ds is blaming me for EXp leaving.

[booyhoo]

I'm not particularly upset or surprised about this as i expected it. i guess to a 5 year old that it is easier to get angry at me because i am here and he misses his dad so won't get angry at him.

BUT

I'm not taking the blame for this. yes i was the one who pulled the shutters down in the end but the end of the relationship wasn't just down to me. I am not letting ds believe it was my fault and carry this belief into his teenage years where he will resent me for doing the only thing i could do. EXp has the victim mentality down to a fine art so i know any hint of ds blaming me and EXp will agree and may even tell him it's my fault without needing any encouragement. I need the boys to know that a relationship is the responsibility of two people but how do i put this in 5 year old terms?

you say

"When two people decide that they love each other and that they want to liove together, they both have to be nice to each other.

Now, when they can't be nice to each other, it means they shouldn't live together any more, or it will be an unhappy place for the children to live, so one person has to live somewhere else so that the children have a nice happy home to live in.

It's not the same for children, mummies and daddies love children even when they aren't being very nice and children always get to live at home."

Agree with colditz.

Will be answered with "But WHY? I want my daddy!" Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

thank you both. yes i expect this question to crop up again and again. i just don't want them ever to get the idea that i (or the woman in the couple) was responsible for maintaining the relationship.

Colditz - thank you so uch. I cant tell you how hard I am finding to to explain to ds2 (8) why his dad is not here. (alcoholism, verbal and emotional abuse) without 'blaming' or critisising XH.

Well, you don't have to protect your ex to avoid blaming him.

I have told my Ds's "Daddy like to spend more money than I do, so I used to get very angry with Daddy when we didn't have enough money to keep the house warm or to buy nice food. It wasn't a nice place to live when I was angry with daddy and Daddy was angry with me so Daddy moved out.

Now Daddy has his own house, so he can spend his money however he likes and not bother having dinner, and I have enough money to make sure the house is warm and that we all have dinner every day, and that means we both get to do things the way we want to do them"

So on the subject of alcohol, you could say

"Daddy likes to drink a lot of beer and he used to be rude to me after he had been drinking beer sometimes. Really, he drinks too much beer for it to be safe for him to live with children because it made him sleep too much, so he had to move into another house where he can drink his beer whenever he wants to and you still have a nice house to live in where the person looking after you isn't drinking beer"

I have just cut and pasted the second one Colditz I think it's really well worded - doesn't avoid the truth but keeps it neutral. Thanks

you are awesome.

Thank you

(I really mean that) x

You're welcome, I hope it helps.

Well what if your ex says 'I drank a lot of beer because your mum had issues about sex and used to nag me a lot'

I'm not saying you did. But I don't think you need to explain to children much more than, we stopped loving each other but we both love you.

If he says "YOu mum wouldn't shag me so I got drunk instead" you explain how getting drunk and nasty is NEVER a good way to cope with someone you are unhappy with. If you have a problem, children, do we talk about the problem and try to solve it, or do we do something like drinking beer that will make us not ABLE to solve it? Which do you think is the sensible solution>?

thank you mj. yes that is what i have stuck to. pretty much what you have posted above. he has accepted it but i can tell it hasn't made him feel any better about the situation. he doesn't talk about it all the time. usually only when he has been to his nanny's.

yes MJ i agree. Exp came over last night and i told him what had been going on with ds. he didn't have much of a response but i told him what the party line was from my end (pretty much what you posted) and i hope he took that as a hint of what i expect him to say when ds asks him aswell. although i know it is entirely up to him what he says. he also mentioned a friend of his who is now going through court to see his DD. i think he was mentioning it as a sort of warning to me that he would do the same. but i told him straight that i will never stop the boys from seeing him and he will never have a need to take me to court. i have no reason to stop them from seeing him.