Living/ staying together for sake of the kids

Purpleplanet564 · 2023-08-19T08:11:03+00:00

I was wondering if anyone who stayed with OH for the sake of the kids could share their experiences please?

AuntieStella · 19/08/2023 09:14

This will only work if you both are fully committed to the idea of restoring healthy family relationships, especially a harmonious, functioning, loving and affectionate relationship between the parents

So are you both going to do the work that's necessary to make it happen? What is the current plan?

RaidFlySpray · 19/08/2023 09:19

I did it for a while, as did my parents. It wasn't great. At the end of the day, your relationship is the model for your kids' future relationships, so I think you have to ask yourself whether you'd want your kids to be in a marriage like yours.

middleager · 19/08/2023 09:21

My parwnts did it and I did it. My advice is don't do it. You may think you areputting up a great pretence - and me and DH rarely fell out, good friends etc, but we couldn't model love and affection.
We served the kids. Then one day I woke up, was 50, kids nearly off to uni with their own lives and I realised I'dlost years of my own life, I was so busy prioritising the kids, when actually they might have preferred to see me truly happy.

bluecrayola · 19/08/2023 09:26

So what did you do, @middleager - and are you happy now?

MillWood85 · 19/08/2023 09:34

It's fine to raise kids in separate households with happier parents. In fact that's probably better for them than a stressed/unhappy single household where Mum and Dad are miserable with each other.

My parents bounced through repeated affairs - it wasn't all roses round the door, and I really struggled to form an adult relationship myself as a result.

Original poster

Purpleplanet564 · 19/08/2023 09:48

I think the problem is me not my OH. He wants to get married and thinks we will be together forever. I’m just not sure, there’s a been instances recently making me think otherwise.

OP posts:

Disturbia81 · 19/08/2023 12:01

Don't. Do. It.

AgentJohnson · 20/08/2023 00:37

Oh, so your partner doesn’t know you are staying just for he kids? Why would you do that to them?

Your thread title is disingenuous, you are not staying for the kids, you’re staying for your own convenience.

Mezmer · 01/09/2023 06:31

middleager · 19/08/2023 09:21

My parwnts did it and I did it. My advice is don't do it. You may think you areputting up a great pretence - and me and DH rarely fell out, good friends etc, but we couldn't model love and affection.
We served the kids. Then one day I woke up, was 50, kids nearly off to uni with their own lives and I realised I'dlost years of my own life, I was so busy prioritising the kids, when actually they might have preferred to see me truly happy.

Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do though, as soon as you have children? Put them first, or the family first? As soon as you have children your own desires take a second stage. And I say desires rather than needs as it is more accurate: if you have food, shelter and warmth then your needs are being met. I have never met kids from a broken family who have not or are who not suffering in some way. Kids shrug things off and are resilient but they are also the masters of just burying pain and sucking things up. They aren’t sophisticated enough to process what is happening to them but it doesn’t mean it’s not having a deep negative effect. I understand completely how hard it is being in a marriage that is stale or below par but there is something to be said for sticking around stoically and seeing it out until the youngest is 18. And I don’t believe you have wasted all those years. You haven’t wasted them, you have devoted them to creating a stable home life for your kids which is what you signed up to do. You should feel a sense of pride in that. Unless one of you in a relationship is committing one of the big ‘sins’ (adultery, abuse, gambling etc) then I think there is a duty to staying together. It’s not forever and there is such a thing as life post 55 where you can perhaps resume focusing on yourself again for the rest of your days having done the right thing while the kids were young.

the7Vabo · 01/09/2023 06:52

Mezmer · 01/09/2023 06:31

Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do though, as soon as you have children? Put them first, or the family first? As soon as you have children your own desires take a second stage. And I say desires rather than needs as it is more accurate: if you have food, shelter and warmth then your needs are being met. I have never met kids from a broken family who have not or are who not suffering in some way. Kids shrug things off and are resilient but they are also the masters of just burying pain and sucking things up. They aren’t sophisticated enough to process what is happening to them but it doesn’t mean it’s not having a deep negative effect. I understand completely how hard it is being in a marriage that is stale or below par but there is something to be said for sticking around stoically and seeing it out until the youngest is 18. And I don’t believe you have wasted all those years. You haven’t wasted them, you have devoted them to creating a stable home life for your kids which is what you signed up to do. You should feel a sense of pride in that. Unless one of you in a relationship is committing one of the big ‘sins’ (adultery, abuse, gambling etc) then I think there is a duty to staying together. It’s not forever and there is such a thing as life post 55 where you can perhaps resume focusing on yourself again for the rest of your days having done the right thing while the kids were young.

Show quote history

I can’t help but agree with this. Kids naturally want their own needs prioritised. They don’t want to deal with two houses, new partners etc. It doesn’t seem like wasted time to me either, it’s giving kids a stable loving home.

AttilaTheMeerkat · 01/09/2023 07:05

But is it really a stable and loving home if there are undercurrents of resentment beneath?. There are many examples on here from adults who wished for their parents to separate when they were much younger because everyone was so unhappy. The adults in mediocre or conflicted marriages are just papering over the cracks and or are kicking the can down the road for their own reasons, they also think that staying is somehow “easier”. But whose sake are the adults here staying for?. It could be argued it’s not for the kids, it’s for their own selves. And as for this idea of leaving when the youngest child is 18?. Not all kids leave home to go to uni then and if they do and their parents decide to separate, that’s another problem for the young person to deal with. Their life has been further destabilised just when they are starting to make their way in the world. These people also know they their parent’s relationship was based on a lie.

the7Vabo · 01/09/2023 11:11

AttilaTheMeerkat · 01/09/2023 07:05

But is it really a stable and loving home if there are undercurrents of resentment beneath?. There are many examples on here from adults who wished for their parents to separate when they were much younger because everyone was so unhappy. The adults in mediocre or conflicted marriages are just papering over the cracks and or are kicking the can down the road for their own reasons, they also think that staying is somehow “easier”. But whose sake are the adults here staying for?. It could be argued it’s not for the kids, it’s for their own selves. And as for this idea of leaving when the youngest child is 18?. Not all kids leave home to go to uni then and if they do and their parents decide to separate, that’s another problem for the young person to deal with. Their life has been further destabilised just when they are starting to make their way in the world. These people also know they their parent’s relationship was based on a lie.

All very good points, no easy answer to this one.