What age is the least worst time for a child’s parents to divorce?

[Beetroot79]

I have two young children aged 4 and 6. I don’t think that my husband and I will grow old together. My own parents divorced when I was 10. What’s the best age to do it? When they go to uni?

I should add that we appear to have a totally normal, happy relationship in front of them.

Young children are incredibly resilient- much more so than teenagers and even adults. I'd say younger the better. Now would probably be good ages.

my mum and dad split when I was 4. I dont really remember it much.
I split with ds1s dad when he was 4 and that was ok I think.

My mum and stepdad splitting when I was about 19, absolutely rocked me though. I think the younger the better.

My SDs were 1 & 5 when their parents split. 5 & 9 now. The younger one looks very cynical about it when we mention that he used to live with them.

The 9 year old took it in her stride at the time. She has concerns now simply because she's old enough to pick up on her dad's alcoholism. She asked if there was a way he could move back in without me having to move out as a result :(

I think if they were splitting now she'd have a much, much harder time processing it.

I was 23 when my parents split and had left home with my own family, my sister was 19 at home and it affected her quite a lot she still mentions it now years later. My DC were 2, 6 and 10 when i split with their dad, the 2 yr old cannot remember living with him and was fine the 10 year old was old enough to understand but the 6 year old took it badly. But that could be down to his personality type rather than his age. My friend has just split and her DS is 6 his behaviour went downhill for a few months but he is ok now.

I was 15 just before my GCSEs, my sisters were 17 and 14. Really mess with all of us, although we all knew from an early age they’d split it did rock the boat A LOT. I ended up missing some exams out of sheer anger, older sis started doing drugs.. was pretty awful.

I’m now in the process of leaving my P and DD is 11 months.

Thanks everyone. That’s really helpful. So the consensus is to do it earlier rather than later.

The other problem, which is purely from a selfish perspective, is that I adore my children and don’t want to only see them 50% of the time. These early years are so special, I don’t want to miss spending time with them.

Lots to think about.

My parents told me they were divorcing 2 days before my exams (O Levels)! Wished they had done it a lot earlier. My exam results were very poor.

As far as the children are concerned I think it is the younger the better BUT there is a balance.

I knew my marriage wasn't forever between 4 and 5 years before we split. We split when the children were 8 and 9. in hindsight it should have been a year or two earlier - as soon as both were full time at school. (this was before any paid preschool stuff).

I think there is a window, to an extent, between settled in full time school and early 'last year in juniors'.

They are old enough to not need personal care re. feeding, dressing and basic bathing/showering.

They are young enough (mostly) to be unaware of the sexual implications.

BUT at any age
They are better if parents don't stay together for 'their' benefit
They are better without parents who argue or where there is constant tension or atmosphere or 'walking on eggshells' to avoid upsetting the partner.
They are better with parents who are happier apart than together.
They are better not having negative role models of either sex.
They are better when parents do not vilify the other parent (no matter what the justification)

And splitting up is definitely better if one parent is abusive of the other however this is portrayed