Looking for Advice - How to tell your child you are separating

[wornoutandfedup]

Morning everyone, as the title says I am looking for some advice on how to tell our 11 year old daughter that we are separating.

Following the discovery of my husbands use of 'Illicit Encounters' website whilst my father was terminally ill (and continued afterwards), I feel that the boundary has been crossed and try as I might it is inconceivable that I can ever trust him again. His 'explanation' - I pushed him away whilst Dad was ill.

We have managed not to argue in front of DD, apart from one quick outburst. However DD is an intelligent little girl and knows things aren't quite right. We have agreed that we will need to tell her together, and have a 'no blame' approach. DD idolises her Dad, and I am terrified that she will hate me when she gets this news.

I am utterly depessed at the thought of breaking this news to her and just cannot seem to 'find' the words. Can anyone help please?

Thanks

There is no easy way to do this. When I broke up with my first wife, we sat our two daughters down and I told them - something along the lines of "you know Mummy and Daddy haven't been getting along for a while. We've decided that Daddy is going to move out." A week or two later I took them to see the house where I was going to live and they helped me get it ready for moving in. If I had to do it again I would do it the same way - short with the minimum details and as matter of fact as possible.

Your DD will be upset. She may be aware things aren't quite right but she may be in denial about it, believing that you and your husband will sort things out. There is no telling how it will affect her. One of my daughters was very upset at the time, went through a period of blaming me, then went through a period of blaming her mother and is now fine. The other seemed to cope better at the time but it has seriously affected her. Your daughter may well go through periods of hating you. She may equally go through periods of hating her Dad, even though she idolises him at the moment.

The only thing I would say from experience is that you need to be VERY sure that this is what you want. I was surprised how quickly separation turned into getting divorced and, although I am now ecstatically happy with my new wife, I do have regrets about how my first marriage ended, particularly because of the effect it had on my daughters.

Have you been to any form of relationship counselling together?

I'm not attempting to advise you on your relationship here. I don't know what he actually did on Illicit Encounters. If he simply posted a profile (which is free) but didn't contact anyone (which costs at least £129 for men - I just checked!) then that is rather different from meeting/sleeping with someone. But only you know what he did and only you can judge whether or not you can live with it.

P.S. As you might have gathered, I'm a Dad, not a Mum. Feel free to dismiss everything I say on the grounds that I'm a man!

I agree with prh. How long is it since your dad died? If it's very recent, I would avoid taking any dramatic steps for a while. You can always separate later.

Thanks for your replies.

In terms of what he did on IE - he was a paid up member for 10 months (approx £1300), and slept with at least three women. He met many others (can't remember all their names apparently) who either he chose not to sleep with, or they chose not to sleep with him. In my eyes, he has therefore paid for sex. I cannot live with the knowledge that he was 1) doing this when I needed him the most 2) Paid for sex 3) regularly lied to me about having to 'work away'.

Dad died in Sept 08. I discovered my H's activities on 21/04/09. As I had been helping my Mum deal with the practicalities that follow a death I hadn't had a chance to grieve fully for Dad, and therefore this whole sordid mess has stopped me from moving on in that process.

We have had couple counselling.

The thought of staying with this liar and cheat makes me utterly depressed, yet the thought of telling my gorgeous DD that we are separating scares me beyoned belief.

In that case I can understand you wanting to leave. I am so sorry.

I stand by my original advice - there is no easy way of telling your DD. I would keep it simple and matter of fact.

She is likely at some point to want to know who to blame. I would strongly recommend not getting drawn into that, however strongly you feel.

Good luck and I hope things work out for you.

That must have been an incredibly painful situation.

There are some books and websites that might help. Have a look here and here

Good luck.

You're doing the right thing Wornout, your H sounds weak and cruel. My ex and I separated over 3 years ago, DD was then just 7 and is now 10.

We just told her mummy and daddy weren't going to live together anymore but that we both loved her and would both still be there etc etc. And we have been, we live close to eachother and have a strong and amicable relationship (but it was dreadful at first)and she is secure and feels loved.

It'll be more complicated for you because your DD is 11 but I think prh is right when he says keep it simple. My DD idolises her dad too but she didn't hate me, far from it.
I think a lot of girls worship their dads, even more maybe if they're an only child, but there is nothing like mother-love.

The good thing is, you and H seem to be able to co-operate in terms of being good parents to your child. If you can carry on doing this whilst you separate and after, your DD will be fine. It might even make her wiser, my DD is a lovely little girl still but with an underlying wisdom that belies her years. She also has great empathy and is concerned for both mine and her father's happiness.