Questions about 50/50 residency

[Chipshopninja]

For those who have this agreement please could you help me?

.how do you manage it?

Me and my partner may be seperating. We have one DD age 6.

If we split we will probably go for 50/50 residency.

For those of you who have this arrangement can I ask...

How do you cope not seeing your children everyday?

How do your children cope with it?

How do you split the time?

Any advice on how to make it easier for DD if we do separate?

Partial answer as I don't have 50:50 residency, but a friend does. They do 5:2:2:5, ie she has every Monday and Tuesday, her ex has every Weds and Thursday, they have every second Fri-Sun. Their son is much older though, I don't know if 50:50 is best for younger children. When we split my ex wanted 60:40 but DD didn't cope well with that and he now has her far less.

Hi, we have a 4/3.
Our four year old has Saturday to Wednesday with me and Wednesday to Saturday with his dad.

It was really hard in the beginning and I would often pop in of an evening and vice versa, that and sleeping in my sons bed at night when I felt too sad.

Over time it's got easier, he has a great time with each of us and I found I'm more patient and in some ways a better parent having a break.

I also eventually filled my time with friends and hobbies.

We split when DS was nine (he's fourteen now,) originally we went for 50/50 with two nights every week and alternate weekends.

For me it was slightly different because I still did the school runs as was a sahm when I split with eXH so it made sense for him to come here rather than to go into after school clubs.

EXH wanted to do one week on one week off but I felt that would be far too disruptive.

The reality though is that however you do it, even if you don't do 50/50 there will be days you don't see your DC such as the weekends when they're with their dad or when they go away on holiday etc. And the answer to that is that you just manage it, and make use of the time you have to yourself. I would never have met my now DP if DS had been with me full-time for instance, because we are in a LDR so being together meant staying together iyswim.

DS is now fourteen and things have changed somewhat since then, and DS spends the majority of time at mine (his choice) does now spend a couple of nights at his dad's during the week but hasn't spent a weekend there for about a year now.

And the reality is that it's actually harder not seeing him now than when it was 50/50, because 50/50 was a routine we slipped into iyswim, and it just was that he would be at his dad's eOW and two nights in the week, whereas now if he's away at his dad's I find the house much more quiet as I've got so used to him being there all the time.

My BIL and his ex wife did this. It seemed to work really well.

They sold the family home and bought/rented close to each other and within easy commute to the school.
Wednesday morning children went to school from dads house and then went home to mums for the week. Next week they left mums and went to dads. They saw the other parents a couple of times a week after school for dinner and met up at weekends.

This was instigated by BIL as he did not want to pay maintenance. At first SIL found it hard but she organised her working hours to give her more time at home when the children were with her. She used her child free time to improve her qualifications and get a better job earning more money than BIL!

When we did it with DSC it was 4/3 then 3/4

So then we had them Friday-Monday one week then Monday-Friday the next.

I did it for quite a while after I split with my oldest DCs' father - who were a similar age at the time. It did work well, but I think only because Ex and I had a good relationship and could talk if there were issues (you need to be at least able to ring and talk about stuff like Jimmy had a bad night's sleep/struggled with his spellings/fell out with Bob at school). As for not seeing them each day - it never really got easier. I missed them like hell. But I knew it was still less bad than having them growing up in a miserable household with unhappy parents - that's how I coped with it. I made sure I worked longer hours on my non-DC days. On a practical side there were always issues like the swimming kit ending up in the wrong house and moving uniform from one house to the next at weekends etc. As I said, you have to be able to communicate with the Ex easily.

My major advice would be think about the future. Our experience was that anything that split up the week more ie Tuesday night at the other parents, was just a pia for everyone. More things in the wrong place for school etc. We now do Friday to Friday and its working much better.

Double equipment everywhere though so no trailing suitcases and teddies to school. Also double stationary stuff - glue etc

I'd also say that whatever they arrive in your house clothes wise should as far as possible be what they leave in, clearly undies and socks dont matter but sports stuff does.

If there's a homework club at school both use it for consistency - my kids have always had to and they are so much better than my step kids at just getting down to it. Then you are just checking work, revising spellings, test practice etc

Make sure school sends all info to you both. They need both your addresses. And whose week (in France we use odd and even week numbers) it is - so they contact the right parent if the child is sick.

From 12ish I would expect DC to have more input as to where they want to be on any particular week, but that's a question for much later on.

Thank you so much for those responses.

Ideally I would prefer DD to live mainly with me and have 1 night a week with OH and every other weekend but I don't see him going for that.

However I am the primary carer (all school runs doctors appointment etc) so I feel this would provide most consistency for DD as I only work part time. I think he mite go for 2 nights a week and every other weekend...but it would be my choice to split so he won't be overly keen on compromise.

What a mess

Hi OP, me and exh have pretty much 50:50 residency. I have them more overnights - 4 to his 3, but he sees them after school as he works part time / semi retired.

We have a two week rota - week one they are with me Sunday morning through to school drop off on Thursday morning then with exh Thurs after school until Sunday morning. Week two they are with me sat night through to school drop off on wednesday and then with exh wednesday night through to sat night.

We have had this same routine since we split 6 years ago (divorced 5 years). Our dc are now 13 and 15.

It has helped that i am organised :)

Dec have got more organised as they have got older with remembering stuff etc.

We live 5 min walk from each other (and their school) and are amicable and co-parent well.

We spend special occasions like their birthdays and xmas together and tend to do week on week off through the school holidays.

No maintenace is paid either way so no money fall outs. exh pays for all school meals and i pay for all school uniform. We split trips and activites 50;50 and will both buy them casual clothes and shoes as and when.

I still miss my dc when they are not with me though, as does my exh. Its never the same after divorce. the feeling of a broken family and split time is one i have not yet managed to get over (despite therapy). I have a demanding full time job, friends and a wonderful dh, but still regularly miss them when they aren't with me. It just doesn't feel right so to speak. Even though I speak on the phone with them on the nights they are with exh.

Good luck op.

I felt that one weeknight and EOW wasn't sufficient for my children to have a meaningful relationship with their dad. We have ended up with Thurs, Fri nights one week, Thurs,Fri,Sat night the next week with their dad.

So basically 2 week nights and EOW but as one of the week nights is a Friday he has most of the following Saturday as well.

DC were 6 and 2. I think the 2 year old might have been better with fewer overnights in hindsight until he is older. The 6 year old has adapted amazingly well. I think he feels like he has two homes which maybe doesn't sound secure for a child but he really seems ok.

I hate time apart from them. When sleep has been bad with the toddler i do feel a little relief at being able to flop into bed.

But not seeing them remains really tough. However I think they now have two happy homes and I feel that is better for them.

I'm full of regret that I didn't make our relationship work. I think it got too bad to fix in the end, some things can't be undone. I wish I could rewind to before that point, get some therapy at an earlier stage.

Good luck working things out.