Relationship with xh after divorce

[grassisgreenerwhereyouwaterit]

For all those who are divorced from their husbands but with children involved, I was just wondering what your relationship is like now with your xh?
I am recently separated (not my decision and have been devastated!) but we have three children together (9,5 and 1). There was another woman but now he just seems to be sleeping around! I think I will always love him and it hurts me just to see him at the moment. I was hoping one day we might be friends but I just seem to be getting angrier by the day at how he's treated me!
How did anyone else handle things?

[currytoohot]

A positive one for you. I divorced when DD was 3 after XH had affair. The marriage had been going downhill for a couple of years and although upset XH had broken our marriage vows, I was realistic enough to know the marriage would not have lasted anyway.

Things were frosty for the first 12 months but after that settled down. We divorced after 2 years separation in a no fault divorce that we handled ourselves without solicitors (apart from when needed for the house transfer to my sole name). We agreed what maintenance he would pay, he paid it every month on time, he rang DD when he said he would, he turned up for DD when he said he would. We continued to go together to school open days etc.

18 years later I class him as a good friend and his wife (the OW) as a friend also.

[Themoleisdead]

I have a outwardly civilised relationship with ExH despite the fact that I think he is completely dishonest, extremely selfish and a useless father (views sadly shared by DC). However I am always polite when I see him and we have attended some things together - we will both be dropping DS to uni in September, for instance. One of my great joys was when DC passed their driving tests and he had no reason to come to the house. Unfortunately when you have children you never really get rid of the ex - I will still have to see him at DC's significant birthdays, their weddings etc.etc

[pullingmyhairout1]

If I'm honest I'm envious of those that have managed to keep amicable relations with their xh. Mine is still in the damaging property stage. Ex, not me.

[Vagabond]

I am friends with my X-H. I left him, so he has every reason to hate me. Luckily, we get along, just as we did for years before we became a couple (we were 'best friends' who should never have married).

We watch our daughter play sport a couple of times a week together and take turns buying the coffee. I pick up his post when he goes away for work and we share in the joy of watching our biggest achievement - our daughter - grow up. I am lucky that he has forgiven me for leaving him. I am lucky that he tells me his problems and how hard he finds it to date again etc....

I still love him, but unfortunately, that love is brotherly rather than sexual and that is why I left the marriage. My biggest hope is that he finds a super lovely woman to settle down with. I would greet her with open arms and welcome her to our funny little family.

[pullingmyhairout1]

^^that is so lovely.

[Improvisingnow]

I agree that where there has been infidelity and/or your exH shows their true colours by being a dick about the divorce, you will never be amicable. I aim for icy, practical politeness and generally manage to achieve it.

The saying "this man is not your friend" is so true. My exH is, and always was, all about himself.

[Vonnie2016]

18 months separated, two young DCS. After the initial freaking out and devastation (he left) we get along great.
He sees the kids a lot so we have to see each other, but we get on well and it's good for the kids to see us getting along.
The good thing is it isn't fake, who knows what will happen when the divorce starts or when other partners come on the scene.
But for now it's okay.
My parents divorced when I was young and still hate each other to this day, it was horrendous being a child knowing they only had to see eachother because of me and they couldn't stand each other.
Don't get me wrong I was very very bitter and upset for the first 12 months, I hated him. But then I realised all that bitterness was just hurting me and getting me no where.

[wantingahappyending]

Vonnie why did you split up if you don't mind me asking?

[Vonnie2016]

He just turned round one day and said he didn't want to be with me anymore, the usual grown apart we were more like friends etc we had been together for 15 years, I was devastated at the time.
But have learned to be on my own, quite like it now.
It's hard with the DC's they are only 6 and 3, but I muddled through for a while and now I feel at peace with it all.
And we get on fine, better than when we were together actually.

[wantingahappyending]

That sounds so much like my situation, it's just so hard to accept (although I am definitely getting there now) it's just incomprehensible to me!
Did he give you any other reasons? Had you been arguing a lot? Did you want different things?

[PopFizz]

We are civil, fb friends, he has come over if I need help with something to do with the kids, we can be at the same weddings/parties ok, I get on ok with his fiance. We had no infidelity though, and it's been nearly ten years.

[Vonnie2016]

Nope, we didn't argue at all. Sometimes bickered but no massive rows, we both wanted the same things.
We struggled a bit financially which put strain on us, but there was no one massive thing, so I totally get how you just look at it and go what? Why? I think we just lost our ability to communicate properly and things just drifted from there.
I didn't want him to leave but he said he had too, so he did.
It is weird sometimes in the early days I wish he had been really horrible to me so I had a reason to hate him other than him not wanting to be married to me anymore.
It was very difficult, glad you are starting to feel a bit better though it takes a while but you get there in the end.

[wantingahappyending]

Has he never had any regrets since then? Was there definitely not someone else?

[Vonnie2016]

Definitely wasn't anyone else, don't know about regrets never really asked him. We are kind of past the going over it all now, so will probably never know if he regretted his decision.

[duffbeergoggles]

I really connect with many PP's experiences here, and thank you Vonnie for sharing a different perspective, one that reminds us all that the absence of OW and abuse doesn't necessarily make it any less painful or difficult to move on after a partner has left. I reflect that had this been my experience too, it would have been just as hard to recover.

I do not have a relationship or contact of any kind with my now adult DD's father. I still, nearly 6 years on, feel it necessary to protect myself from his influence, although I believe that any unfinished business between us is as much, if not more about him, than me. I believe that he was convinced I would disintegrate and expire without him and all his forward planning and treatment of me was aimed at achieving that end, regarding a divorce settlement and DD. I am done with rehashing the details but you get the picture.

But I didn't disintegrate, nor did I expire .

My goodness, if I felt like I didn't know the man who I'd lived with for 20 years, he most certainly felt like he, at the very least, had massively underestimated me.

So - no, despite numerous attempts from him to exert his will, we remain very firmly no contact.

[tartanbuggy]

Very interesting reading all the posts. I'm 7 months in from STBXH suddenly announcing he'd been miserable for years and was ending the marriage. When asked if there was somebody else he told me he'd met somebody at work - described her as a really lovely person who had had a very unhappy and dysfunctional childhood - and was 28 years old to his 54 years. I worked out who she is and he confirmed it. He declared he loved her and within two weeks they had moved into a rented flat together. Still there!

I found the only way I could survive (if that's the right word) was to go completely NC. I have not seen him or spoken to him or contacted him in any way since the day he left. I have blocked his number on my mobile and email. I instigated divorce on the grounds of his adultery and requested that he pay the full costs and in return I would not name the OW as co-respondent. He agreed.

I'm really lucky to be able to go NC: divorce being handled by solicitor; finances being discussed at shuttle mediation; and DCs are old enough to arrange their own contact. Currently DD1 (20) and DS (17) are refusing to have any contact with him; DD2 (17) sees him a couple of times a week but only on the understanding that she does not have to meet the OW.

I still find it very, very difficult and have days where I just yearn to see him or speak to him but I know that if I did then it would be just like Cassawooff described: the pain and hurt and anger I still feel when I see him have me being unpleasant or self-pitying or bitter. I know that I would become either a shrieking, screeching harpy or a blobby weeping heap. I can just see him standing looking at me with that cold, hard, quizzical and contemptuous look.

I really feel for people in my position who have to remain in contact with the Ex/STBX and it's usually because there are young children involved or the Ex won't move out. It must be absolute agony having to keep going and keep up a civil and amicable front when you are just dying inside. I'm having a particularly low time at the moment but I know it would be far, far worse if I wasn't NC. Huge to everybody going through this particularly horrible thing.

[LittleCandle]

I am fortunate that when we split, DD1 had already left home and DD2 was in her teens. XH did cough up maintenance without a qualm, mostly, but did try shitty stuff like stopping paying all the bills on the house when I had no job to pay them. I didn't have to face the dreaded handover for contact, as he lived and worked abroad and rarely saw DD2, but if she had been younger, I would have had no qualms about refusing contact altogether. As it was, I did stop her going to visit him whilst the Arab Spring uprisings were still rumbling on, which was apparently very unreasonable of me.

We are not friends. I have seen him once since the divorce and was civil, but only because I had a very good friend who texted me constantly whilst I had to endure his company. He, for some reason, thinks we are great friends and in fact always wants to touch me (not happening!!!) and speaks and acts exactly the same way as he did when we were married. It is utterly repulsive. He still lives abroad, so thankfully about the only time we are likely to meet is if either of our DC gets married. I will be civil if that happens, but on the occasions when I have seen him, I have had to fight not to stab him. Kudos to those who can remain friendly - its beyond me.

[Mrscaindingle]

So much of these stories resonate with me. I too started out hoping for friendship or at least civility but of course OW soon materialised, he introduced her to DC before we split as his 'friend' and over time his behaviour and complete disregard for me and DC's feelings eroded any ability on my part to be civil.

And yes to that puzzled slightly contemptuous look on his face ()when I was angry at him deciding to live abroad or being a complete dick about the financial agreement. All the way through it has been do things my way, within my time frame or it will cost you.

I don't even do handovers anymore as it used to get me so stressed it ruined my rare free weekend worrying about how to deal with him. He now waits in the car and we communicate by text.

[Elefant1]

I have a good relationship with my exH, he cheated on me with ow but I decided that wanted to keep things friendly for DD even though I would have preferred to have as little as possible to do with him at the time. I was lucky that he behaved well with sorting the divorce and money (though he never paid cm he did pay for school trips and bits and pieces). 5 years on I was at the evening do for his wedding (not to ow, though I am still in touch with ow, it was her who told me when her cheated on her!) and we text occasionally and will have a chat when we happen to meet.
I think it takes both of you really trying and behaving reasonably towards each other to keep thinks friendly and if one isn't interested there nothing you can do, I know I was lucky.