Tell me what divorce will be like

[Anonymous]

Divorces affect kids, high school students, college students
and young adults of all ages.

Parents are in pretty major denial in thinking a divorce will
not affect kids to young adults (20 somethings).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You are worried about dating? I would be worried about my kids

I am about to be divorced - as in, papers are signed and filed, STBX has bought a new place and will move out soon, and we are about to tell the kids - and yeah dating is the farthest thing from my mind now. Breaks my heart to think of the bomb we're going to drop on the kids. Think it will be a surprise because we have not had any overt conflicts in front of them.

So, why are you doing this to them? Serious question.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Divorces affect kids, high school students, college students
and young adults of all ages.

Parents are in pretty major denial in thinking a divorce will
not affect kids to young adults (20 somethings).

So what are you supposed to do if behavior has emerged in your marriage that is intolerable?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Divorces affect kids, high school students, college students
and young adults of all ages.

Parents are in pretty major denial in thinking a divorce will
not affect kids to young adults (20 somethings).

So what are you supposed to do if behavior has emerged in your marriage that is intolerable?

Divorce with your eyes open to the impact and parent your children in a way that takes it into account.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wife wanted divorce and here is what it looks like 10 year out...

1. kids are REALLY messed up:
Daughter went from talking about being a doctor pre-divorce to a suicidal cutter in therapy with low self esteem at about the 5 year mark.
Son who participated in MATHCOUTS and went to a STEM focus high school refused to take the SATs or fill out applications for college got fired from his summer job and is just working at fast food and still doesn't have a drivers license.

2. Years spent in court.
Ex decided to break custody agreement and not allow me to have access and possession of the kids.
Several years of being in court and "winning" only to have her NEVER comply with the court orders and NEVER get any sanctions. I haven't had access to my kids except on the phone for about 5 years. I believe this is a major factor in the kids outcomes.

3. Financially it was devastating. I earn in the top 5% so I'm not doing well by DCUM standards. I'll never be able to retire.

4. It also upended my career and I'm earning less money than pre-divorce. Post divorce I took a job without travel and allows me to work at home so that I could have access and possession of my kids. See item 2 above so this didn't help.

5. As for dating, I didn't date for about 1.5 years. The first 9 months I was very upset and depressed. I think that it took several years to start to heal but I miss my kids EVERY SINGLE DAY.

6. I did date and re-marry at about the 7-8 year mark. I think that if I had not been so damaged by the divorce I would have had much more "fun" in the dating market but simply was not in the dating mindset much of the time. There were too many other worries and concerns. When I did date/marry I married someone that is taller, thinner, younger, and prettier than my ex so there is that...

There were a few never married AND divorced women that lost interest after finding out that I was divorced. They were usually concerned about dealing with and ex but MORE PARTICULARLY concerned about child support payment obligations. There was also a few that were stepping out into the dating pool but never really jumped in because of their own kid obligations. Bottom line is that people say they love kids but the truth is that they love their own kids not other peoples kids.


In conclusion: because OP is already talking about dating as she is considering divorce it looks like she has bought into the divorce lie hook, line, and sinker...

Thank you for posting. This is a very realistic scenario.

There's not a single thing realistic about it. PP's wife is a horrible shrew, his children are extremely emotionally harmed, he refused to do anything about it, was forced to take a giant paycut to take a non-travel job (even after his wife refused any custody of the kids), then he magically married a thinner, prettier woman at the 7/8 year mark! This guy is a toxic loser, 100%.

No. YOU, PP, are the 100% toxic loser if you can't see what is going on here. Twenty bucks says you're trying to justify your own affair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will be the booty call of lots of a$$holes you will find online. You will certainly catch HPV.

You will not get married again, unless you find a man in the same situation as you. Your next spouse will probably be 15 years older than you or more.

You will be doing the childcaring on your own. Your kids will get messed up and need therapy. Your DH will move on and have a new family.

Your HHI will be impacted. It is rough out there.

PP here. I got HPV from my husband. 50% of women get it by age 50. Not a big deal.
Who cares about getting remarried? Never again.
50/50 custody—I will be doing less childcare, actually
Kids will not need therapy. They will be fine. Their life will not change that much.
(I am messed up from parents who stayed married in a terrible marriage.)
DH is done with kids. Unlikely to remarry ever: but if he does, I am ok with it. He will get a prenup to protect kids’ assets.
Who cares about HHI? Yes, it will be less. But I am 40% of the wealth. My quality of life will decrease. It is worth the emotional cost of staying in a marriage wasting more years that will ultimately end in divorce anyway.

You are making huge assumptions about divorce that are not universally true.

LOL, you think you can tell in advance that they won't need therapy? What a joke. Nobody can predict that. And double LOL to the idea your DH and his new wife will agree to a prenup. New wives look out for their own children first. It is you making huge assumptions!

Neither of us is interested in remarrying ever. He would also never marry anyone with children and he does not want more children. My kids will not need therapy. Their lives will hardly change at all. Only difference is that they will spend time with us separately. We will be nesting for a few years. They have never known us to share a bedroom. Not much will change.

Oh honey. You are in denial. Do not believe what your STBX says! He is telling you what you want to hear so that you won't try to lock down money for the kids. They will definitelt need therapy, because their mother is delusional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will be the booty call of lots of a$$holes you will find online. You will certainly catch HPV.

You will not get married again, unless you find a man in the same situation as you. Your next spouse will probably be 15 years older than you or more.

You will be doing the childcaring on your own. Your kids will get messed up and need therapy. Your DH will move on and have a new family.

Your HHI will be impacted. It is rough out there.

PP here. I got HPV from my husband. 50% of women get it by age 50. Not a big deal.
Who cares about getting remarried? Never again.
50/50 custody—I will be doing less childcare, actually
Kids will not need therapy. They will be fine. Their life will not change that much.
(I am messed up from parents who stayed married in a terrible marriage.)
DH is done with kids. Unlikely to remarry ever: but if he does, I am ok with it. He will get a prenup to protect kids’ assets.
Who cares about HHI? Yes, it will be less. But I am 40% of the wealth. My quality of life will decrease. It is worth the emotional cost of staying in a marriage wasting more years that will ultimately end in divorce anyway.

You are making huge assumptions about divorce that are not universally true.

LOL, you think you can tell in advance that they won't need therapy? What a joke. Nobody can predict that. And double LOL to the idea your DH and his new wife will agree to a prenup. New wives look out for their own children first. It is you making huge assumptions!

Neither of us is interested in remarrying ever. He would also never marry anyone with children and he does not want more children. My kids will not need therapy. Their lives will hardly change at all. Only difference is that they will spend time with us separately. We will be nesting for a few years. They have never known us to share a bedroom. Not much will change.

Take a look at "The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce".

Basically, everyone thinks what you have bolded here... but it is simply not true.

It is true we’ve been living like this for years. My kids are not gonna know any difference of whether were married or divorced except I’m not there three nights a week. That’s like a work trip. Both of my parents were absentee parent and they were married. I can assure you that my kids will see us both more than I ever saw in my absence he married parents and will be so much better off regardless of a divorce or not. The problem with you divorce disaster posters is that you automatically assume that all marriages are the same and they are good to begin with. What a marriage is never really good or normal it’s not that big of a deal to get a divorce because often times it’s better than staying married and the marriage when the kids see a bad example of what a marriage looks like. You’re not gonna see any kind of decline in affection or hanging out or having dates or spending holidays together blah blah blah we have not been doing that for years. It’s time to stop pretending. Only difference is that mommy and daddy won’t be husband and wife anymore and will be legally single. It’s not some big traumatic transition they’re staying in the same house.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I got divorced 20 years ago after 25 years married. I'll tell you what it's like, it's great. My husband wasn't all that bad but I knew it was time for a divorce. I did wait until my kids were both out of high school so I did not experience, or force them to experience, the trauma of divorce with young kids. Good luck OP.

The trauma is worse for teens and college students

I can understand teens, but college students? Come on. You're an adult, you have sexual and relationship experience, you should be able to "get" why these things happen. Also, you're out of the house, so it's not affecting your daily life like it does for kids still living at home (e.g., now going back and forth between two houses).

Are you kidding me? You actually expect a 20/ 21 year old college student to "get" why his/ her family crumbled after all these years? You equate his/ her little relationship experience with understanding the complicated emotional messes of people of his/ her parents' generation?

No way.

And yes, it may not affect you deeply every single day like it would have if you were still living at home, but believe me, the emotional impact of the devastation of the home you thought you had, behind you and supporting you, not being there, can be just as catastrophic. And I don't use that word lightly.

[Anonymous]

I'm four years out from papers signed, and it is only last year that I didn't get nauseous thinking about the whole mess. I finally invited the two of them over for dinner over Christmas and reached some level of peace (they met after the divorce but I still found it difficult to see him so happy and me still alone.) It's kind of awful, worse than I expected, but I'm still working through it. Never had great self-esteem, and what I had was undermined during the marriage. One of my kids did great, the other is floundering and unavailable to me.
Divorce is not for the faint-hearted. I did my ex a huge favor -- he's very happy, so there's that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've read every page of this thread and feel like something is missing in the "divorce messes up the kids" discussion. In every example cited, the divorce sounds like it was contentious (moving kids multiple times across the country to avoid their father - that's an extreme case, but JFC). Custody battles, badmouthing...of course that's terrible for anyone near the couple.

I feel like it's not the divorce that messes up the kids. It's how the ex-spouses handle their divorce and post-divorce co-parenting.

No. It's the divorce itself. Human beings are wired to need a sense of security, which throughout all of history has been in the form of a mother and father raising them in an intact home. Just because some of you like to think you are so far beyond that now doesn't make it the reality at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will be the booty call of lots of a$$holes you will find online. You will certainly catch HPV.

You will not get married again, unless you find a man in the same situation as you. Your next spouse will probably be 15 years older than you or more.

You will be doing the childcaring on your own. Your kids will get messed up and need therapy. Your DH will move on and have a new family.

Your HHI will be impacted. It is rough out there.

PP here. I got HPV from my husband. 50% of women get it by age 50. Not a big deal.
Who cares about getting remarried? Never again.
50/50 custody—I will be doing less childcare, actually
Kids will not need therapy. They will be fine. Their life will not change that much.
(I am messed up from parents who stayed married in a terrible marriage.)
DH is done with kids. Unlikely to remarry ever: but if he does, I am ok with it. He will get a prenup to protect kids’ assets.
Who cares about HHI? Yes, it will be less. But I am 40% of the wealth. My quality of life will decrease. It is worth the emotional cost of staying in a marriage wasting more years that will ultimately end in divorce anyway.

You are making huge assumptions about divorce that are not universally true.

I am seriously worried for your children. Your cavalier "their life will not change that much, therefore they will be fine" attitude is horrifying.

[Anonymous]

One thing that people getting divorced should realize is, you can no longer be as close to the kids. They will not want to hear anything negative about your spouse even if they are struggling with the same issues you had with the spouse. They will not want to tell you what they do with the other parent or anything about their experience with the new parent because they don't want to hurt your feelings. Half of their life is off-limits to you, because they're afraid they'll be caught in the middle. It's really a bummer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Divorces affect kids, high school students, college students
and young adults of all ages.

Parents are in pretty major denial in thinking a divorce will
not affect kids to young adults (20 somethings).

So what are you supposed to do if behavior has emerged in your marriage that is intolerable?

What kind of behavior? You have to be more specific than that. As a PP said, divorce is for one of the 3 A's ONLY: Abuse (and I mean physical or serious, ongoing verbal abuse; not, "he said some things that hurt my feelings); Addictions; Adultery.

Anything less than that, get counseling and work it out.

[Anonymous]

Men get stood up a lot in online dating. A man should
figure roughly 50% of his first time meetups will be
no shows.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You will be the booty call of lots of a$$holes you will find online. You will certainly catch HPV.

You will not get married again, unless you find a man in the same situation as you. Your next spouse will probably be 15 years older than you or more.

You will be doing the childcaring on your own. Your kids will get messed up and need therapy. Your DH will move on and have a new family.

Your HHI will be impacted. It is rough out there.

PP here. I got HPV from my husband. 50% of women get it by age 50. Not a big deal.
Who cares about getting remarried? Never again.
50/50 custody—I will be doing less childcare, actually
Kids will not need therapy. They will be fine. Their life will not change that much.
(I am messed up from parents who stayed married in a terrible marriage.)
DH is done with kids. Unlikely to remarry ever: but if he does, I am ok with it. He will get a prenup to protect kids’ assets.
Who cares about HHI? Yes, it will be less. But I am 40% of the wealth. My quality of life will decrease. It is worth the emotional cost of staying in a marriage wasting more years that will ultimately end in divorce anyway.

You are making huge assumptions about divorce that are not universally true.

LOL, you think you can tell in advance that they won't need therapy? What a joke. Nobody can predict that. And double LOL to the idea your DH and his new wife will agree to a prenup. New wives look out for their own children first. It is you making huge assumptions!

Neither of us is interested in remarrying ever. He would also never marry anyone with children and he does not want more children. My kids will not need therapy. Their lives will hardly change at all. Only difference is that they will spend time with us separately. We will be nesting for a few years. They have never known us to share a bedroom. Not much will change.

Oh honey. You are in denial. Do not believe what your STBX says! He is telling you what you want to hear so that you won't try to lock down money for the kids. They will definitelt need therapy, because their mother is delusional.

+1000