It's not just the divorce but how the parents act afterwards. OP, can you let your ex know that DS is being negatively affected by his behavior? Can you get your don done counseling? Just repeat to your son that it's done, you and ex love him very much, and while you're never getting back with his dad you are really happy that he and his dad love each other and have a strong connection.

How old is your son?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This post is a great example of what's bad about mental health related divorces. The poor DS is now being left alone with an unstable parent, who has plenty of unsupervised time to do all kinds of damage. Dad crazy? Good luck, kiddo, you're on your own! And crazy exes attract crazy step-parents. Sometimes divorce just replaces one set of problems with another.

Trust me when I tell you that any parent who divorces their mentally ill spouse has already weighed the risks of constant exposure to crazy against short periods of exposure. When I was married to my mentally ill husband, it was 12 hours a day (more on weekends and holidays), 7 days a week vs. many fewer hours under our visitation agreement. Plus, he cancels a lot.

PP, I really found this to be true. Mental illness is much more difficult to live with 24/7. Plus, it is a myth that somehow the well spouse is able to control the MI spouse if they stay in the relationship. This is just not true. IME, splitting up and having a healthy environment 50% (or more) of the time is far preferable. And, as the PP says, in our case my MI ex often doesn't use his full visitation, which is disappointing to the kids but leaves them more time in a healthy environment.

For those of us with an MI spouse, we often have a choice set that is all bad choices and we are picking the least bad one. Yes, it's "bad" to split up and it's "bad" to live with the MI unstable spouse. The "good" choice -- a marriage in a relatively safe and healthy environment -- often does exist for us.

I am also worried about the children in these mental health divorces. I'd be scared to leave my children alone with the ill ex-spouse.

Anonymous wrote:This post is a great example of what's bad about mental health related divorces. The poor DS is now being left alone with an unstable parent, who has plenty of unsupervised time to do all kinds of damage. Dad crazy? Good luck, kiddo, you're on your own! And crazy exes attract crazy step-parents. Sometimes divorce just replaces one set of problems with another.

Trust me when I tell you that any parent who divorces their mentally ill spouse has already weighed the risks of constant exposure to crazy against short periods of exposure. When I was married to my mentally ill husband, it was 12 hours a day (more on weekends and holidays), 7 days a week vs. many fewer hours under our visitation agreement. Plus, he cancels a lot.