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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be hurt by this

35 replies

willowrush · 16/08/2015 23:53

I know full well in my heart of hearts I'm being unreasonable so I suppose what I need is some advice and also reassurance!

I have a difficult relationship and my eldest child is unfortunately aware of this, although we've both obviously tried to shield him as much as possible I don't lie to him.

I wasn't a great mum when he was a baby. I was quite young and silly and didn't know much about babies. I also was depressed and low. But since he's been two/three I would say I have been a good parent to him and I know he loves me.

All the same, he has told me that if we (DH and I) split, he'd want to live with DH. We also have two younger children and he has asked if the youngest can stay with me () but the middle DC go with them in this hypothetical situation.

I am hurt and I feel rejected.

And I know I'm being unreasonable. And I haven't said as much!

OP posts:

Blu · 19/08/2015 06:30

Lots of possibilities here.
That he says this to you because you are actually the parent he feels closest to or safest with and feels his father would be lost to him unless he clutched his fathers coat tails : i.e he sees you as the 'unconditional ' parent.
Or as said below he has worked out this is the best way to try and keep you together.
Or he is feeling insecure and wants to take control by creating a self - fulfilling prophecy: so terrified that he might be rejected or left behind by you in a split he makes that his choice.

It sounds as if you should split, really. If you did, would your DH want or fight for residency? Would you fight for residency of all your children?
Maybe your DS wants to hear you say 'you are my child, I will never let you go, I am your Mum, you live with me and always will'. Though you can't say that if a split would trigger a messy battle over residency .

You are the adult and parent. This isn't about your feelings of hurt but about how you make your child feel
Secure and safe when it sounds as if he feels he lives on a precipice, worrying about a split .

Children do very well with seperated parents. Staying together for the children, or because your 8 yo is pulling emotional strings is not necessarily the best situation.

MammaTJ · 19/08/2015 09:40

He is a crafty little so and so! He is saying that to force you to stay together! It is working! Fancy giving an 8 year old all the power in a family!

Goldmandra · 19/08/2015 13:14

He is a crafty little so and so! He is saying that to force you to stay together! It is working! Fancy giving an 8 year old all the power in a family!

Fancy making unpleasant, sweeping and judgemental comments like that to people who are asking for advice and reassurance!

MammaTJ · 20/08/2015 06:22

Nothing sweeping or judgemental about it, based on what the OP said.

We aren't hopefully separating (I have to admit this is primarily because of DS's insistence he wants to stay with DH) but it does jar just a bit.

She is staying with him because of her DS saying he would want to be with his Dad. That gives him the power and control in the family, it also gives him a level of responsibility that a child that age should not have.

The OP should be taking control and the responsibility herself. Harsh, maybe hurtful to the OP, but she is an adult, I am concerned for her child!

Goldmandra · 20/08/2015 09:00

That gives him the power and control in the family

It is perfectly appropriate for an 8YO's opinion to be sought about which parent he would like to live with.

Having a say about who you live with doesn't give you all the power in a family and to say it does is sweeping and judgemental.

If the OP 'takes control' and initiates the split, then the matter ends up in court, decisions about contact and residence will take the child's wishes into account.

MammaTJ · 20/08/2015 10:01

She has said she is staying primarily because her 8 year old says he would stay with his Dad if they split. That is giving power and control to the child.

Goldmandra, I have noticed before, although you do not have enough impact for me to remember specifics, that even though there are other posters saying the same, you pick my posts to pick holes in. Give it a rest.

UrethraFranklin1 · 20/08/2015 10:37

There is a lot of armchair psychology going on here, with nobody pointing out the simplest explanation. That the child is just closer to his father than his mother. There is no reason this shouldn't be the case, no basis for an assumption that he should be closest to his mother and there must be convoluted reasons for his feelings.

OP would do better focusing less on her feelings and more in why this young child is so focused on his parents relationship and who he might live with. He's far too young to have such worries, and the fact that he's reassuring his mother that he loves her rather than the other way around is disturbing.

Goldmandra · 20/08/2015 11:09

Goldmandra, I have noticed before, although you do not have enough impact for me to remember specifics, that even though there are other posters saying the same, you pick my posts to pick holes in. Give it a rest.

I can assure you that I don't recognise your user name at all, although I probably will from now on.

If I do pick you up on statements you make regularly, perhaps that is because you have a habit of making sweeping, judgemental and unhelpful comments to people who are asking for reassurance and support. I wouldn't know, to be honest. However, if that is the case, I will continue to challenge them as and when I see fit

JaceLancs · 20/08/2015 11:50

I can understand how upset you must feel - however I don't think you should let this cloud your decision about whether or not to stay in this marriage
Staying whilst unhappy will not benefit any of your children in the long run
Once you have decided what you want to do then explore options for who lives with who
A lot of my friends who are separated or divorced these days have shared care arrangements which seem to work quite well
In my day this was less common and my children lived with me Monday to Friday and saw their Dad at weekends
There were many times when they tried to play one off against another but we worked round it

Notbychance · 20/08/2015 14:52

It is probably him trying to keep control in a situation he feels helpless in. And if you not splitting is up in the air, then he will sense that. The initial split would have scared him, more than he might admit, and I suspect if you were holding everything together so he could have Disney time with dad for a matter of hours in the week- he MIGHT have thought you were stressy and grumpy and dad wasn't, of course he wasn't if he didn't have to do the grinding mid week slog.

I suppose the bottom line is do you think your husband would be willing to be the parent with the major part of residency?

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