Better to leave my exWife and our children to their own devices?

[exDH]

Any single mums able to comment?

What I mean is I'd rather get away from my xwife than see my kids (sometimes)- the only way to get away from her is to not see them....

They are 6 and 7 - I guess she'd be within her rights to stop me seeing them when I come back ?

poppyfox, my mother left my father when I was 2 because he was a violent alcoholic. Back then the benefits for single mothers were even worse and she had nothing - I have to tell you that my childhood was extremely happy, all the best stuff is free. Ok life is definitely easier with money but look, walking to school instead of driving is a GREAT habit for them to get into with all the long term health benefits that come with regular excercise.

Back then I may have whined about wanting something and I can even remember making my mother cry by sulking when she couldn't buy something but I was happy, I look back with happiness and now that as an adult I understand what she did I am filled with admiration and love for her.

oops double post....

OK!! you're all right I should not be a selfish prick and see the boys every weekend (I think the tuesdays are disruptive for them and they are very difficult for me with work)

I feel guilty for whining now loads of you have had break up/divorces from hell!!

To be honest the bitch is perfectly civilised it is me with the problems with my sadness, I think I'm quite similar to you lostdad. In that I believed that my family were EVERYTHING and that I would do ANYTHING to keep us all happy and together. Funnily enough though my xw accuses me of never having 'broken away' from my mother...

I just can't see how counselling or anything else will help with my sadness and pain at the break up of the family - I SWORE that MY kids would never lose a parent in the way that I did....I get so angry that she left in spite of the affairs, I mean I should be happy that she did because I could NEVER do that to the children

Just wish I could stop being in pain and be happy that they are alive and well and so am I and I'm able to see them

The pain will ease over time exdh. It might not fully ever go away, but trust me it does get better.

And I honestly do recommend counselling. growing up with a violent alcoholic couldn't have been much fun for you at the best of times.

You mention your exw is civilised. So have a talk with her about when the best times for contact will be good for you both. Or if you can't talk with her, go see a solicitor and draw up plans.

Then enjoy your children. Support them in everything they do. Guide them, listen to them and savour every minute.

I wish you all the luck in the world x x

my dad did something similar (just stopped seeing us for whatever reason - I never knew why0 and I have NEVER forgiven him and never will. He totally destroyed my self-esteem as a child and my confidence and shattered my little world. NEVER do that to a child if you are a decent human being. Sorry if that's not the answer you want.

Sorry just skimmed but I don't get this - us single mums don't get the option to "run away" because its too hard
My H cheated on me treated me like shite but I kept seeing him because my DD's needed to see him they adore him - breaks me up and makes me a wreck but I don't even consider it a choice and IMHO neither should you

.....another thread full of pain and anguish.

Sigh.

.....helps to reinforce my sensation of general good fortune.

.....happy stable childhood, (largely) successful marriage, and 4 children that (though not straightforward) are splendid.

(sound like Pollyanna. Sorry!)

Whatever distress your relationship has brought you (and probably your ex too,else events would not have unfolded as they seem to have) it ain't the kids fault, so enjoy them.

I think the best option would be to collect the children from a family member your or ex wifes. also make sure you are consistant in your childrens lives as it is children that suffer the most when the parents split up...

PoppyFox - sorry, can't find it. The way I understood it was: when there was a major dispute or problem with contact, mediation included the children having sessions (I imagine without their parents) and their feedback going into the process. Apparently, this form of mediation is considerably more successful in getting parents to work together.

exDH - really pleased you're hanging in there! I thought the Friday night to Monday morning idea was a good one, if you could manage it.

Exdh, thanks a lot for posting that. It really does give me such a lift to read about people (men in particular, because I worry a bit more about my son) who look back and remember a poor but happy childhood, even without a Dad.

I also tell myself that Barak Obama's Mum was a single Mum! Mind you, I am not as driven as her! I won't be making my children get up at 5 am to do 2 hours studying before school chance would be a fine thing!

exdh, I know you don't see the point of talking to somebody, and I don't mean to annoy you, but have you thought about Anti-depressants? I can really sing their praises. I was on them for six months and they just really helped push the useless thoughts that kept going round and round in my head out finally. I was getting bored with putting my head on the pillow every night and having the same annoying thoughts barge their way in and stop me from sleeping. Anti-depressants just helped me feel that maybe I could sort this mess out.

I completely identify with what you say about so badly not wanting your children to be the ones brought up in a 'fractured family' or whatever you call it. And although that new reality killed me to start off with, I have grown used to the idea. Would have loved the traditional setup though. I am so conservative. I really hope my children find happy marriages. Well that's a long way off.

Vast numbers of men deal with the pain of divorce by stopping seeing the children ever. It's almost a standard practice for some of them. My older three children haven't been contacted once in 5 years by their father. It is very unfair on the children and the mother. I think the law should be changed to force men to have children 50% of the time particularly when the mother works full time.

He does see the younger 2 but has not spoken to me for 5 years either and simply arrives rings the bell, gets back in the car and the boys go out - thus you can have contact without ever seeing or contacting the mother.

It's a huge cop out and cowardice for these men who do it - who either kil themselves or move abroad - yes they can forget but what if the mother did the same - the children would be on the streets.

Xenia - my dad did a similar thing - saw my two siblings but not me. How do the older ones deal with it? IME it isn't any less hard if you are an adult child who father ignores you.

He sees the younger ones? But not the older ones?

Wow. That must hurt. Or is it partly their decision at this point not to see him. They are now the ones NOT seeing HIM?

My x is the opposite. He has a good relationship with older child and talks about 'my daughter' and I have to remind him he has a son too. Weird. I don't understand a lot, but i especially don't understand this.

In fact, recently when my xh came to take the children out for lunch he tried to leave my son behind. He said he would be too much trouble in a restaurant. He's 3. I made him take both of them and it was fine apparently, but I'd hate to think of my son remembering that. But at least he had a burger with his Dad. Hopefully he'll remember that bit and not me saying "what? NO you have to take both of them!!!!"

I'm so scared my ex will not see my DC that I'll even hint that there's a chance of us getting back together just to make him stay in touch more. It's sad, but it works.

Are you in the early stages of your separation?

It's just a thought. Think it. Problem solve. Move on.

Try to stop blaming. Blame is the prime destroyer of relationships - even post-seperation ones

I like your sentiment CapricaSix, it sounds as though I am normal to have turned to my mum for support rather than being the emotionally defficient child that my xw thought that made me. Perhaps she was the abnormal one in that she did not ever refer to her parents for support...maybe she was even jealous of the strong bond I had. She was brought up as a Jehova's Witness and her parents therefore did not believe in birthdays or christmas, that in itself shouldn't have caused her to have a dysfunctional parent/child relationship though.....

C6 is right about that instant bond, I personally need to focus on that and make sure it becomes and stays unbreakable.

MumontheNet, not actually divorced yet, xw has continuously postponed it with similar hints to those described by Emily. I have put my foot down now as I'm hoping that the divorce will have the same effect as the break/escape that I started this discussion talking about. She left a couple of days before my 30th in July last year (about a week after finishing the 2 year drama course that I had got myself into increasing debt to fund) it's not as raw as it was back then but you're absolutely spot on, the boys are a reminder and I have to disassociate them from those feelings of anguish.

Xenia, I don't think that suicide is cowardly, I think people wrongly attribute greater emotional toughness to men than women when in fact it is often the woman (especially when she feels her kids are affected) who can emotionally wash her hands of the whole situation. Leaving the man utterly devastated and continuously rerunning every scenario wondering if he could have been more loving, kinder, provided more material wealth etc

I am extremely close to my family; but my parents occupy a different place in my heart than my xw did. In my mind, there was no competition. In my ex's there was.

Then again - we're talking the woman who also told me (calmly, not in temper) that her horse was more important to her than I was.

Maybe I read that the wrong way too, eh? [wink[

Oh..

Blame, blame, blame...

Don't fool yourself that just becasue a woman holds herself together for the kids she is not emotionally devestated. If the man is so unstable as to threaten suicide, then she is mearly making a pragmatic choice of walking away from someone who cannot support themselves through trauma, never mind her and the kids. What is the other choice do you think? Let the kids live with such instablity? Never feel stable herself?

Stablilty is undervalued in many relationships. My ex couldn't give us family that and that is why he lost us. I came to see that he just didn't know how. Didn;t want to look in the mirror and address the issues that could have done that for himslef and us. We have more stablity without him than with - but that does not mean it was not emotionally devestating at all.

This discussion is breaking my heart.

My father left when I was 2, and my brother was 3. It was a very acrimonious divorce - my parents loathed eachother, and made no secret of the fact.

My father scaled down his visits over the years, and eventually stopped visiting when I was about 12. I have no idea what his reasons were, but maybe he found the brief contact with my Mum unbearable. Or maybe he felt he needed to "sort himself out" in order to be any use to us.

Whatever his reason, it was a big mistake. The feelings of rejection we experienced were immense. Although I got on with my life, I never re-established a relationship with my father, despite his attempts to have regular contact now I'm an adult. We e-mail, he visits, but I feel nothing for him. My brother wasn't so lucky. He took it very hard, never got over the fact that someone who created him could so easily just drop him. He committed suicide when he was 19, and his diaries spoke at length about the devastation caused by his father's abandonment.

I think that when you bring a child into the world, you have to put them first, however hard you may find it. I split with my ex when my son was 3 weeks old. I had to move out, despite it being his choice to split. It was very hard - moving house with a tiny baby, leaving the person I was in love with. But that's life - I had a son, so he came first.

Please, as much as you may be suffering, put your children first. And don't justify hurting them by telling yourself you'll be more use to them when you're more sorted. You're their Dad, they love you, and if you drop them now you may lose them for ever. I'll never ever forgive my father for what he did to my brother. Never.

The person who divorces, who rejects their spouse doesn't have the same issues as the person rejected, whatever their sex. So anyone whose spouse initiates the break up goes through and through what they did wrong, how it might have been different etc. For the other person it's not the same issues at all - just massive relief it's over and a lot of sadness. So I don't think that point is gender specific at all.

On the question of seeing two chidlren and not others, no it's not the older children who won't see him. Their approaches have been ignored, even fairly important stuff like invitations to a graduation so I don't even see him turning up at their weddings at this rate.

Suicide... very cowardly and done by men or more often threatened or tried and then it fails leaving the person disabled for life. Yes it can relate to being mentally ill and I saved my ex in one case although I often wonder what remotest bit of good it has done any of us that I did. But it's easy enough as a father who has washed his hands of his children to kill himself or run away but if you've got your chldiren 365 days a year you don't have the convenience of that option. If the law forced men to have children 509% of the time, made them have to do things liek full time working mothers do such as find child care not just for after school but when they're on business trips etc and out of hours, made men wash children's uniforms, sew on the name tapes, konw which days they need books for school, made them proper parents on a 50% basis everyone would benefit and if these mnen didn't like then that's just tough.