To be feeling so upset and conflicted about this decision?

[Sinkingships]

Really struggling with this right now.

Things are complicated as you may know from my previous threads.

I have come to realise that I cannot live a life so far from my DC's. I knew that I would leave where I'm living right now to move closer to them after I finish my course of study but I feel like I just can't wait that long.

So now I have a decision to make.

I either leave being my friends, my home, the place I love living and my partner and transfer to a new course of study closer to them.

I stay here and commit to the whole length of the course, running the risk that I may leave part way through and lose my opportunity to get my degree and realise that I will have to leave in two years anyway.

On the face of it it almost seems like an easy decision. I desperately want to be closer to my DC's but I will be moving there with no job, no place to live, and hardly any money, plus the new city is notoriously expensive to live and travel in.

I desperately love DP and I don't want to leave him but I know he won't move with me and it wouldn't be fair of me to ask him to leave his whole life behind for me. I want him to be happy. And I know deep down that our life together isn't going to work long term while I'm so far from the DC's. It's breaking my heart just thinking about it but I don't think I can stay or I will just be putting it off for two years.

Ok then, do it closer to your children. Work 40 hours a week in a £7 a hour job between lectures. Take home £1k per month. Find a room in a shared house with bills included for around £600.

Is there a link to previous threads? It's difficult to advise without knowing the full facts.

Sorry lush, I think you have me confused with someone else. It has happened before. Thank you for giving me a straight answer.

I also remember you, and I'm astonished that your DP is one of your considerations in deciding whether to be near your children. If I recall correctly he really isn't worth it. If it were me, I would forget this particular degree and try to find a live in position in the city where your DC are, and study part time with the OU.

I think either stay where you are but give up weekend job (maybe look for evening work) and visit children every/ every other weekend. Keep relationship strong by seeing them more in the holidays, calling/ skyping every night and sending letters etc. But surely, after the course you will want to move there anyway and you will be 2 years on by then.

Or move, continue your course in their town, and arrange set times to spend with them. Find a job and the cheapest house share you can. Would you be able to take the pressure of your family by looking after them at certain times? Accept that you and your partner aren't going to work out and move on or try a long distance relationship?

Either way, it's hard but I think I would want to be near my children and would do all I could to make it possible.

I think you are getting a much rougher ride for this than a man would get in the equivalent position. I don't think binaries between selfishness versus selflessness are a helpful way of thinking about this either. (I think many women are trapped by such oppositions, to the foreclosure of more positive alternatives). I think the compromise you need is one where you get to fulfil your ambitions and prospects without compromising your relationship with your children quite so much.

Key to this is solving the geographical issue. Yes, I get that the city where your DCs live is really expensive and you can't afford to live there. But I don't buy the idea that you couldn't be closer. Say your DC were in London - the most expensive city in the UK, indeed one of the most expensive in the world! I can totally see how someone couldn't afford to live there. But there are places within easy striking distance (by which I mean 1 hour travel time) where you could live more cheaply and get to see your DC regularly by booking cheap rail or coach tickets in advance.

You could move your hours around to do this. How about working full-time 9-5 in the best-paid job that's open to you right now, and then doing an OU degree on the side, in evenings and weekends when you're not with the DC? You have more flexibility then, but you will still have more of an opportunity to put your life back together.

I realise that the changes I'm suggesting are scary and difficult - but they are do-able to get a balance that makes you happy. I also have to question whether a DP who won't move in spite of a partner's misery about having kids is really worth staying with. It doesn't sound as though you're getting the emotional understanding or support that you deserve.

But you really dont like to listen to advice, if youd have taken on board what was said by us, social workers, teachers this situation may never have occured but you have had this 'must do my degree at all costs attitude' which has no doubt not helped you or your children's situation. You like to blame others a lot but seem unable to look at your own shortcomings which is what makes a good responsible parent, not having a degree or a well paid job.

Well, as I said stitched, I have already decided that we will have to split up its just a question of when and how. At this point my main consideration is how will I afford to live/work/study/whatever in this new city when it is financially very difficult,

Sinking I can see how desperate you are to do this degree. But I think the timing is wrong. If you got a place before, you'll get one again in the future.

I'm sorry, I know it is frowned upon but your situation is so unusual I have searched your username for your recent threads. Your relationship doesn't sound solid enough to stay for, imo. Your family obviously want to support you in contact with your DC. The city you're moving to is really expensive, yes, but also chock-full of opportunities to earn money and live (relatively) cheaply. It CAN be done. But you need to be mentally strong enough to deal with whatever decisions you make. I think you need to access counselling.

The are obstacles and difficulties in both choices - if it were me, I would wholeheartedly take the chance to be close to my DC, no matter the personal cost to my day-to-day life. But I feel convinced that would be the right choice, and you don't seem convinced at all. You need to explore why that is.

I think a man who put his own needs before his children continually despite being warned this could effect his children's custody arrangements/PR and their emotional wellbeing so he could please himself education/job/relationship ride would also, quite rightly get as much stick.

I actually think the reason your children were removed is very relevant as it may affect how good it is for them having you nearby. Any decision should be solely informed by this and you still sound like you are in a conflicted place in general.

Saying your family think it is good for you to be near is a bit of a limited view. What happened? What would professionals around them recommend?

Sharon, I fully admit that if I had made different decisions at certain points then things might be different but I also don't believe that if I had blindly followed every bit of advise I've been given I would be in a better position and without knowing the circumstances neither, really, can you.

When things first started I was working and doing a degree was not even on my agenda so it don't think what you're saying is the case.

Just a practical suggestion: how about looking for a live in part time role, like a home help for an elderly person?
You'd get the accommodation covered and get a bit of pocket money (depending on how many hours/tasks they needed). I know someone studying for her masters in London who does this. She helps her employer get up, get dressed and have breakfast. She makes her lunch, leaves it covered and goes to lectures for 10. She picks up shopping on her way home, makes dinner and the rest of the time is hers...(except taking her to routine medical appointments).
There are agencies who make these arrangements for people you can google..

Yes you were working away from home often then before your degree weren't you?

I'm not answering a question you haven't asked, I'm trying to give you a workable solution to your problem. This however involves a change to the grand plan.

You seem now to be saying that your situation is this:

1. stay where you are (in a not very good relationship but with someone you're in love with) and complete your degree (which you won't change in any circumstances) but don't see your children

1. move and complete the same degree and see your children but have a much lower standard of living.

If it's a simple as that it becomes as straightforward as children versus standard of living. Easy decision.

There's no magic wand which someone can waive and give you a solution if this is all it boils down to. But central to your difficulties is that you won't give up this particular degree course. That's a problem of your own making I'm afraid.

I am sympathetic to your general scenario but your refusal to consider a change to the degree rather limits your options.

Personally I think you're mad to risk that relationship with your children and unless this degree comes with a guaranteed job at the end of it (in which case half the students in the country would be doing it) then you're also living with your head in the clouds.

Honestly, I'm not sure what the professionals would advise because I have had no contact with them since the DC's left. They have offered me no advise or support whatsoever they just completely washed their hands of me, then again, they provided me so support before hand either so I'm not wholly surprised.

I don't think I would trust their opinions anyway if I am honest, they proved time and again that they really have no idea what is best for my children.

Squirrels, I am wholeheartedly convinced that being close to them would be the best thing for them and the right decision all round. My feeling conflicted comes from not knowing whether now is the the right time or, as others have said, I should work on getting myself 100% before I move. Due to a number of factors I have already discussed. I don't want to move only to find myself dead broke, living in a dump, dropping out of uni or not starting at all and being unable to improve my prospects, unable to spend time with the DC's due to working all hours of the day and night just to afford a roof over my head. I do want to move, I really really do, and I will as soon as I get the chance but I don't want to make a rash decision and end up in a worse position than I am now.

No lush, I used to work full time but I've never worked away from home.

You seem very unwilling to take any sort of responsibility for your own life and actions.

It's almost like you're paying lip service, saying you want to be near your dc because you feel like you have to IYSWIM.

You don't have to be honest with posters here but be really, brutally, 100% honest with yourself. If you can't manage to put your children's needs and wants ahead of your own then just stay where you are and let them get on with their lives.

Yes, I do disagree. I love my parents and they are doing a fantastic job, the DC's are happy and their needs are met. But they were happy and still had those needs met with me and I think that absolutely being with me would have been the best thing for them. I think my parents & the DC's would agree.

You keep saying 'that's not why' or 'that's not what happened' so it's hard to give advice. Give a bit of background so people can advise well.

For example if you chose your course over your children, dropping out might later in life give the message you let them go over nothing. The history is a major factor here.

I think if you stay where you are you still risk being dead broke, working all hours of the day and night to afford a roof over your head and living in a dump if your relationship broke down, for example - not saying it will, just saying nothing is impossible.

Yes, counselling, get yourself 100%. But you could do that in another place if you were motivated.

It's really a case of what you feel you can handle. It may be better for your DC if you stay where you are, if you don't feel you can handle life if you move. Only you can know that. On the balance of what you have posted, I would still move. But I am not you, and I do not have all the facts. No one here can make that call for you,a s we are not pricy to your whole situation in an unbiased fashion. As everyone knows, situations can't really be judged from one side of a screen.

People are offering you opinions and possible solutions - it's ultimately up to you what you judge to be useful. Bear in mind that you should seek advice from SS or professionals, as they can judge on the whole situation (no matter how unfair you think they've been in the past, the future is now what you're focusing on.)

Good luck.

No, that is absolutely not the case Walter.

I cannot ever put my feelings accurately into words so you will never really understand how deeply I feel about this, which is suppose isn't your fault.