... to not know how much to tell the kids?

[Helpmechooseausername]

I currently live with my ex and our 3 kids (16, 14 & 11). It became apparent soon after baby 2 came along that he's autistic and struggles massively with the hustle and bustle of having life. He's been a crap dad, very uninvolved, comes across as very mean, but I've always excused it as he can't help being autistic. I've lived that life for years now and we split up four years ago. The kids have also lived that life for years. It's their normal. I'm basically a single parent and they know I do everything for them. They do have some sort of relationship with him, but it's very sporadic. He does nothing with them apart from maybe taking one or two of them to KFC a couple of times a year.

However, over the last few years he's become an alcoholic. He's always enjoyed a drink and it didn't bother me too much but now he's drinking at least 250 units a week, every week.

I had always decided to stay with him to avoid breaking up the family home and was aiming to do that until the kids have moved on (so potentially another ten years), but his drinking is making him become nastier and nastier and I genuinely don't think I can put up with it for much longer. I'm beginning to actually hate him.

So, my question is this : how much do I tell the kids? I really struggle to weigh up the pros and cons of keeping as much of it as possible from them as they're kids and don't need to know all the details of our relationship or that I think he's an arsehole / them needing to know the truth of what I actually have to live with and why I'm contemplating breaking up the family home?

I'd really appreciate your opinions to help me try to come to a balanced decision!

Thanks all x

YABU for pretending you have a normal happy family life. Be honest if it’s financial reasons. This is not a happy home environment to grow up in. Better no father figure than an abusive one. He has no right to drink around you to that extent and it is a slippery slope to DV. What are you role modelling to your children - that this is normal?

work out your finances and get him to leave. Not your husband not your problem.

you can agree to sell house when kids leave school and split proceeds if you can afford to stay there.

(yet another post with a feckless husband and OP thinks she is creating a happy home?!?!)

You need to live separately and have a fresh start.

What do you mean how much should you tell them? They already know. They know exactly what he's like and they know he's an alcoholic. They have to live with it and they will always wonder why you haven't left him and taken them away from him. Shame you aren't married but you have to sell the house and downsize. He can pay maintenance.

Even if he wasn’t drinker this is a terrible situation to bring your children up in. They aren’t stupid and can see you don’t talk to each other plus must wonder why he isn’t interested in them. Not healthy at all. Please make moves to either leave him or get him out. You all deserve much better.

He's abusive op.
Abuse can be emotional too.
Protect your kids.
Don't let let them "normalise" his behaviour and repeat it later in their lives.
Asd may have something to do with it but it doesn't mean every person with it is like this.

I would acknowledge the fact that your exDH is an alcoholic - it's bad for them if the non alcoholic parent looks like they are going along with the story he's not.
Growing up with an alcoholic parent, who was enabled by the other parent has caused lifelong trust and addictive issues for some of us.
It has been said that 70% of children of an alcoholic become alcoholics themselves.
You need to move him out pronto to safeguard your children's future well being and mental health

Your kids probably already know and can see how bad it all is.

But you are choosing to raise your kids with an alcoholic.

Please choose to live separately. You all deserve more

It's difficult not to make the kids feel responsible for any decision you take if you burden them too much or ask them to decide for you.

Also difficult not to end up with them blaming you if you don't tell them about the situation. They might feel you are complicit or oblivious. They might see you as a victim, or as part of the problem.

I think (based on an experience not like this but to do with what parents told me - I think I was too involved in decisions at age 12 but I was also completely aware of all problems before that), that a carefully planned day / walk / meal out with them where you say you have something to discuss and discuss it carefully, with a script of sorts, where you tell them all of this but in stages and say you want to be open with them without burdening them with a decision, might be the way forward. They must already know a lot of this, but if you don't talk to them, you don't know how they feel. So my instinct is to discuss some or all of this with them where you have plenty of time and can try to monitor, and carefully manage, their responses.

That way you can start to think through any plans.

I hope it all works out for all of you.

You’re staying with him to avoid “breaking up the family home? Yet you’re subjecting your kids to living with a mean and vile alcoholic?

sorry, but that makes no sense to me.

The kids know. They will see it and although it’ll be their ‘normal’ they will know things are different.

Don’t stay ‘for the kids’ my parents did this and it was utter hell for me and my sister living in a household where they didn’t get along. It ruined our relationships with others and with them. It’s a fallacy that staying together helps the kids.

Just another add on the whole ‘your kids know’ thing. I am ASTONISHED at how little my DS ‘knew’ when I finally told him about his dad’s problems. He’s 13. He’s seen his dad slurring, driving erratically, falling asleep uncontrollably, in terrible states of dishevelled dress and hygiene… and still DS did not know. And went with his dad’s explanation when I said ‘he’s taking too many painkillers son’ by way of explanation of a particularly extreme display on ineptitude. Don’t underestimate how strongly some kids need their parents to be OK. And you can know something in your heart but not really know it. You know your kids best and will know how gentle you need to be about breaking the news about this. They will tell you, in lots of ways, when they’re ready to hear the worst about their dad. Too soon and they’ll resent you - or just disbelieve you. You can’t force people to believe something if they don’t want to. Even kids. It’s taken my DS 18 months to be ready to hear about his dad fully.

I suspect your children know your relationship isn't good and that your partner is drinking. Why are you staying? It sounds that both you and your children would be better off without him.

Look, there's no point in saying you should've done this, that and the other. You can't change the past. Draw a line, learn from it, move on.

You're ready to make a change. Make it now before it's too late for your 14 and 16 year olds especially. You don't want them to behave the same as him or accept that treatment from someone like him in their lives.

Just to give you a bit of perspective here,
I was the child in the household where they "stayed for the kids" (as you're doing now)

I'm sure it's completely unrelated that I struggle daily with mental health issues and have been attending therapy twice a week for years trying to unpick all of my childhood trauma.

I spent every single day wishing that my parents would just divorce (it came through the day after my 18th birthday). Trust me, the kids are fully aware of what's going on.

I know someone who drinks this much, it's disgusting

I think YABU to attribute this to autism. Perhaps that's how you excused the behaviour in order to stay. I definitely think he needs to leave OP, for the sake of you and your children.

In the kindest possible way, that’s just not going to be the case for your kids. Yes they aren’t around screaming and arguing, but the fact they are living in a home where partners ignore each other and one parent continually chooses alcohol above their needs or even any sort of relationship with them will have caused a huge amount of psychological damage. The longer it goes on, the worse..

You all need to get out of this situation.

Does he have family he can go and stay with whilst you organise a formal split and sell the house?

He clearly isn’t going to go for 50\50 parenting so you’d be entitled to at least half the proceeds of the house sales and some child maintenance. Do you know how much he earns?

Take action!

I know a stranger on MN can't really effect how you feel about this, but it absolutely wasn't your fault, it was their choice. They chose this not you. It is never the childs fault. Saying they stayed for you is a way to try and distance themselves from the guilt when they realise how badly they fucked up. They messed up badly twice, once by staying together and second time by making you feel guilty for their choices. He wouldn't still be alive, he'd have found another excuse to drink, it's what alcoholics do and your mum would likely have ended up in another abusive/toxic relationship. The adults chose this, not you, never you. It is not your fault, it's theirs.

We do to some extent know better now and still too many parents stay to long. I think I did, partly out of fear of him being alone with our kids when they were so little, because of the nature of his abuse there's no real evidence. I know my DD especially has seen to much and that is absolutely on me. My fuck up, I know at least not to peddle this rubbish about staying for the kids. I'm sorry your parents didn't know better than to try and excuse their behaviour this way. They had choices and options, you didnt chose this and it isn't your fault.

@Helpmechooseausername you tell them the least you can and take it on the chin if he makes you out to be the bad guy. My XH has done that, it's all my fault, he was always going to make it my fault and tell the kids all sorts about me. Me doing the same would just have made them feel even more torn. When they bring something up that's wrong and important, not just him being an arse, I will say something like thats not true and I'll say he's feeling angry or upset at the moment and that's why he's saying that, giving an excuse and staying outwardly neutral about his behaviour. They don't need to know more about his abuse. I don't need to be the good guy, they need me to be dependable and be there and to not make them feel more torn than he already makes them.

Your kids are not small children. There is no way on earth that they haven't noticed that their father is an unpleasant alcoholic and that you are leading separate lives. I think you have to be completely honest with them. They barely have a relationship with him anyway and I suspect they find him as difficult and unpleasant as you do.

I would tell all the kids that you are changing the way you all live and this means selling the house and setting up separate from their Dad.

Sit him down and tell him you have told the kids and he can do it the easy way (agree to sell up) or the hard and expensive way (you will get a court order for the sale).

Keep the kids in the loop all the time. They will know far more that you think already so keep them up to speed in a non emotional way so they know you are on it and handling it and all will be well long term.

If DP doesn't comply. Go to court.

It may not be pleasant but one of you has to be an actual adult and it's not going to be him.

At the moment your life is out of control. I would not be able to stand being in your position OP. Good luck and crack on.