Parenting Marriage /stay together for the kids.

[Lookingforhappiness]

Hello , is anyone in one of these or knows anybody who is ?
My partner and I have been together since school although we seperated 6 months ago. Since the separation we are getting on a lot better and everything is very amicable. He stays for tea one night a week and has the kids every other weekend. Neither of the children seems hugely affected and we've settled into a lovely routine.
However, this isn't sustainable long term due to financial reasons. My (ex?) partner is living with his parents an hour and a half away so commuting into work everyday is quite tiring for him. He is still paying the mortgage on our house until the fixed rate is up at the end of the year and we will then decide to sell. I work as a relief dinner lady at my eldests school so don't earn enough to buy my own house at this point. I feel bad that the kids are missing out on holidays etc and things have become very tight but still manageable with the maintenance payments and benefits.
There is no way our romantic relationship will ever be the same again , we tried for years to get intimacy back and going out for meals , talking to each other and there is just nothing there romantically. What is there however is mutual love and respect as parents of our 2 wonderful children. It seems silly to throw all that stability and way of life away for the kids just because we are no longer in love.
I'm just looking for advice from anyone who has/is in one of these relationships. I've ordered a book called The New I Do which looks like it will be helpful but any first hand experience would also be good. :)

I know quite a few people who share a house but not a bed, and they are just the ones who admit it! It works for some people. None of us can tell you if it's right for you. Only thing to consider is how you both will feel if the other meets somebody?

Oh yes that makes sense. A part of me would always think of a dream marriage from a movie or novel but I know realistically it's probably not out there. & if it is , I have plenty of time to seek it when the kids are adults. When my youngest is 18 , I will be 40 so there will still be a lot of life in me yet ! Who knows my husband and I may fall back in love with each other and if we don't, we won't regret having chosen to raise the kids together.
I've been reading the book for the past half hour and going though it with a highlighter pen . With regards to the kids being happy knowing we are happy "what kids need is a good-enough marriage-a relationship in which the parents get along for the most part and work as a team to provide enough of the things kids need in order to function well" supposedly kids don't care all that much if their parents are fulfilled in their marriage . What they care about is stability, consistency and a close relationship with their parents. So that would go for both co-parenting relationships where parents are divorced and also if parents were living together . The problems arise when there is conflict and arguing in the home then the best solution would be to divorce.

Annie thats great. I bet there must be lots who dont admit it . I've answered that question a few times throughout the thread and neither of us would care if the other met someone else as long as they didn't bring them into the house. I'm not going to actively seek dates by joining OLD or anything , I dont know what my husband will do.When we reassess the situation if the other wants desperately to move in with their boyfriend/girlfriend then we will discuss it again. But as it stands , we are 100% commited to raising the kids first and foremost .

Hi OP. I've been living with DH for two years now post split. We're amicably splitting just stuck for visa reasons. It can be ok. It can be hard. Really hard.

When you've made the psychological click into not being together, there's the relief. But then comes the realisation that you're alone. Yes, you can meet someone and never have them home, so can he. But, if you met someone who said he and his wife were separated and sleeping in separate bedrooms, would you really believe them? If your friend told you she'd found a great guy and that was his story, wouldn't you tell her to run a mile? And if you're planning on working on your relationship, even as non romantic parenting partners, you do have a relationship and new partners will feel that.

You need to understand that you ARE giving something up. For me what is helping on that aspect is that I'm using the time to go back to university and study for new career so in the end I'll be in a better position alone than I would have been.

The loneliness is hard though. A few weeks ago I just wanted someone to curl up and watch TV on a Friday night with. In my own home, on my own sofa. It hit me that this can't happen unless we're living separately. I had to deal with all the feelings that brought up.

And you have to realise that for the situation to work, DP also has to accept all those feelings.

It can work but it's not the easy option.

But neither is divorce.

Hi Thanks for the input , its good to hear how difficult it can be , to have a realistic picture. However we have struggled since 2013 trying to make things work in their own way. I have noticed how lovely it is being on my own the past 6 months and having the house to myself, I don't feel lonely at all and I do think I will struggle when I have to go back to sharing my space with someone else. But it is a sacrifice we will have to make for financial stability. I really can't stress how far up shit creek we will be if we try and afford our own homes and how that will impact on the kids. If money was no object or if we could comfortably afford 2 homes then we would be able to keep the status quo .
Meeting someone else isn't high on either of our agendas at the moment but when they happens we will work something out . If other people run a mile when they hear our situation then so be it, the kids come first.

We are going to keep our weekends seperate and spend a family weekend together once a month. So my husband will take the kids to his parents one weekend, I will have them at home or at my mams the next and then one weekend a month will be all together. If I did meet someone there would be at least one weekend a month they could spend in the house with me and same for my husband. However , that's just not on the agenda right now and we will cross that bridge when we come to it. We are BOTH willing to sacrifice things until the kids are adults or until we are financially able to separate and live independently. We are lucky that we had our children young so will be relatively young when the time comes for us to go out seperate ways. It might be completely the wrong decision or it might work out great. I was surprised not to hear more first hand experience so I think I'll post when we've done it for a while for anyone in the future looking towards doing something like this.

I don't mean being by yourself, being alone.I mean loneliness if you're living together and not a couple. We too struggled for years and years, had therapy etc. It's definitely better to not be trying to make it work and able to relax a bit. But then goes hope of things too.

You asked if it can work. Two years on from what you're about to start I can say it can be ok. But it's not painless at all. It's not straightforward. Your age gives you more options than me doing that a decade later but you're also giving up a lot that you won't fully appreciate until you start seeing divorced friends getting excited about a new man, discussing the things they plan with their partners, etc. While you haven't had romance for a long time, the fact you were working on it meant you had some hope of it happening. And you wanted it. When hope ended, I'm guessing splitting up came soonish. You wouldn't have split up if you were happy to have, essentially, a sexless, romanceless marriage.

The next phase involves giving up any chance of anybody hugging you, telling you they love you, thinking you're the best thing ever. That state of it being gone, even in hope form, is exceptionally isolating and while you can have one night stands or fuck buddies, they're not the same as what you hoped to get from your marriage. And you can't get those things anywhere else. It's not something replaceable by friends or family.

Fine till one of you meets someone else. That's likely to change everything.

So you would be sharing a house.
Like room mates.

If your ex was happy at his parents he would stay there?

Doesn't seem doable.

Aren't you showing your children how to be in a relationship?

Footle I have gone over the meeting someone else countless times on the thread (don't mean to sound snappy if that's how it reads but fingers are aching going over it). Both of us can date and if either of us was to meet anyone 'serious' then a discussion would be had but as far as we are concerned right now , we are committing to 5 years of staying put in order to become more financially stable , get more savings, more equity in the home etc. At this point we will reassess and maybe go again for another 5 years , see how we feel at the time.
Robin I have also covered the showing your children how to be in a relationship & as far as children are concerned they don't care if we are fulfilled in our marriage as long as they have their needs met . And to be honest, having been the child of parents who did stay together for the kids , I didn't care that they weren't romantically involved with one another. When they separated when I was 15, they both had new partners and it was lovely for us kids to see them genuinely happy and in love but it didn't take away any of our family memories or make us feel like those years were wasted unhappily.

I think people can underestimate the financial implications of divorce for those of us who aren't professionals with lots of equity in a marital home. There is a need for us to do this in order to give the kids and us financial stability and to get some savings for if we do divorce in the future.

I've read your updates and its clear you have thought a lot about the practicalities. It does sound as if its worth a shot. It will at least give you some breathing space while you try and improve the financial side of things. Good luck

Good point.
Personally having been a single parent for a couple years with my 1 year old I couldn't have stayed in a sexless marriage.
Lived in my 'own' little terrace house and worked part time with tax credit.
I was 27.
My mortgage was tiny though.
I even had a car :)

I met my dh and we have been together happily for 25 years now.

But I can see where you're coming from.

Thanks, I think that's the idea to sort out finances during the first 5 years and then reassess it. Give ourselves time for me to be earning more money, pay off more of the mortgage , have more savings etc which will make it so much easier to go our separate ways. Kids will be 14 and 11 when we reassess so we could divorce then or think it's worth keeping going until they've finished school depending on if either of us was in a rush to get out.
Robin that's brilliant that you managed to get a mortgage on your own and are able to drive/have your own car. I am 28 now so similar age to what you were and I do enjoy living on my own these past 6 months its just not financially viable long term. We live in a little terraced house already so couldn't afford to own 2 separately. When my husband left the family home in October we hadn't had sex for almost 3 years so was already living in a sexless marriage; the only difference now is there is no pressure on us to work on that aspect so we can focus more on saving money and raising the kids whilst living our own social lives.

It all sounds very mature. I hated my ex so it wouldn’t have worked for us. Will you continue to share a bed?

I've been where you are where it seems easier to just get along like a family.

In reality though I think it really blurs the lines for the DC and mine would say why can't daddy stay over or why can't daddy come to xyz. Much harder to explain when as far as they can see everyone gets on great.

I also think this doesn't work if one person moves on which is inevitable and either partner might feel resentful of your relationship. And lastly sometimes it's really confusing for yourself and I would find myself having moments wondering why we couldn't just get back together etc.

I’m in this situation and have been for several years now. Kids still in school, eldest is 2 years away from university, younger still in primary
Separate rooms/beds for years and the chat has long been had.
Mostly it works ok.
My biggest problem is that he’s ALWAYS here if he’s not at work and that drives me insane
We have a way to go on the mortgage and he has a lot of debt
I’ve spent the last few years digging myself out of debt but don’t have enough to run a second household
I’m trapped.
On the plus side: I have freedom outside the house which I take advantage of
I see my kids every day
I have met a man in the exact same situation (I know it for a fact, I’ve been in his home) so I do have some kind of love-life...
I’m a bit stuck in that I can’t see a way out and this gets me v down sometimes
We very rarely argue and parent together reasonably well. At the same time we occasionally joke (dark humour) about how great it would be if the other dropped dead! mortgage paid off/pensions/death in service payments etc
I’m older than you OP and I do struggle with it all sometimes but in reality it’s the only game in town

Personally If i was going to contemplate this I would sit down with ex and brainstorm literally every scenario possible - all romantic possibilities for you both, issues with kids, one of you loses job and wants to move, everything - and talk about how you might feel and what you‘d do. I‘d also really want to work personally on what you want from life or might want in a couple of years, and how this arrangement might affect that. You‘ll always find someone who unusual set ups work for - you just have to really work out if you personally are that person

OP I think it can totally work given that both you and he sound like very level-headed people. I wanted stability and financial security for my DC and so did my XH. It got harder as the years went by but we made it until the youngest was 18, and I have almost no regrets. We did our best for them. And now we are each having a ball, freed from each other and still friends (not best friends any more, but still).

One word of warning though: if you do start to argue, cut your losses. That is not good for DC to be around, at any age.

And if I were you I would have a regular sit-down review every year, not every five years.

It seems like you really have looked at it from all angles.

I wish you all the best.

Notcoolmum yes we will share a bed but then we did for the 3 years of not having sex before we split up so won't be any different there. I'll have the house to myself every other weekend when he has the kids and on the alternate weekend I'll take the kids to my mum's so he has the house to himself.
Worriedmum I would never ever wonder if we could get back together because I don't find him attractive in the slightest , turns my stomach to imagine having sex with him. When we sell up we will look for a 4 bed so we can have seperate rooms but initially we will still be sharing a bed which is fine , I know it is because I've done it.
Cillantro the only game in town sums up exactly the situation we are in, can't see another option that wouldn't be selfish or putting the kids in unnecessary financial hardship. The dark humour sounds like us to be honest. Or we will say I wish you would just run off with someone so they could share the load of a second home for the kids. I think it's lovely that you have met someone and I do hope in future you can move forward once the mortgages are sorted and live with him. Do your kids know the situation ? I'm unsure if we should tell ours or just have him move back in and say nothing, I don't know if they're too young or if they'll even care at this point as long as nothing changes for them.
Crazyhead we are committing to 5 years regardless , it'll only be another 5 years of what we've endured for a long time anyway. I think often people are cynical about set-ups that aren't traditional but we just can't see any other option at least for the next few years. I can't make it any clearer how difficult life would be financially. We need time to get more savings behind us , more equity in the home, for me to work more hours. It's just not the right time and sometimes love and feelings come secondary to financial stability when there are kids involved.

Cassettesarecool thank you so much for the input, I'll bring this to the table when we discuss it over Easter . A review every year does sound sensible, we can assess how we are getting along/not getting along and how the savings are , work situation etc. To hear that you have almost no regrets is so reassuring. Having a couple of people on here with first hand experience has really helped me today so thank you for taking the time to comment.
Robin thank you .

I have found this thread very interesting, as it does reflect my own thoughts on this topic. My own marriage is not stable, but I am reluctant to split as I don't think it is necessarily the answer.

I have read many a MN thread where comments are along the lines of: 'I really think you should LTB. There is better out there for you. I left my ex-DH and now, three years on, my DC are fine and I am with a lovely man'. Yes, that's because you are in the honeymoon period and his flaws haven't revealed themselves yet, nor have yours.

Many marriages have issues, which often only reveal themselves once several years have gone by. So, what's the answer? Serial monogamy with children experiencing their parents having several 3-5 year relationships over the course of their childhood? How is that any better?

Financially, I think you are being very sensible. The period between about 2000 and 2015 was uniquely generous in terms of providing tax-credits etc to lone parents and families, plus rising house prices often meant that equity splits were enough for both spouses to start afresh. But times are changing and Universal Credit seems to be a lot less generous. Not to mention the economic uncertainty created by Brexit.

I would focus on your own training and development in the meantime. You are clearly literate and write well with very few errors - can you do any admin or finance training? Improving your pay would stand you in good stead for the future and give you a chance to build up a pension.

Best wishes.

Maybedoctor I do have a degree in Early Childhood Studies and the intention was to complete a PGCE afterwards. However I got pregnant in my first year of uni and having children changed my timeline. My youngest child is non verbal autistic and has very high needs so I do receive carers allowance and disability allowance for her and this goes some way to explaining why finding suitable work and childcare is challenging. I am more than happy to find a job that I don't have to bring home with me, and that ideally has no need for childcare. Working nights whilst my husband is home or school hours (hence why I'm currently a lunchtime supervisor at a school within walking distance).
In terms of my literacy and very few errors (?!) Haha thanks , I don't really focus on grammar or spelling when writing in a forum though . As long as people can understand me that's fine.
I think you are right that many people do give up on marriage too soon. If people can financially manage on their own then great but like you say times are changing unfortunately.

I understand your situation and the barriers to working.

Apologies, I didn't mean to offend - you mentioned that you could only access minimum wage jobs so I wondered whether it was a lack of qualifications holding you back, whereas you seem very articulate and write well. As a teacher I worked with a lot of lunchtime supervisors and only a handful of them could write like you do. Which is what I was trying to get across.

I don't think teaching would be the right choice for you at the moment, but would you think of something more office-based? Lunchtime supervisor pays minimum wage, but if you get some kind of office qualification that would get your hourly pay up but is still something that could be left behind at the end of the day.