Separating - How to do it the right way

[Wannabegreenfingers]

Hello, this is my first post, but I've been around for a while and commented on other threads.

My husband and I have finally agreed to separate (his instigation), I've tried, but I can't fight for my marriage any longer and need to except it's over. How do we separate without destroying each other and the kids. They are 9&7.

He is a good dad and will be going forward just as I am a good mum. Please tell me how you manage to co parent and keep the children happy? It's very early days and there is no hatred between us, we can be in the same house and spend time in each other's company. I just want to have two well rounded children at the end of the process. I'll be staying in the house with the children x

I’m sorry to hear about your situation. Unfortunately, I’m in an identical place and just don’t know how we do this 🤷🏽‍♀️.

Rubbish isn't it. I really thought we could work through it, but I realised today I've been banging my head against a wall for a very long time. I'm a doer and need to plan for the future, I can't be in limbo, so we mutually agreed that separation was the only way forward. Its not want I want, but for my sanity it's what I need x

We went to Relate to hammer out the specifics. We went in on the basis that the separation was a fact. It was a good space to discuss how we'd do things. Get legal advice independently now though. There's a lot of factors to consider and it's easy to end up rolling over and doing yourself out if what you're entitled to for the sake of an easy life. As I put in an earlier thread what is best and least disruptive for kids is best. That may well be staying in the home they are in now, with you if you've been the primary care giver.

We are a few years on now and yes it is amicable and was managed smoothly so DM me if you want any specific tips. My kids were same age as yours.

Thank you Notsure94

Male poster and my first post too!! Just been through this and with 3 kids! Took us a year to sort the legal stuff out and, i won't lie, there were difficult moments along the way but, wherever possible we tried to be amicable. We agreed most things before we enlisted a mediator, and we did that jointly to keep costs down. It's important to put the kids first and to back each other up when the kids challenge you individually (which they will inevitably do!). The hardest thing for us, and despite living apart now for 5 months it's still difficult, is having the stuff that the kids need at the right house at the right time, we still make frequent trips to each others houses to collect or drop stuff off. I wish you luck, it's not easy, but on a personal level, i'm happier now although i will always feel i let my kids down for not giving them the stability they should have had .

Just be yourself, no putting other parent down in front of kids no playing games dont go against each others word and should be fine.

Be positive sell it as they will have 2 bedrooms etc

I'm divorced and ex and I co parent together on excellent terms.

Never slag off the other parent in front of them, don't use the children as cannon fodder which I'm sure you wouldn't anyway.

Unpopular opinion but neither ex nor I think 50/50 is always in the best interest of the child. We don't do 50/50 custody, I am the resident parent and DS has overnights/weekends with his dad. This is because we wanted DS to have one proper "base" rather than being shafted from one home to the other constantly.

Keep up regular contact with their dad, if DS ever wants to speak to his dad when he is with me he can call him on my phone and vice versa.

I’ve been separated for almost 2 years. My kids were the same age as yours when we separated.

I was just saying yesterday (to my therapist) that when we separated I thought it was about the end of that relationship but what I realise now is that the past two years have been more about changing that relationship. Yes, sorting out the logistics sucks but remember if something is ending you get to build something new.

Thank you everyone. It's good to know that couples can separate and still co parent with love and dignity x

I can only comment from the perspective of having an exhusband who is using our daughter to get at me. She's aware of his strategies and it is very upsetting to her that he is not prepared to just be a loving parent to her because that won't score points against me.
I know you've said you're amicable, but Remind yourselves that you are adults and chose the relationship initially, even if you don't want to split, but the children had no choice.
I would have loved to have used mediation to agree finances and child arrangements but against a history of domestic violence, financial abuse and then immediately weaponising the children (they knew he was moving out because apparently I couldn't be nice to Daddy anymore before I did, nevermind that I'd reached the limit of tolerating his crap) we ended up at court.
Good Luck and give yourselves credit for being proper grown-ups about it!

I'm a couple of weeks down the line so very early days yet here.
First week was awful and suspect other times will be v testing too.
3 children, youngest is 9.

3 children here too...7,7 and 12 ☹️.

I’m in a similar position, we’ve agreed to separate, married 20 years, but been unhappy for a long time. I’ve stayed so long as I felt I should keep trying and didn’t want to cause the kids pain and upheaval, my parents had a very messy angry divorce and I didn’t want my children to have to go through that, instead I’ve realised I’ve put up and shut up and lived with mean, selfish, unhealthy behaviour instead. I’ve finally realised, I deserve better and the best I can do for the kids is for them to see that you should never accept less than you need or deserve and we should all go in search of happiness and peace. We have told the kids last weekend, the youngest was upset , the older two very accepting and not surprised which just proves that even though I thought it was well hidden how bad our relationship was, it was pretty obvious to the older kids.
He is moving out in 2 weeks but at the moment we are still sleeping in the same bed and trying to remain calm and friendly around each other, he is giving me the silent treatment again at the moment though as I asked if he’d look after kids for a weekend in the summer while I go and visit my cousin in York. He moaned that I must have money to waste which led to an argument about who has the least amount of money , he earns 4x my wages and has only agreed to paying half the mortgage and no child maintenance as he can’t afford it, he has a weeks holiday abroad booked with his mates though . Anyway my main priority is the kids , to keep things calm and enable them to see there dad whenever they want , he’s not a hands on father and has never taken responsibility so I think this may be difficult as I don’t think he knows how to organise a day out or holiday with them, or will he even think that he should do this. The most upsetting part of my parents divorce was seeing them hurt each other purposely, mostly with words, sarcasm and spite,this is something I’m trying hard to avoid. I just can’t wait for him to leave at the moment so I can breathe again. As long as you are considering your kids feelings along the way then you are doing the best you can, good luck.

I'm 10 months on from separating in similar sounding circumstances. Kids were 5 and 7 then. I moved out into rented, we share the kids 50/50 and we sold the family home and ex bought a place recently. I'm now buying a place too. So a lot of change for the dc to cope with! And ex and ds are both on the spectrum.

Tbh it's been very up and down. Things are amicable between us but I felt anger and resentment for a while. The kids coped well at first but as we're all settling into having two homes the teething problems become more apparent. As a pp mentioned, I find it frustrating if the stuff they need is at the other home, and we (I) have to regularly reshuffle uniform and clothes. I've always said, and emphasised to my ex, that we will shuttle their current special toys between homes as it's not their choice to split. Most everything else is duplicated.

It's not always easy doing 50/50 but I don't feel I have any more right to time with the kids than their dad. And the kids want to spend equal time with both of us. We try to be flexible without making it unsettled for the kids.

My advice? Strap in for a roller-coaster of emotions. Draw on all your support network so you can be as okay for the kids as possible. Allow all of you to have whatever emotions come up. Emphasise that you love them no matter what - I found books great for this especially Mum and Dad Glue. Oh and we also drafted up a parenting agreement using a template on amicable's website. We haven't ended up using it much but it gave us pointers as to what to think about.

Good luck

Gosh, so many of us in such similar circumstances. Big hugs to everyone x

I married for life (probably naively), but it's not to be. There isn't anyone else on either side, but my husband is a serial manonogmist so I dont think it will be long before the next Mrs X, will be lined up. I truely hope I'm wrong and that he uses this time to work on himself as i am, but i understand that i dont have any say over this, so time will tell.

I'm a blubbing mess, but thankfully work have given me the rest of the week off. I'm trying to go with the emotions rather then suppressing them. I keep telling myself a day at a time x

My ex got together with someone else pretty quick. She is at least autistic as well apparently so maybe it'll work. I'm his 2nd marriage...

I was in shock for a good couple of months and felt lots of physical adrenalin and panicky feelings when alone. I cried probably at least every other day. But it reduced until it was weekly then fortnightly and now it can be a month without crying. Those extremes of emotion have been replaced with a general feeling of sadness, but I think that's healthy and part of the process.

Be kind to yourself

If you know in your heart that he is a good dad, trust him when he has the children. As others have said, don't bad mouth him. I can honestly say it probably took me 9 years to truly be over my ex (and I re married in that time). Remember that he will not always tell you the truth. It is very sad when some one loses love for another but if it's gone, it's gone. I'm so sorry you are going through this - give yourself time to grieve and heal. I am 16 years down the line and he feels almost like a brother to me now. We have a shared past and will always be connected through our son. Remember you loved him once.

I kept busy today doing a big clean, but then had to do a food shop and was a wreck. I take beta blockers for the physical effects of anxiety and maxed out my dose around the super market. Home feels like a safe space (feels ridiculous to say that when I'm over 40!)

Leah2005 - sounds like you went through the mill, pleased that you are now remarried and have managed to move on x

Thank you. You'll get there. I didn't spend 9 years crying but he was often in my thoughts. Be kind to yourself.

I was honest with DD from the start. Her Dad and I love her but don’t want to live together and be married to each other anymore. We both said the same and never wavered so she became accustomed to the idea fairly quickly. I comforted her when she cried about it and accepted that it was a huge upsetting upheaval for her.

Ex and I never argued in front of her (in fact we didn’t argue much at all). We agreed to sell the house and split assets equally and that contact arrangements should be built around DD. We tried a couple of patterns and listened to what she wanted before settling on one that works. We are both flexible in accommodating any changes.

We occasionally drink a coffee at handover and will help one another out when in a fix but we found a “family day out” didn’t work. After all we got divorced because we didn’t enjoy one another’s company anymore and that seeps through after about 30mins together.

We do parents eve together, school plays, DD birthday party etc...

She took 6 months to fully settle and is happier now (15 months on) than she was living with us as an unhappy couple. She loves double Xmas and double birthday. She loves our new house and her new Daddy house.

It was surprisingly easy - we were just kind to one another. Neither of us had an axe to grind or wanted to hurt the other so when in doubt we chose the “kind” option. I don’t love him anymore but he is a good Dad and a really decent human being.

I'm just over a year into this.

It was me that wanted the split but to the DCs, we said it was both of us that wanted it. That way they couldn't blame one of us.

Don't live together any longer than you have to. Our split was amicable but we had to live together for 6 months and it was awful. We had a couple of big rows, which wasn't like us, and I saw a different side to him.

Ex likes to play the martyr. DCs feel sorry for him as he has shown them he's upset and seems incapable of putting on a normal tone of voice and often sounds a bit sad and pathetic. DCs have absolutely picked up on this and I can see what it's doing to them. Both of you putting on a game face as much as possible is best. Children take on parent's problems and will worry endlessly. A friend of mine is also going through it and the guilt one of her DCs feels because of the guilt tripping shit her dad comes out with is awful.

Luckily ex and I sorted all the finances and we agreed so no arguments there. I stayed in the family home with the DCs so stability for them.

I also don't agree with 50/50. I think this is purely for dad's interests, not children's.

DCs see ex and I talk briefly sometimes when he picks them up or drops them off. He also came over at Christmas but that's not something I'm getting into a habit of doing.

There isn't any ill feelings between us which is good, just an air of awkwardness.

I've been surprised at how quickly they did adapt. It was worse when ex still lived here. DCs got more and more unsettled the longer it went on even though they were told from the beginning when it would happen. Once he left and I told them the new routine (I wrote a copy for each of them and they pinned it up in their rooms) they just accepted it and got used to it.

They still say they would like us to get back together occasionally but they know it won't happen. They also know I'm a lot happier, less grumpy and far less shouty at home. Unfortunately I don't think I can say the same for ex and youngest is starting to struggle when she goes over and a few things she's said makes me think she isn't always happy there. All I can do is try and create a calm and stable environment at home and hope this will see them through. I do think it would have been easier if my eldest had been a bit younger. My youngest has adapted much more easily.

How are you doing Wannabegreenfingers?

Its been just over 2 weeks and I feel I’ve turned a little corner, no longer crying all the time. I’m going back to work tomorrow.

In all honesty it bit multi personality. Upset one minute, busy and manic another. We told the kids today, was really hard, but a day at a time with them. Hes not actually moving out for another two weeks.

I'm glad you're feeling better and that there is light at the end of the tunnel x

2 weeks isn't bad. I did 6 months before he moved out! It wasn't fun.

I'm really encouraged reading all the responses here. It sounds like most of you have managed to make it work. I'm driving myself mad mulling over all the possibilities of going through with telling dh I don't want to be together anymore, and I just feel as if it's going to be too hard. In fact I spend every day with my mind flipping between 'I have to do it' and 'I just can't do it' a million times a day. We had another talk at the weekend and he blames me for creating a bad atmosphere in the house by being miserable all the time. Well, that's because I am so sad about how I feel! When he's not there I feel so relieved and 100% happier. He's away tonight and I am so looking forward to having a nice cuddly eveing with my two boys. It's utterly clear what I have to do. I can't live the rest of my life looking forward to my husband not being in the house can I....