so sad children have to live like this

[Pasithea]

For a specific reason I spend 45 minutes in a McDonald's / garage. Car park on Friday evening.
during this time 4 cars pulled up and one or two children got out or where carried to another car with obviously the other parent in. Cases swapped , children swapped and off they went.

It must be so horrible to be passed over like this on a weekend , some where crying most just resigned. How can kids continue with clubs and friends etc when they spend weekends away with another parent.

Nope she said the exact opposite.

"If there's abuse, emotional or otherwise then of course that's a different matter altogether"

She has taken some heavy personal attacks for what looks to me as a badly worded sentence.

But I doubt now she will be back to clarify.

Take read

I really hope no daughter of mine would expect me to sit in the same room as my ex on their wedding day because it was "their" problem

I hope my children would have a little more respect for what I had been through.

I'm in a slightly unusual position as dh and I separated and then reunited and as we have teenagers now we have discussed what they felt about it all. In our case we were together for about ten years before children (5 pre and 5 post marriage) and hit a really bad spot that involved dh having an affair three-five years after children. Have been back together for coming up eight years.

They both said that the worst time by far was when we were together and arguing. That living in two homes was fine, but that being back together again was best. I would suspect that many many children would feel the same way. What children want is everyone together and happy. Everyone together and unhappy is quite scary for them (dh and I thought we had sheltered them from the worst of things too). Separate but happy parents isn't ideal but it's a hell of a lot better than living in a hostile environment.

Toffee that's a totally selective quote that misrepresents singsong's position. What she actually said was:

'If there's abuse, emotional or otherwise then of course that's a different matter altogether but even then I think it's reasonable to say that two loving parents who live together is better for kids, surely'

Oh and sometimes parents don't tell their children why they broke up because it is too painful to talk about or because they were trying not to badmouth the other parent in an effort to preserve their children's relationship with the other parent. Just because on the surface things look fine it doesn't mean that it is.

I have a family member that had an affair for over twenty years but didn't leave his wife until not only their children had grown up but his mother (who lived with them) had died. I think that's quite a spectacularly shitty thing to do.

Toffee I am truly sorry for what you must have suffered. My parents, I am absolutely certain, didn't suffer in the way that you have, they simply didn't like each other. They got married in the days when you had to if you were pregnant, before legal abortion and before single parenthood was condoned. My grandparents rented them a house in a different county for two years after their wedding to hide the fact that my mother was pregnant outside of marriage.

My mother's life was good and if anything she was more horrid to my father than he was to her. Why I feel the need to explain this to you I don't know.

Yes toffee, please see Nooka's post. Singsong did say it was still better for women in abusive relationships to stay for the sake of the children.

Re read that quote with the two bits together and with an open mind.

As I say I doubt we will get clarity

Um no, there is no alternative way of reading it. She said 'even in that case'. How do you explain that?

Singsong has a habit of dropping onto threads to be a smug arse and then disappearing.

Yes i remember her on another thread being like this.

XH and I are now able to spend time together and be pleasant to each other 98% of that time, solely because we aren't in a relationship any longer. DS gets plenty of time with both of us and he doesn't need to see us modelling unhealthy patterns any more. Mostly because since splitting I am now able to enforce boundaries about what is ok in my house whereas I couldn't when we lived together (I'm talking about leaving mess around, not doing his own dishes etc, not abuse or serious stuff)
I also don't rely on him for anything so he is far less likely to let me down.
Plus we are both happier people apart so that's better for DS also.
Unusually XH comes to mine for contact and doesn't have him overnight (doesn't have a suitable place) so the impact on DS is minimal but he has far more and better quality time with his dad since we split than he did when we were living together.

I apologise for "disappearing"- I have two children and can't therefore hang about on MN constantly!
To clarify my point, abusive relationships are, of course, a complete exception. Anyone, man or woman, in such a situation should, absolutely leave and never return. Who in their right mind would disagree? My "however" was simply an assertion that, in my humble opinion, two loving (loving being the key here) parents is surely the best case scenario for the raising of healthy, happy kids. There's a body of evidence to support this isn't there?
My earlier post was to suggest that parents who are together long enough before children come along are less likely to be surprised by their spouse's behaviour and therefore are more likely to stay together for the long haul. It would be, I imagine, unusual for an otherwise decent, caring man who you'd lived with happily for 10+ years to turn into a violent thug once children appeared.

Singsong not a violent thug perhaps, but there are plenty of men and women who have been in 10+ years to have an affair and leave the other person. Or to simply fall out of love. You seem to be suggesting that people should stay together at all costs even if they don't love each other any more. It's not. That is damaging and a very unhealthy view of relationships to present to children.

Isn't this "falling out of love" thing a bit wooly though? As I said previously, there are moments when my dh drives me mad! There are times when I am so exhausted that I can barely open my eyes in a morning, let alone contemplate loving thoughts towards my dh! That's life though isn't it? It's having young children! For better and for worse and all that.
I stick to my view that two parents who, actually, get on fine, are perhaps "like brother and sister" (as my friend says her and her dh are) rather than slobbering all over each other romantically, but are perfectly content in each other's company despite this could, absolutely prioritise their children's sense of security and well being over their own need for a romantic ideal.

If you really think it's better for children to see parents who don't actually love each other stay together just for them then I can't really say much else to you can I.

We're not talking about couples who get on each other's nerves, or who are too knackered to have sex or go on dates etc - these things are normal. We're talking about couples who no longer have a physical or emotional attraction to one another and are unhappy together. No, if I felt like my husband had become like my brother, I would not stay with him. That would be unhealthy for my DC as well as for me.

In those situations where its mutual the parents can often remain perfectly amicable, FWIW.

Singsong your points are all well and good if both parents are happy with that and it still is a happy house. Mine wasn't. My exh said I don't love you anymore. I don't know where I was supposed to go from there but I tried and tried to no avail. If my dds lived still in that house seeing that relationship it would be wrong for them. What would they be learning? They wouldn't be happy at all.

If I could I would want them to have both parents at home but it isn't to be. So instead both their dad and I have shown them that sometimes things don't work out and it's not easy but we can now get along as friends. They have love in both families. Their needs are put above everything in as much as I can do. And now my new dp and exh and his dp are showing them more love and teaching them tolerance, problem solving, compromise, happiness etc etc.
unless you have lived in it I don't think you can comment so idealistically to make others feel so low. In an ideal world we would stay together forever. I'd known my exh since school and was 27 before we had children.

Well Singsong your last two posts have just repeated the nonsense you spouted earlier on and haven't changed my opinion whatsoever.

I still think you have no idea what you are talking about and wonder what you're doing on a board entitled Divorce/Separation.

Maybe your friends have "sacrificed their family for a romantic ideal" or whatever it was you said. However extrapolating one family's (possible) experience out to cover everyone is silly beyond words.

In any case you have no real idea of what your friends relationship was like or why they split up. With your attitude, do you really think your friend would have bothered confiding every detail, so she can be judged by you and found wanting?

You have even less of an idea what the relationships were like of random strangers on the internet who are divorced. Evidently you have not experienced and unhealthy and unhappy relationship.

In fact, are you posting simply to underline to those of us who are divorced how lucky you are that you are in a happy relationship and aren't divorced? Because that sort of smuggery would be tasteless in the extreme.

Well sinsong i guess there are couples that become friends/housemates/coparents rather than lovers and stay together. I also believe that there are couples where they fall out of love and one or both parents go on having affairs, staying together "for the children" and teaching their kids an ulhealthy family dynamics (i.e. Affairs are tolerated, love among parents is irrelevant, etc). I think it is better fot the kids to learn that happiness is important and that they dont need to tolerate an unfaitheful partner.

toffee I also hope that when my children are adults they have the maturity and the understanding and the respect and the love not to expect me to have a man who was abusive to me in my life too. At the moment they're court ordered to spend time with him, but I do hope that I'm raising them to be decent adults who will love their mother enough to have some loyalty to her?????????? I don't know.

OP sounds SO naive and judgemental.

I hope my dd has a great relationship with her dad when she's older. Of course I do - having a great relationship with both your parents is surely the best possible outcome?

I think he's a total arsehole. He lied, cheated, treated me (and her) like shit and is a selfish narcissistic bully.

However, I hope he comes up trumps with her and I will do anything to enable this to happen.

If he can't bring himself to have a brilliant relationship with her then it won't be my fault, and I hope in that case that she can find the strength to either carve a functioning relationship with him or cut him out of her life if she needs to. I will facilitate whatever she decides.

However what I do not expect is for her to not have any kind of good relationship with him out of some misguided sense of loyalty to me and on some point of principle over something that happened years ago. That would be incredibly self centred of me and sad for her.

Are you not worried that he'd lay the same shit at the children's door? Making them feel responsible and guilty if they don't make the choices that suit his needs/convenience best. I used to worry about him getting cross with them and shouting at them for spilling drinks. Now I worry that he will put pressure on them to go to university near him, to choose career paths suggested by him, to drop friends he doesn't approve of, just generally be responsible for him and his emotions. it frightens me.

I see where you are coming from swallowed but I don't completely agree. My Dad was abusive to my Mum. I have little relationship with him now and am quite content with that. Honestly, I couldn't square it morally with myself to have much more to do with him than I do. My Mum raised us alone, with very little money and no help from him. He's nowhere near as much of a parent as she is, and I can't and don't place them on any kind of equal footing.

I completely see where you're coming from and if that's the road my child wants to take then I would also 100% support that.

At the moment my ex seems to be doing ok. Not great, but ok. On the one hand DC loves spending time there and seems close to him (and ow). However I know that he has never seen DC on their birthday, or sent a card, or enquired after them when they're ill. At the moment they are too small to notice.

However, whether in the future the DC realise that he doesn't come through on the little things, and that negatively affects their relationship, or whether the fact that the DC can badger a bit more, so he'll step up a bit more.... I really don't know.

So I suppose I'll see what it's like when it happens. But whether he comes through for DC or not will have nothing to do with what his relationship with me was like (aside from the fact that he's a wanker might fuck up both).

At the risk of being flamed, there's a basic point here which I agree with. Two loving (and in love) parents raising a child together is the ideal scenario. God I wish I had that. I have chosen to be a single parent instead, also working all the hours in the world, trying to be good at my job, a wonderful mother, and I, myself, am irrelevant. Clearly I would not choose this life if it were not better than the alternative. I chose to leave an abusive relationship, and no, he never hit me. I don't actually need to explain it all, and neither does anyone else. It's enough to know that it's worth it.
Every single case is different, and everyone has a reason. They should not have to justify whether they've tried 'hard enough', or 'waited long enough' before having children. Good grief what a load of projection and judgement. I'm not going to bother reading this any more, as I can only imagine there are people on a wind up mission, or who at the least have extremely blinkered views.

I actually agree with the op . This was my life growing up.

I do think that growing up in a house hold with parents that hate each other is extremly harmful but it doesn't get better when parents leave and are still hostile to each other. I think a lot of children fall in to the gaps of two families.