresyoursalad "The people occupying mental health beds due solely to a partner cheating on them, are indeed very minimal in this country. I am well placed to state this."

Cheating is only a small part of the whole picture of relationship breakdowns.

She told him to move out, she told him it was over, but now it's her fault he didn't listen?! It's not like she was forcing him to stay for finances.

Mum wants to go out 'clubbing' 😂

These kids have two parents. You're literally making things up to excuse this fella.

Who needs men when women like you hold up the patriarchy so well.
SMH.

Not necessarily these are two children who have significant needs due to asd he could be putting them 1st by slowly introducing the massive change we don't know all we know is the op is pissed off because she can't be out clubbing yet

He may well be aggrieved, that's fine. Relationships end for many reasons. Bottom line is, he doesn't get to drop his responsibilities.

It's a man putting his own feelings before those of his children. Twas ever thus.

@Theresyoursalad Please don't call people with mental health issues fruitloops.

It was you who dismissed and minimised these individuals' situation not me,

@Hoardasurass The problem with your scenario is that you were both carrying on with your normal family roles you being a stay at home parent and him being the breadwinner.
Rightly or wrongly he feels that he was funding your lifestyle whilst you were off out dating then he loses his home and is being expected to find a new home suitable for him and the dc and furnish it from scratch (unless you split all the furniture and white goods) whilst paying you child support (which he should).

This nails it ^.
It's not surprising he is aggrieved - to put it mildly.

I'm a social worker (AMPH) and have worked for over 20 years with Mh hospitals, sectioning individuals under the MHA, so my comment was from a place of knowledge and experience myself.
Please don't call people with mental health issues fruitloops.

And if we may get back to the point, because yours is irrelevant.
This guy hasn't been sectioned. He is choosing not to have his kids, or only on his own terms. Women don't get to do that, and don't want to do that.
The knots you're tying yourself into in order to make excuses for this guy are wild.

He's a lazy father and I'm not surprised OP had enough.

The problem with your scenario is that you were both carrying on with your normal family roles you being a stay at home parent and him being the breadwinner.
Rightly or wrongly he feels that he was funding your lifestyle whilst you were off out dating then he loses his home and is being expected to find a new home suitable for him and the dc and furnish it from scratch (unless you split all the furniture and white goods) whilst paying you child support (which he should).
Tell me how do you expect your dc to handle the changes in living environment and not having you there overnight? I ask because I know how difficult it is for my asd dc to handle small changes let alone huge ones like you are trying to rush them into.
Quite frankly I can see why there dad could be refusing to have them together or overnight just now, your dc need time to adjust involving short 1to1 visits to dads new house building up over time (at a pace that suits them not you) to 1to1 overnights, then having them both together during the day at his and finally him having them both overnight at the same time when they are ready. Did it ever occur to you that he might be putting your children 1st in this rather than "punishing" you?
Whether you realise it or not your coming across as really rather selfish here

@Pickledpeanuts I don't disagree that cheating can have a horrendous impact on many people, but since the OP didn't cheat its not really relevant to this guys behaviour.

Maybe to you. But we are on the outside looking in.

The guy refused to accept the relationship was over until she took up with another man. Then reality smacked him in the face, To him that was the betrayal.

I would really disagree that a parent entering medical care, whether that's for mental health issues or for cancer, is comparable to or considered as abandoning your children.

I don't disagree that cheating can have a horrendous impact on many people, but since the OP didn't cheat its not really relevant to this guys behaviour.

@Theresyoursalad "Thankfully this is a tiny tiny minority of women who would likely have had longstanding significant mental health issues prior to the cheating, if they had a breakdown as a result. Cheating is very far from unusual, but that scenario (ending up in a psychiatric facility) is in comparison. I don't think using extreme examples is helpful."

It's more common than most of us think, according to my friends who work as psychiatric nurses.
Just dismissing these people as being "fruitloops" prior to the breakdown isn't helpful either. Some even go on to commit suicide.