is it possible to have a good family relationship after separation?

[PintandChips]

DP and I are splitting up, i am moving 10 mins up the road with DS, 2.5yo. the plan is that he will see his dad every other day roughly, and we will try and do stuff all together as a family sometimes too. all our friends are mutual and have kids of same age, so there will be a lot of opportunity to hang out together as a family but not alone.

the split is amicable and we both want it. i have this vision of us being really good friends, and accepting of each others partners, and having a kind of extended family rather than a split family.

does anyone have any actual experience of this utopian vision?

with the exception of socialising with mutual friends then yes I have this with my ex and it has been fairly smooth ony 2 hiccoughs in 9 years.

how old was your child when you split? and has he/she/they coped ok?

a friend at work who split with her partner years ago, but acrimoniously, saw a child psychologist who apparently told her that spending time together as a family was a bad idea as it would encourage the child to keep hoping that their parents would reunite, which is unfair to the child.

i'm slightly of the opinion that my DS is too young for that way of thinking - and for that i'm grateful that we're doing it now not in a couple of years, but i do worry about how he'll cope with it all.

Yes! Ex-Dh is well and truly part of the extended family. The split wasn't amicable - it took a good couple of years for us to be friends again - but we're now at the stage where Ex-DH, DH and DS2 (from relationship with current DH) go to the football together, Ex and current DH play squash and go drinking together, we go out for meals together etc.

Ex spends Christmas with us and goes out for all birthday meals, whether they are his children or not. And he's the "in case of sudden death" guardian for younger two DCs (not his).

He was always a nice guy, just a rubbish husband - I'm so grateful I've managed to keep his friendship.

I have a couple of good friends who have managed this and though it took a while it has turned out well.

Also DH and his ex are now far more than civil. We go round there for sunday dinner sometimes (and a few years ago it was solicitors at dawn )

It is very early days for you so don't expect it to be completely smooth but it is possible

If both of you are in agreement that your couple-relationship has run its course, and you are not splitting up because of vile behaviour by one of you (abuse etc) then there is no reason at all why you can't form a very amicable co-parent relationship.
Problems may arise later on if one or the other of you starts a new couple-relationship with a monogamist fuckwit who makes a great big deal out of being The Partner now and won't be civil to the other co-parent, but one thing about amicable separations is that you usually understand each other well enough to be able to see off undesirable new partners.

My dd was just 3, niether of us had any family to speak of and we'd only been together 5 years so we still had his & her friends. It wasn't until she went to school that we'd both be together at parents evening & performances etc. However as she got older (she's now 12) with done things together the 3 occasionally and he'll often stop of a cup of tea & a chat with me etc

In some ways he's still my family, we swapped cars once, have no hesitation to loan him stuff and if rang me in a crises I'd do all I could to help.

wow, that's so encouraging, thanks. I do feel like it should be possible. We've talked about the fact that new partners might be an issue in that they might find it difficult, but both agree that if they can't handle it they're not the right partners!

neither of us are jealous by nature - although i might feel differently when i have to actually meet his new partner - so i'm less worried about that bit. My main concern is that it doesnt' get confusing for our son.

CarGirl, we've only been together 5 years too, but i moved to 'his' town 2 years ago so all my friends are basically his friends - though some of the girls have become more mine in that i see them more with the children.

all our friends know that we've been struggling for ages so are supportive of what we're doing because they can see we've tried so hard to make it work. i think that will help.

Hassled - does your ex DH have a new family too? if so how does that fit in?

i'd like to think we'll have christmases and stuff together but that's bound to get tricky when we both have new partners?

In reality I only had my two bestfriends (who live miles away) and some newish friends at work but had a new partner quickly whereas my ex had lots of long standing friends living closely but it wasn't an issue their was no hostility from anyone towards anyone IYSWIM.

Christmas has always been fine dd usually spends the morning with us and at some point goes to her Dad's and stays overnight. Neither of us are the sort of people to "have" to see her open gifts to feel like we haven't missed out. Perhaps because neither of us had "good" parenting ourselves we are just happy that we are both interested in her long term emotional welfare and have never had an interest in scoring points over each other.

I suppose my fear around christmas and stuff is actually for myself, not our son. I'm sure he will be fine, but i can just see me having a lovely morning with him then waving him off to his dad's for the rest of the day where there will be a new girlfriend and possibly step-siblings, while i sit at home crying over the queen's speech and an M&S meal for one...

er, not sure what happened to my positivity there...

Well plan in advance to spend time with friends and actually enjoy a Chritmas Day that isn't entirely present & child orientated.

My friends daughters parents seem to have a fairly good relationship. They live a couple of streets apart and both have new partners. Their DD goes between both houses and has a her own room at both. Dad still does stuff like lay new flooring for Mum and they all seem to get on OK. Don't think their is much socialising as such but did see the parents plus partners at a school event and they all seemed to chat OK, no hair tearing or stand up screaming matches .

If you are splitting up on good terms and haven't cheated on each other and new partners will be exactly that NEW not affairs then there is no reason why you can not have a good working relationship. But I would keep it as that a working relationship, I wouldn't try too hard to be best pals and all that. I would accept there will be two different families not one big waltons thing .