To judge friend for leaving her children

[GuiltyJudging]

NC and Dailymail are scum.

My best friend of 20 years has confided in me that she plans to leave her DH and DC in two weeks time, once the oldest DCs communion is out of the way.
She has organized a job relocation to a different part of the county and has paid a deposit for a little flat. She’s been planning this a while as she met someone (also married) through work and he plans to follow her when he ties up his loose ends.

She spent an hour on the phone after she’d “let me in on it” excitedly telling me about the decor she’d chosen and talking endlessly about the dress and shoes she’d chosen for a friends wedding next month and gushing about this arsehole who’s also leaving his wife and child.

It hasn’t exactly come from nowhere, even when she didn’t work she had them in full time childcare and never seemed to enjoy motherhood.

I consider myself a feminist but I’m so upset about this, her youngest is only 3.

AIBU to question a 20 year friendship over this?

There was a thread on here recently about people whose mothers had left them and the devastation it had caused. Its not just about the personal relationship between mother and child but also because their are so many pressures/expectations from society about the relationship it magnifies the whole thing as it is seen as more normal for a man to leave.
If you think she is serious and she is your bf you need to sit down and talk to her about what she is doing- she needs to prioritise her children- leaving is fine/moving is fine but it all needs to be managed not come as a bolt out of the blue. If you think its true and she won't do anything its probably one of the few circumstance when I think telling her husband and sister is the right thing to do

Bloody hell OP. What a horrible position your ‘friend’ has put you in.

Those poor children are about to have their world turned upside down. I have a feeling this will be the worst regret of her life after a few months.

I have no advice, but I would judge.

Yes motherhood can be hard work, the hardest job in the world. I have never felt so tired, stressed, my mental health went downhill for a long time being a SAHM. I suffered with crippling anxiety, I had post natal depression. BUT my kids are my best creation, I would do anything for them. And the smiles and hugs and love I receive off them makes every tear and tantrum worth it.
The thought of leaving them for a fling makes my stomach turn and my heart hurt.
I get that maybe she doesn’t/can’t be that mum that they need, but why move so far away, why not stay local and still maintain contact?
I wouldn’t speak to her OP, I would let her get on with it and help her DH as much as I could. I have a feeling if you try to warn him he will believe her and she will just do it all over again at a later date xx

I hope her sister has some advice

@GuiltyJudging How did it go? X

A friend of mine did this. Moved in with the other man and cut her children off. It's been years now and even when one of the children got cancer, she still didn't make contact. Instead she had another child with the new guy and the last post I saw of hers before I unfollowed was a picture he'd given her on Mother's Day, which was personalised with their names, the baby's and the dog's saying she felt like the luckiest mum. Elder children written out of history :(

I don't agree that men are not judged, maybe we are more flippant in judgement (eg. Call them a prick and move on).

I think the reason most of us are more shocked is not even the affair, its the dramatic running away plan (a bit like a delusional teenager). As odd as it sounds, if she put as much effort into speaking to her husband/partner to split up, they could sit the children down and say "me and daddy are going to live apart now. You will live with daddy but I'll see you every Tuesday, Thursday and EOW" or something like that. Not just they come home from school/childcare to be faced with a devastated dad and no mother.

That's the bit that shocks me, rather than the affair, divorce or leaving children with their dad

Let her be excited.
Let her leave and hopefully tell the kids herself before she goes.
Let her end up on her own because he will not leave his wife or if he does the guilt will send him back.
Let her realise that she has to pay maintenance to her husband which will curtail her spending.
Let her realise her kids will not understand what they did to make her leave and will struggle to deal with it.
Let her miss out on their milestones because of her decision.
Let her come home to an empty flat and live with the silence.
Let her realise that you love her but you cannot condone her decision because of the hurt she is causing so you have to walk away.
It is her life, her decision and her consequences to live with.

elder children written out of history
I personally know of a couple where the wife's elder children from her first marriage have been written out of history, though I suspect this is because the second husband cannot tolerate having them (ie another man's children)as part of his life

She's going to regret it. Bet you he does not follow at all it's just talk to keep her sweet. She's going to walk out on her family and have nothing to show and it serves her bloody Wright.

It is her life, her decision and her consequences to live with.

If only.

That's cold. Why on earth have 3 children if you loathe motherhood too. The impact on her children emotionally will be huge. Although it's probably already an issue if she's that anti a role she chose. My mother was crap at/hated motherhood & took it out on me: it leaves you so damaged.

GuiltyJudging I don't know if you have been listening to the BBC radio 4 15 Minute Drama, Cuckoo.

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qy2s/episodes/player

"Set between the 1920s and 1940s writer Jeremy Raison tries to discover why his mother was kept at home until she was a teenager and brought up by a nurse instead of her mother."

I've only caught the end of it. Basically, the writers mum did not grow up with her mum. I've not listened to it all but I caught the end and it was sad. Anyway, I think your friend is a fool and you are a good friend by trying to convince her of her folly.

I met the revolting man she planned to be with (through sheer coincidence) he isn’t a colleague per say, he’s on a CE scheme in her job because he’s long term unemployed. I could barely contain my contempt for him but in the interest of fact finding I kept it civil. He told me he sees himself as a bohemian philanthropist who says this stuff. Though he’s been supported by his wife for over a decade and her mother does the child care while he’s picking up women and being all bohemian 🙄
Friend was very embarrassed and I gave her a serious “what the fuck are you at!?” talk afterwards.
I don’t think she should stay with her husband and if I’m perfectly honest I don’t think she should stay in the family home as I actually think her relationship with the children would flourish if she lived down the road and maybe did 50/50.

She seems to have been talked out of the idea for now.
It’s no less a mess as I see it imploding in some way sooner rather than later.

It's really good if she is thinking of doing things differently.

Well done for being a good friend.

@GuiltyJudging good for you. I am glad your friend is reconsidering. Hopefully she'll stay locally if she can when they split, which it sounds like they need to.

He sounds like an utter prat. Imagine screwing everyone's lives up for someone who sounds like Jez off Peep Show. Hope she's well on her way to changing her mind.

Imagine screwing everyone's lives up for someone who sounds like Jez off Peep Show.
This gave me a much needed belly laugh!

What an utter ass he sounds like. So is it all off then? Job transfer etc?

OP Even before you met him and found he was a bohemian philanthropist (tee hee - eg unemployed, philanthropy from wife) I was going to ask how the finances were going to work out. Your friend is employed but would be moving 4 hours away but perhaps she can move offices if not jobs. She planned to rent (not inexpensive) and support the philanthropist but would presumably be contributing to childcare and the maintenance of the home? the philanthropist would also lose the support of his own philanthropist and some of any earnings should he get them would be quite rightly sequestered for CSA .

If she starts up again, I would ask her to look at finances - which clearly appeal slightly more to her at the moment than abandoning her own family and the philanthropist abandoning his.