Why do so many parents break up before their DC start school?

[StrangerThings123]

Inspired by a discussion I had with friends earlier in the week.

We are all mid 30’s, and when we went to school the general consensus is that it would be very rare for one of our classmates to have parents who weren’t together. I’m talking Primary school here, so up to the age of 11.

Nowadays, it seems there’s a huge rise in parents breaking up when their DC are young. What do people put this down to? I said the ease at which people can now move on and date e.g the apps is a big factor.

The baby /toddler years can drive a wedge between you as their needs can become all consuming. As you come out of the otherwise you may not realise you need to reconnect and work on it.

Spend a few weeks on mumsnet and you'll find out.

To summarise... useless men who often financially bully their wives while expecting them to do everything and be grateful he goes out to work and does nothing else, whilst simultaneously pestering his wife for sex amd chasing younger women who aren't as "boring" as her.

I think there's one maybe two broken up parents in my daughter's class Y2. Its not the norm here.

I think it’s more common not to be married which makes it abit easier just to walk away

As well as the rise of social media I’d say perhaps it being more socially acceptable for parents to break up if they’re unhappy - whatever the source of that may be. Also, extended family bonds aren’t so strong anymore so way back when, it would have been more frowned upon and family would probably have rightly or wrongly been more involved in trying to keep family units together - there was a stronger closeness and interest there partially underlined by religion and partly the potential impact on the reputation of the wider family. When I was a kid in the 80s it was extremely rare for parents to be divorced.

Statistically more likely to split if unmarried. If you compare stats for when you were at school v now, number who had married parents will be much higher when you were at primary school.

Having children too early in a relationship without any commitment to each other first.

Nor mine either. Only one child in my daughter’s class has a parent who is single (year 4); the others are all married.

It's quite area dependent, my DD's class i dont think anyone is split up and DS' maybe 2 or so. Very MC area (so less financial worries to add to relationships i suppose).

Also women having jobs gives us freedom to not accept shit relationships

Children are hard work and put a strain on relationships (and it isn’t just the baby toddler years teenagers are just as tricky) so it is all about foundations.
if you have made your house from straw or sticks then a baby can easily blow to all down. The house needs to be a solid brick one to get through it

I was married to DD1s dad, I left when she was 16 months as he started to abuse me during pregnancy (I've since learned that abusive men often start when the woman is pregnant) I tried everything I could think of to not break up the family but in the end I had to keep us safe.

Hopefully it's because women are starting to realise that they don't have to put up with terrible behaviour from men.

The small children years are incredibly hard and illuminating when it comes to highlighting the flaws or the gaping cracks in a relationship. Previously 'loving but a bit useless' partners stop appearing quite so adorable when you are knee deep on nappies and they aren't pulling their weight, or worse expecting you to do even more for them because you are now at home with the baby

These days women are better informed about what abuse looks like and encouraged not to put up with it. We have access to lots of other women via the Internet who aren't invested in the relationship like friends and family are and can give impartial advice.

Hopefully it's a move to a societal shift toward the expectations men should be holding themselves to - shape up or ship out.

Well this is inaccurate. In past decades people met and got married and had a kid within a year cause they weren’t allowed sex before marriage. Yet they stayed together rightly or wrongly

Less social and religious pressure to stay together than there was in the past.

Women have better opportunities to support themselves and live independently of relationships which are unhappy or abusive.

Babies born into casual relationships which were never going to work long-term.

Increase in individualism, post Thatcher. "No such thing as society" and all that.

I agree with @sleepandcoffee
Easier to split when not married,

Similar age to you OP, parents still together, most of my friends growing up had both parents together. Alot of us having a SAHP in the house hold.

This has lead to several of my male friends not understanding why there partner has left them in my opinion.
There mum/dad was at home doing everything. To have a similar lifestyle as their parents, both MF and DP are having to work now. Yet MF have still seen the baby as 'women work' 🙄
She can pay 50% of bill and do 95% of everything else. MF attitude was I pay half the bills and wash the car, my job is more important - I need a full nights sleep.
Not all are like this. I did have to kick my DP occasionally to do his night feeds, by the 3rd he was trained

I see the opposite, most parents together before school years. Start splitting up when the children are around 7-10?

This and I'll add men who act like kids themselves so sulk whenever they don't get as much attention as they like/used to pre-kids and all through birthdays/christmas/easter or any other happy event. They also usually never organise days out or holidays and seem to give up on thinking about presents for their partner or own family members once the knot is tied as well as expecting wives to become their social calendars, which becomes tiresome.

Where are you getting this information from? I would imagine those who got married and had a baby within a year did so exactly because they had sex before marriage. Lots in my parents’ and grandparents’ generation definitely dated for a few years before marriage.
Look up the stats on relationships breakup with children without being married.

Not the norm where we are. In my eldest class one set of parents got divorced when kids were 11 & 7.... pretty sure mainly because mum was not keen on getting any sort of job beyond hobby/self employment.

Another child has a single mum - but she was never in a committed relationship with the dad to begin.

In youngest class there's another like that then the rest of the parents are married/long term cohabiting partners.

I think a lot of it is no stigma anymore, and UC giving women financial support to go it alone.

My gps divorced in the 80s when I was a child which was probably unusual then, and my Auntie divorced early 90s when my cousins were young. But my school friends parents were married. Now, I'm the only divorced parent amongst my dd2s friends, and one of two of dd1s friends so still not prevalent in my circles

I'm glad women can leave more easily than in the past, so many women stuck with horrible, abusive men with no escape in the past I'm sure...

I think a few things contribute:

• higher earners are penalised less financially now to leave someone than in the past. Spousal maintenance is extremely rare and 50/50 is more common. I think this leads to a lot of higher earners getting sick of a spouse who wants to be a sahp, especially beyond when children start school, and realise they will be better off separated.
• people are juggling work & family and are knackered and stressed out. Not good for healthy family life.
• i think some women in the past were very financially vulnerable and turned a blind eye to men who cheated or were abusive. Nowadays there are more options for women to break free.

I split from DDs dad when she was 4yo. She called me a c*nt and I realised in that moment that I wouldn't be protecting her if I didn't leave.

I feel like there are some key times when parents tend to split. Going into year 3 and year 7. It's the years when the independence really takes a leap forward and the gap in relationships becomes harder to hide. Definitely most splits were in those years in our kids classes. Not sure if it's just coincidence.

Knowledge from family of that generation, I’ve been plotting our family tree back several generations.

I don’t mean the ones who quite obviously had sex before marriage got up the duff so had to marry. I mean the ones I’ve talked to who were so desperate to have sex they ‘courted’ for awhile, set a date for married and had kids quick cause no contraception. But ultimately stayed married as it was a vow

When I kicked my partner out it had nothing to do with dating apps it had everything to do with the fact that he was a financially and emotionally abusive knob. My DD was 3. She’s 16 now. I haven’t dated anyone. I’ve moved on as a single mum.