Can husband move away with son?

[GreenGrassySkies]

I am thinking of divorcing my husband. We have an 18 month old DS. He has never been the best husband, does very little round the house, drinks far too much and can be mean when he does, and really incredibly selfish. I stupidly really thought he would be a better dad, but he isn’t. He spends more time inventing reasons why he can’t have our DS than actually looking after him. And I’ve realised that actually my life would be a lot easier if he wasn’t in it.

I’m really struggling with the guilt of what this could do to our DS. It breaks my heart that he will never remember a time when his parents were together, and will have to live a life being passed between us. My husbands family also all live 7 hours away. We met near where we live now, he didn’t move here for me, but always claims he did, and he has been here for 16 years. But he has no family and very few friends in the area, and I know if we were to separate he would want to move back to where his family are. Despite doing the bare minimum now, I know he will threaten to try and get full custody of our DS, and will try and move back to his family with him. Is there any way this would be allowed?! DS has always lived here, goes to nursery here, sees my parents most days and my mum has him a day a week. I feel terrible for my husband that he will have to choose between living here with no support or moving away. But I’ll do whatever I can to support it even it means driving up and down the country every weekend.

Id love to hear from others who separated with a young child how it worked out. I’m just feeling such a huge amount of guilt i don’t know if i can go through with it, and I know it’s going to be a horrible process that will end up in court as he will won’t be fair or rational about it. And I feel so much shame about how other will judge me

It is unlikely that he will be allocated primary residential status of an 18mo or you have been the primary caregiver.

Even if he is declared the primary residential parent, you can file in court to prevent him from moving away with your shared child.

If the court still allows him to move away with the child, you can always make the choice the follow.

living in a separate region from your child is incredibly unlikely if you are willing to take steps to prevent separation, even if they aren’t ideal.

It’s very unlikely he will get full access, unless there is more to the story. He potentially could get 50/50 but won’t be able to move away. Don’t feel you have to stay with him because he will have a tantrum when he doesn’t get his way.

It is unlikely. Continuity of the children is important. Is there any way you can provide evidence that you are the main carer? Hospital/health worker letters, contact with nursery, anything at all? You can then argue as the main carer that should continue.

My ex is from 7 hours away originally, but when we met lived 1.5hours and moved here for me. He is trying very hard to be resident parent, however he is unable to coparent and I have evidence since we split about his poor communication, name calling, not putting the kid's first, so cafcass have advised that we are not able to parent 50/50. Something to consider moving forward.

Even if he did get resident parent it would be very tricky to get a court/judge to agree to move that far away from their other parent. I asked as it was a concern that I have had. If he chooses to move away the plan for your child could be different like school holidays rather than every other weekend.

Hope it works out well for you.

It's very unlikely he would be given a full contact order unless there is something significant in your past like drug or alcohol addiction or you have had previous social work intervention. It is even more unlikely that he would be allowed to move your child so far from you when their life so far has been here and he is in nursery etc. Speak to a solicitor.

Could you start keeping evidence now to build a case,like.messages about him drinking / declining to do a,b,c for your son etc. Sorry it has come.to this. When my brother and his ex split (my brother moved countries for.her) he stayed with barely any friends etc. It was very hard for him but.he met someone else and made a good life for himself and more importantly maintained 50/50 split with his children.

I separated with two young children (pre school age) and moved 250 miles away (this had been our plan as a family when I was naively trying to save things). Similarly, DP did nothing and drank, and was also verbally/ emotionally abusive, which I had on record with health visitors and police.

I thought he was going to play it very hard but we actually agreed in mediation to one day per month (which he doesnt fully use due to travel cost!!)

Cannot promise you will be as lucky but 'prepare for the worst, hope for the best' xxx

Thank you for your comments. I guess you never know what’s going to happen until you set the wheels in motion. There nothing in my past that would have any effect on custody. The frustrating thing is he can’t look after him for more than a few hours on his own and even if he has 50/50 custody I know it wouldn’t last long. I’ll start trying to document anything that may be useful. He’s not a bad person. Just not a very good husband or dad