Honestly, is it better to just make do when the kids are so young?

[Genuinity]

Obviously not including violence, emotional or physical abuse. If you just realise you aren't in love, that this isn't the person for you, that it just isn't right for you.

Are you more likely to regret leaving and losing your kids 50% of the time, missing some birthdays and christmases, taking that family unit and home away from them? Or are you likely to regret staying and look back in a decade and think I wish I'd left sooner?

Part of me thinks life is too bloody short to be with someone you don't love. But the other part of me thinks that with kids so young there's more to lose than their is to gain, and essentially by leaving to find a better relationship I'm picking hypothetical men over them? Has anyone come out the other side of this, or have any experience/wise words they'd like to share?

It's really just so hard. I know the relationship isn't right but this feeling that sinks in when I think I'm really leaving this time terrifies me. As much as is wrong between us this is my partner, this is our family, our house, ours kids, our pets. Our sons love their nursery. They have a nice home. Enough money. It's so hard to actually ruin it all for my own selfish gain

Given what you have described i would ultimately leave.

I agree with @Nyxly's points
A key consideration for me would be finances. If you arent married things may be v difficult. Given your age and 2 under 3 i imagine you havent had a chance to establish a career. I would make this a priority and aim to slowly start to exit the relationship "officially" in the next couple of years.

This thread is an interesting split.

Although those of us who are saying 'leave now' are saying it from experience.

Can anyone who is saying 'stay for the children' detail please if that's from their own experience, or just what they think from the outside looking in?

I recommend keeping a brief diary where you mark "b" bad and "g" for good etc, against each day. Then tot up each week or month to see whether you are overall happy or having bad days. That might help you decide your cut-off point. The age of your children will be a big input. Young children and babies play hell on a relationship. Sleep, lack of time for self-care plus partner time. If you were massively in love before, I'd try to be patient.

My parents stayed together 'for the children'. I had absolutely no idea growing up that they weren't an average married couple. Me and my sibling had a stable happy childhood with non of the crap my children have to deal with of split parents, a new stepmum, back and forth between houses, missing me or him at any given time. Once we were adults and I had my own marital woes my mum shared with me that they'd been fairly unhappy but splitting just wasn't what you did. They are now in their 70s and I think happier now. They've supported each other through ill health and worked out a way to remain stable and content. They took the 'for better or worse' thing seriously and I will always be very grateful to them.

Although I don't think OP should "leave now" I'm not saying "stay indefinitely" either.

I think it's a very common thing for couples to lose their spark and to be snipey with each other when they have two young children who are close together in age and they're up to their necks in teething, sleepless nights and nappies. I think a lot of individuals/couples don't feel particularly zesty and on top of the world during that phase, and I'm speaking from experience. It can be a real slog.

So IMO OP should give it a bit of time and invest in some relationship counselling. At least if she decides to walk away she can do it knowing it was the right decision.

This clearly isn't just the small kids & exhaustion ennui that often happens when they are young.

This relationship seems fundamentally flawed. The age gap is a real problem, and the OP was incredibly young when they got together. Having matured, it's clear this is not the relationship and future that she wants.

OP, at 26, I really would be making plans to leave. Yes, the process will be hard, but ultimately you deserve to build the life you want.

And the constant sniping is hellish for kids - my parents didn't spilt up until they were in their 70s and two of the most unhappy people on Earth. I wish so much they had spilt decades earlier - they weren't happy together and in the end lived very miserable lives.

But, @HugeAckmansWife
There's no guarantee that split parenting would be crap though. I'd say ours is fairly good. We're amicable, spend christmases etc together, on the same page parenting wise, plus our dc have more quality time with my ex now as he actually does things with them now as he sees them less. We both keep our dating life separate and will do probably until they're adults. It just all depends on so many things.

I left my xh when dc were 4&5. Now 4 years down the line we have a really healthy family dynamic, we run businesses together, have holidayed and are holidaying at new year together, we've always spent Christmas and birthdays together, hell, I even moved in during the first lockdown!

BUT neither of us have had another relationship. We've both had flings, FWB, but I think it would be very difficult to sustain what we have with new partners involved. I'm not fussed, everything I fo is for my dc and they have 2 happy houses, see their parents getting on for the most part and barely remember life before we split. Don't underestimate both your dc resilience and your own happiness

I called time on my marriage after 7 years. What you describe is ultimately what ours had become. I felt life was too short to be unhappy in a marriage. At the time our DC were 5 & 2 years old.

It was an amicable split and despite some bumps along the road it was the best decision. I don't regret a thing. It's funny how life turns out. He originally had them 2 nights during the week and every other weekend. He was (naturally) devastated at the thought of not living with them full time.

Fast forward 9 years and he now has them 4 nights a month! His life has moved on hugely and the children have sadly become less of a priority. They still have a good relationship with him albeit minimal. He recently remarried someone who is significantly younger and doesn't have children.

As for me. I met a lovely partner 3 years ago who has a DC from his previous marriage. Together we had a surprise baby together! We are all very happy in our lives.

Our children don't really remember a time when me and their dad were together, certainly the youngest.

No one can tell you what the right decision is in your circumstances. All I would say is life really is too short - I was 33 when we split so in comparison you could have a whole new life waiting for you.

We never know what is around the corner and our happiness must be taken into account.

Good luck OP. 💐

Is being comfortable a form of love? As in, I definitely don't feel in love, passionate, intimately connected to him. I don't feel sexually towards him.

But we are so comfortable. I can sit on the sofa with him every evening and enjoy his company even though we are just watching tv. He's a good companion even though we do argue.

It still doesn't make me see him sexually. He is a brilliant dad and I love seeing him in that light, but again it doesn't make me want him?

I do fantasise about meeting other people, and have had my head turned although haven't acted on it multiple times. I just don't know what to do.

I don’t think it’s reasonable to give up 50% of your kids in the hope of meeting an imaginary man who may not exist. After you have kids they are the big picture and you are merely the frame. You made your bed and you have to lie in it.

@Ryannah

I don’t think it’s reasonable to give up 50% of your kids in the hope of meeting an imaginary man who may not exist. After you have kids they are the big picture and you are merely the frame. You made your bed and you have to lie in it.

I don't disagree. It's just a scary prospect having my entire life decided by a decision I made at 21.

It's not your entire life OP, though I understand it may feel like that now. At 46 your children will be in their 20s and no longer at home and you will have half your life left to live as you please.

I promise you everything from 30 goes very quickly indeed.

I'm 39 and have a one year old, so if you were my age I would totally understand that sentiment. But even if you stay only 10 years you have the majority of your working and social life left ahead of you.

And in those 10 years you may feel differently anyway.

He says he really wants to try so have you tried getting external support eg counselling?

Ps: I don't really believe anyone feels sexual in the first few years after giving birth. In generating life and sustaining it, caring for it, your body is just doing a while different thing at the moment.

It will been MUCH better for the children to separate while they are so young than to wait until they are 8/12/16...
I know you're worried about the impact on them and losing time with them but if a separation is inevitable (and it sounds very much like it is) then do it before they will be too impacted.

Do NOT listen to people saying you've made your bed and have to lie in it. That's absurd, misogynistic, old fashioned nonsense. But you do have a responsibility to make it as easy as possible for the children and that in my opinion means being brave and doing it while they are young.

@YukoandHiro

Ps: I don't really believe anyone feels sexual in the first few years after giving birth. In generating life and sustaining it, caring for it, your body is just doing a while different thing at the moment.

Rubbish Lots of women still fancy their partners after giving birth. Don't gaslight the OP. She has said she isn't in love with him; that's not a hormones after babies thing. The man pursued her when she was 21 and he was almost 40. It's hardly surprising she's outgrown him.

My parents were married for 42 years before one passed away. They had huge fights and blow ups when we were younger, and dad would threaten to divorce mum. But they never actually separated. And once we got older, more independent and finally left home, things got better for them.

I honestly think the stress of raising a family along side other issues was the cause of their problems. As children my sib and I would just wish they would just divorce.

I guess my answer if, if you're not in an abusive relationship but one with lots of general conflict, is it better or worse for the children to stay?

If you can show your children how to deal with arguments and conflict successfully, then there is hope for everyone. If they learn just to suppress their feelings instead of dealing with them, maybe not so much.

My fiancé left when DS turned 9 months. I hadn't been happy either but I believe we should've made do and once DS became a bit easier (which he is now at 13 months) we could've worked on us.

He did me a favour in a way because I wasn't happy, and now we co-parent really well, but it's very sad. Plus I want another baby but obviously isn't going to happen now.

Only you can make the decision.

I think it's very easy to become disconnected from your relationship when you have a busy work a d family life. I don't think it necessarily signifies that the relationship has to be over. However, in your case you are still so young that I suspect you are always going to have a sense of missing out on something which might mean leaving would be the better option.

It's a fair point about good and bad coparenting and one thing I can say for certain is that you're far more likely to do it well if you mutually agree to separate rater than you (or him) acting on your 'head turn' and ending up with the fallout of an affair. It's clear on here there is no one right answer. Only you can know the pros and cons of the status quo and exactly how it makes you feel. Personally, I'd have settled for tolerably comfortable if dull, if it meant m kids were spared the shit show of my divorce, but ex ran off with OW so I didn't get a choice. At 26 you could start afresh at 40 with a lot of life still to live with kids pretty much adults. You could use the intervening years to build a solid career so you can be comfortably independent in the end and if your feelings change in the meantime, you may end up staying.. Though I suspect the age gap will become more of a problem.

Thing is, if you stay together, you may well come to actually dislike and resent your dh, and that'll turn into a toxic environment for your children. And you can't guarantee he will be happy to stay in this exact situation forever - while he might be OK as is now, he may well become dissatisfied or bitter himself.

Plus you run the risk of having your head turned by someone else and it all becoming extremely messy and bitter. Or vice versa.

You're too young to give up decades of life to the altar of a fake nuclear family.

It's not to the children's benefit to see an unaffectionate, distant marriage as the norm. Would you be happy for them to replicate this in their own futures?

And the chances are, you wouldn't do 50/50. And while they're young, they'll adapt more easily.

We were like this, and then there was an incident that forced my hand and although I wouldn't wish that on anyone, it does somehow make the separation more acceptable. So I really do feel for you.

One thing that swung it for me was I considered what type of relationship we were modelling to our kids. They didn't see warmth and affection, just perfunctory interactions.

All roads are hard. The concern I have for you is that if you just suck it up and continue, eventually you'll arrive at your own 'incident' which may be really damaging for everyone.

Why did you settle down at 21? Do you understand your motivations then? It might help to assess what is happening now.

I left when my kids were 4 & 6, but not before we had gone through lots of counselling, and I'd been clear on what changes I needed (to stay).

It wasn't an amicable split but we're now in a really good place and I have never regretted leaving.

We show up differently when we're unfulfilled in a relationship and our kids pick up a lot more than we know. We're also their main role models for what to expect/give in a relationship and I wanted more than I had - for my kids too.

We have a shared care arrangement and our kids are thriving.

They are experiencing much happier parents and homes; and thanks to our shared care arrangement, their dad is much more involved (than he ever was when we were married) so they're closer than they would've been.

It's taken time but I've also managed to rebuild my life and a nicer home (than we had at the start of the divorce) largely because the shared care arrangement has offered me time/space to build up my career.

At your age, I definitely wouldn't stay in an unhappy marriage but I would do everything I can (as long as he's committed to the process too) to see if we could make it work. If we're not able to make the changes needed to get us happy, I would move on and not raise children in a marriage that isn't happy.

No two circumstances are the same and as a starting point, I would recommend that you get some professional support for your marriage and then see where that takes you. Don't leave without knowing you tried your best and were clear on what changes you needed. Best wishes