Decisions about children in an amicable split

[Misty9]

I'm hoping to hear some experiences of what people did about sharing childcare in the cases of amicable splits. Especially if the dad was a very involved parent.

I'm facing likely separation but their dad is very involved and neither of us wants to have much reduced contact with the kids (2 under 8). 50/50 just seems like it would be so unsettling for the dc constantly moving homes. But what is the alternative?

Could the children stay in one house and you each live there for one week?

Seems a bit out there, but to avoid ALL and ANY disruption to the children, it will have to be you and your Ex doing the heavy lifting.

Alternatively, do a week at a time, at your own (new) homes to avoid alot of back and forth

Hope you figure it out.

Could the children stay in one house and you each live there for one week?

I would have done this but my ex and both lawyers seemed to think it was a bad idea.

One of us was often out in the evening anyway. Instead of having to run two full homes run one and a sexist or 1 bed flat.

Kids have minimal disruption and parents alternate the home and the flat.

I am sure it would have worked for us but never got a chance to prove it.

Kids are incredibly adaptable and resilient. Keep things positive (“bright and breezy” I think is the MN phrase) and if they have two homes they’re loved in, it’s really no problem. From friends trying 50/50, full weeks at each seems to be harder than EOW and split weeks.
You can’t spend the rest of forever just working round DCs and your (STBEx?)H - you’ve got your own life and relationships to move on with :)

Sadly I have an incredibly unadaptable child with likely SN (as soon as he drops the act at school!) and he really can't cope with change. Maybe he'll have to try though.

I did think about us being the ones to move about but I wouldn't want to share my living space with an ex- even if they weren't there! I wondered about a child led approach so they can have set routines but also have the option to go to dad's/mum's if they want to? Likely to be misused at the start I'm sure but could help with feeling secure and would probably settle down? But I don't know anyone who's tried it...

We do a 4/3 split. Exh has the kids every Tues and Fri plus alternate Saturdays and Wednesdays. So one week it's Tues/weds/Fri and the next is Tues/Fri/sat. It means we get equal weekend time but he still pays child maintenance as he's a higher earner than me.

School holidays we are more flexible to accommodate holidays and seeing family.

It works pretty well and kids have got used to it (helped by us being amicable really so no stress if we need to swap for work commitments and similar). It can be a little tricky making sure the right stuff is at the right house though.