Can a child decide which parent to stay with?

[Boomerwang]

I'm not sure I wrote the right title for this, as I'm not talking about any kind of custody arrangement.

I share my daughter with her father, whom I left two years ago. We live in the same borough. Up until a couple of months ago we were the ones who decided where our daughter should stay the night and it was usually in blocks at a time i.e. 4 days one parent, 4 days the other.

We both became jobless around the same time a couple of months ago so now there are much fewer considerations. We thought we'd allow our daughter to decide where to spend the night.

I didn't anticipate the factors which swayed her decision one way or the other, such as who gave her the most computer time, or who cooked the best food, or who was more of a pushover etc. I naively thought a 4 year old would actually stay until the point she missed the other parent and then switch.

I've tried to be very careful not to lead her into her decisions but I can see she's finding it more difficult to say the words and I'm worried that she's shouldering too much.

The idea was to allow her to choose the most satisfying path for herself, but should we go back to routine blocks of time spent at each parent?

There is a spanner in the works of that idea, however. My ex has recently started anti depressants and is still having unbalanced days. I don't want to expose my daughter to his dark moods as I have been guilty of doing so in the past and I know it affected her as she was much quieter around me. I don't want to force her to stay a length of time at her father's house if she is stressed.

Can't help the feeling that all this would be resolved if I just upped and left the country (sweden) and took her with me back to the UK.

Read Penelope leach.

Sorry I meant that I was guilty of having dark moods myself around her (due to my own anxiety problems which are now sorted out) not that I'd allowed her father to have her while depressed before.

Just googled Penelope Leach. There seems to be a dispute about whether it's detrimental to kids to allow them to sleep over with their fathers if they are not the primary caregiver. What constitutes a primary caregiver?

Yes, she needs the routine of a set contact pattern.

It is deeply unfair to put a decision like this onto a child who is way to young to have the maturity to handle it. The usual age for DC having this sort of input into the decision making about contact is when they are at secondary school.

XH's depression is no reason to remove your DC from the country they consider home. Have you actually researched the law on international child relocations from Sweden?

It's a flimsy reason to skip time with a parent anyhow.

I think that at 4, she is too young to have the responsibility of deciding which parent to be with and when. I think that's a decision to be made by parents.

My two are 13 and 11 and have some amount of decision as to going to their dad's house but overall he and I are still the ones who decide what is happening.

4 is too young to make a reasoned decision.

But do you really think upping and taking her to another country is going to be in her best interest? You need a formal agreement between both parents so she has routine and knows where she will be when.

She's 4. You two need to parent her, and take control of this situation. You wouldn't give her a choice on other important factors at that age, so not this. You may be overestimating her emotional ability to do this at this age. Maybe when she's 10.

Thanks for your responses.

I don't like the lack of control over what happens with my daughter, and I hate to let her down. I just feel if I never had to organise time with her father then neither of us would feel so insecure.

I can't take her out of the country without his permission and really I don't want her to be without a father. I wish we could work more closely with one another to keep her confident and secure but we always fall out. All of this started when she was born.

Think I should get some professional advice?

4 Is too young to let her decide. She needs routine and consistency . You both need to put your own problems to one side and agree between you what days Is best to split her time, whether that be 4 days at mums 4 days at Dad's and so on or primarily with mum but stays over with Dad Monday Wednesday Friday for example.