that 50-50 res is AWFUL for kids & mothers and women should fight back?

[rageagainstthe50res]

OK, hands up, i name-changed, because this is so emotionally charged and I don't want to be alienated from my usual threads.

BUT, AIBU to think that actually 50-50 parenting is fucking awful for kids? I mean, can you imagine living your life between two houses? Just how disorientating and unsettling it would be?

And AIBU to think that women have given away too many of their own rights in the name of 'fathers' rights?' I LOVE my father, and my DS loves hers, even though we're not together but in 99% of all parenting cases I know it is the woman who does the laundry, the packed lunches, the kiss it betters, the costumes for the nativity.

We don't have gender equality in this country - salary discrepancies, violence against women, flagrant misogyny in the media etc. Yet the few rights we do hold - that we should be the primary parent because we grow our children inside us and feed them from our own bodies, we now glibly throw away to 'fathers'. I AM NOT SAYING FATHERS SHOULD BE DENIED ACCESS TO THEIR CHILDREN. But I do think 50-50 is too much. And you're telling me that women don't HATE having their kids only 50% of the time? I'm sure most of them are absolutely miserable. A weekend off, great, but 50-50 just sounds heinous.
REally, I'm not being an arse, I'm just massively curious.

"In your basic average family, with no twunts..."

LMAO SOL!

What would you say the average twunt-to-nontwunt ratio was in your typical family?

My ds (5) would love to experience 50/50 parenting. In fact I reckon he would actually settle for a Christmas card from his dad. In a world where the childcare is so slanted in favour of women, for right or wrong, I think it is admirable to think that there are men who take their parenting responsbilities seriously. Its a shame that ds's father isn't one of them.

"One parent deals with the more attachment side of things (the one they run to if upset, etc) and one is perhaps more practical or earns the money, makes meals, etc etc
what does the child do when they are upset and currently in the 'practical' parent's home?"

when DH was working was all 3 DS's would come to me when he was at work......I was their only option, as soon as DH got home from work it was . Right now he's not working so they go to him ALL the time

He's also the most practical (in terms of housework), and will be the one earning the money once he's ready to start looking for work again - I do the cooking though as I won't let him in "my" kitchen (hell I've got to have one bit that's ALL mine )

I love Moroskys quote about twats shitting on twits

What does the child do for money in the "attachment side of things" one's home?

Oh, that's right, the "practical side of things" one is supplying it.

I am planning to pass that little nugget of information on to my daughter when she is 16 alwayslooking

in fact it was so good that I read it out to DH (usually I keep MN stuff quiet unless it's really good as he gets a bit fed up of me interupting True Blood or some such like with quote from people I don't even "know")

if only someone had told me 15 years ago

This is such a sad thread to read.

I can't help thinking that if we lived in a world where men and women shared work/childcare equally, this wold not be quite as problematic and painful.

So many of the problems seem to stem from the fact that men are not involved 50% in childcare before relationships break up. Those who've posted who do have very involved partners seem (unsurprisingly) to find it much easier to imagine a 50:50 split.

And of course in cases where the woman is SAHM and the man is FT WOH, it is even more difficult/impractical to imagine such an arrangement working

I know that in my case, one of the main reasons XP and I split up was because he was not pulling his weight and had completely disconnected from DD and I. To hand her over to him for a substantial part of the week was incredibly hard.

But because we were both lucky enough to be able to work flexibly - and to be financially independent of each other - we were able to make it work. After a few months it got a lot easier for me - and I always knew that it was the right thing to do (in our case - not generalising for others) so that made it easier.

But we were v. v. lucky - the vast majority of couples I know wouldn't be able to make an arrangement like this work. And that surely tells you there's something wrong with the whole family set up atm.

StewieGriffinsMom - sorry to hear about your step-mother.

"What I dont understand about this is the definition of 50/50 anyway as there is always a non-resident and resident parent as it is counted on nights and there arent an even number."

The way my ex and I did it was that they spent one week here and the next week there. We thought it would be best to have a simple schedule that our DCs could easily understand.

I definitely think 50:50 can work although it is certainly painful at the start. I cried every night when I was first separated for 3/4 nights solid from my little ones

However, it is very difficult when someone needs to relocate for career reasons. In my case I had already taken a job away from home when we split up and ex H by insisting on a rigid 50:50 split with Wednesday 'handover' has effectively ruined my chances of a career. If we could have agreed 50:50 so that I had them during term (I work very flexible hours while he does not) and him in holidays etc I would have been fine with that but he rigidly insists on half of each week being with him and the children's base being near the original family home so that I am expected to commute 3 days per week 250 miles. He refuses to contemplate moving somewhere where we could share parenting and I could work. I have not been able to obtain work in the SE.

So I feel that although I was supportive of 50:50 parenting originally ex H is actually using it to control me and I wish I had not cooperated with it initially (stupidly thinking that if I was reasonable and agreed to his wishes he would consider an arrangement later on that would allow me to keep my career).

A Families Need Fathers advocate recently told me that relocation is getting harder for 'sharing' parents even if they are unable to get work where they are....which I find a very difficult concept (I'm basically facing unemployment because of H's shared parenting demands and yet in family law terms that means nothing- but I just can't see that it's in the kids best interests to put me out of work...)

Sorry to hear that, agingoth, your ex sounds like a bully (which is presumably why he's an ex).

Is he really able to control you to such an extent? Surely the courts wouldn't stop you moving for work?

Look, the main problem is that some people are abusive as partners and as parents. It's not in a child's best interests to be forced to spend time with someone who is violent, or an addict, or who is manipulating the children to harass their XP (telling the children that the XP doesn't love them any more, has hurt the NRP, is evil, that it's all the PWR's fault that Mummy and Daddy don't live together any more when the reverse is true). No matter how much one parent tries to facilitate and maintain contact with DC after a split, if the other parent is vindictive or selfish or completely mad, it's not going to work out very well. And that's going to be the fault of the selfish, difficult parent, not the fault of the 'sexist' legal system, or the other parent, or 'Society'. Some people probably shouldn't have children at all because they're not actually fit to raise lettuces.

I agree with ABetaDad that there is some truly shocking sexism on this thread - it is full of assumptions about how mothers somehow make better parents than fathers.

And bratnav has come in for an unjustified beating, too.

I am also a stepmother who is very supportive of my DP's preference for shared residence of his DSs, for many reasons. It makes for two happy, welcoming homes for the DSSs. It is not always easy living with the constant constraints of the DSSs' mother's own agenda, but I am absolutely convinced it is in the interests of the children to do so.

Right, long post required! my DS1 has a different dad to my DD & DS2 (long story lol). Me and his dad split up when he was 9mo. At first he just had him during the day on a saturday. At 18mo he started having DS1 overnight on saturday every other weekend. At 2.6 when DS1 started playgroup, dad wanted to be more involved so started having DS1 overnight one night a week. When DS1 started full-time school, we also added in half of all school holidays. For the first 4 years, we did hand-over at 1pm on his birthday, and we have always alternated christmases. Now DS1 is 7.7 and his dad is happily re-married with a stepson and a new baby. We make the oddest family in the school, as we all now get on really well, I have even babysat DS1's stepbrother while his stepmum was in labour....DS1's dad actually lives closer to the school than I do, and we don't find any 'logistical' problems with it all. We just grab each other in the playground if all the school uniform has ended up in the other house, and we take some with us in the afternoon. I was brought up in a very similar way, as a 60-40 split, but the other way round, my dad was the 'main carer'. I absolutely fail to see how just because I carried and gave birth to our son, how that makes me any more 'worthy' of keeping our son with me? He benefits greatly by both his dad and I being so involved in his upbringing, and doesn't miss out on anything. I will admit that it could be a little bit of a nightmare with books etc when he goes to secondary, but both me and his stepmum have younger children at the same primary, so all she and his dad will have to do is grab me. And by that point, we will have worked up to 50-50 anyway, so he will have his week 1 books at mine and week 2 books at his dad's. A lot of people on this thread are saying it would kill them as a mother to be separated from their DC's for a week....how do you think their father's feel?? While I will admit that Christmas day this year will be a little quiter than usual with my DS1 at his dad's, and DS2 at his, I will still have my DD at home with me, and even if I didn't, I could drink wine do something else, and console myself with the thought that they were not going to miss out just because I wasn't there, it's still christmas for them, just not for me. OP, I think YABU, you need to put your own feelings aside to do the best for your DC, which is to share time and these important events with their father just as often as with you. I agree that 50-50 is too much for LO's, but by 9yo, there will be no problem if it has been a gradual increase taking into account of your DC's age and development. Your feelings as a mother don't come into it!

Yes Georgi, you can supply money from far away...you can't supply a cuddle though.

Though awassailing suggests it is about availability usually and she may be right. I don't know.

and in many cases one of the parents takes it upon themselves to supply neither, ever...

I think that yours sounds the ideal Loudlass and I know a family where the 8yr old DS has a similar arrangement and all 4 parents speak to the teacher at the same time on parent's evening, they all go to the school play etc on the same night.
Your last sentence sums it all up:

'Your feelings as a mother don't come into it!'

OP may be heartbroken but she is the adult and has to deal with it. 50/50 isn't good for her but it is best for the DCs-which is all that matters. If she makes it easy for them they will find it completely normal and it will only be unsettling if she divides the loyalties and lets them know her feelings. Parenting is an equal partnership-I never see why one parent is more equal than the other!

100% agree about abusive relationships, SGB. In those sorts of scenarios, any sort of contact is a nightmare for both the non-abusive partner and the kids.

But it is heartening that there are lots of examples on this thread where parents have made shared residence (if not always quite 50:50) work.

Edam, in effect if 50:50 is the status quo (which it is now because I was trying to be reasonable while we were separated) H can effectively force me out of a job because as stated above 'my feelings as a mother don't come into it'- family law is all about the status quo.

The FNF advocate I spoke to said that courts take no account at all of either ex spouse's employment as the entire decision rests on the child's interests- so although I could offer my children far more time with me if they came to live nearer to where I work and less with a nanny, this cannot really be taken into account.

H has effectively now trapped me in a part of the country where it is near impossible for me to carry on my job. He knows this and does not care, 50:50 suits him fine, he gets to feel as if he's still in control but also gets his 'time off'. I really hate the time I don't have the dcs and always have- I long to see them every night, and I could, except that they're with his nanny until 7pm - especially as I'm stuck in London with few friends and the prospect of no job.

It's a truly horrible situation and I think goes to show that 50:50 is not always the ideal solution if one parent is unwilling to really work with the other one for a shared parenting arrangement that is suitable for everyone.

I would need to establish sole residence now in order to have a chance of having the kids come to live nearer to me. This is NOT what I wanted to do as I always saw H and I as (near) equal parents. I say near equal because in the end it was me left holding the babies when H stayed at work late, went drinking etc and I took far more time off when they were little.

agingoth - while I have every sympathy with your situation, which is horribly complicated, I do actually think that the one situation that makes separation/divorce unbelievably difficult for children is when their parents live a very long way apart from one another, such that the children cannot carry on with the same daily life outside the home whichever parent's house they are sleeping at.

When children can carry on with their lives as normal (school, friends, extra-curricular activities, sports etc) all the time, parental separation/divorce is really not as disruptive as all that for children, as they have plenty of continuity and minimal logistical disruption.

agingoth, have you spoken to a solicitor as well as FNF? Surely spending more time with a parent rather than a nanny would be viewed as being in your child's best interests?