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I think its wrong for any of the parents to use children as leverage, or like I explained to my own parents, "using your son as the ball in a table tennis match". My parents got a nice deal with me
(October 5, 2013 at 6:04 am)NoraBrimstone Wrote: What's best for her will be best for the kids, because they will grow up with a happier mother.
Wow! Talk about misogyny! Why do you assume that the mother always gets custody of the kids? Three houses down from me a mother lost custody of her kids to her ex-husband. The mother wasn't terrible, but she wasn't financially or emotionally stable. The ex-husband remarried and evidently convinced the judge that theirs would be a better home. By the way, one of the reasons she lost custody was that she made several unsubstantiated claims about his "horribleness."
What's best for the dad could equally be what's best for the kids. What's really "best for the kids" would be that both parents pull their head out of their asses and start acting like adults that have, and live up, to the basic expectations of a marriage.
WTF is this crap? I said mother because we're talking about the kids' mother here, not their father. Of course a happy dad = happy kids, too. But wtf does that have to do with Ivy and her current situation? Also, misogyny doesn't mean what you seem to think it does, mate.
And that last bit is just ridiculous. If a marriage isn't working out, the most sensible thing to do is get out of it, not stick with it and waste your life and set a bad example for your kids.
I have some things to say, but I have a great day ahead of me so it will have to wait. All I will say for now is that we are keeping it cordial for the kids and we would not use the kids to fight. Also, I do not intend to speak badly about him to my children or in court. We are going for 50/50 since he is such a great dad. Some people need to understand that all cases are different and you can't apply the same system to everyone. I will get back to this.
(October 4, 2013 at 9:16 pm)Captain Colostomy Wrote: I've spent twenty years working on my wife's distrust of men thanks to her parent's acrimonious split. Them two still...30+ years later, fight something horrible. So divorce can damage kids. I think the secret is to remain amicable, even if that cocksucker of a deadbeat deserves a crowbar to the skull. Kids are like sponges, so show them how proper adults can be, and they'll manage fine.
You're absolutely right.
My parents split when I was a teenager - and my dad wouldn't speak or otherwise communicate with my mother except through attorneys and in the form of child support checks (which he was diligent in staying current on).
Twenty years later, when my son was born, he buried the hatchet and they are now on friendly terms.
Unfortunately the damage had already been done.
I learned from that - my son's mother and I are still on friendly terms.
(October 5, 2013 at 11:13 am)The Germans are coming Wrote:
For what it`s worth I copied some articles and links:
Quote:Effects of divorce on children
Psychological
Divorce is associated with diminished psychological well-being in children and adult offspring of divorced parents, including greater unhappiness, less satisfaction with life, weaker sense of personal control, anxiety, depression, and greater use of mental health services. A preponderance of evidence indicates that there is a causal effect between divorce and these outcomes.[19]
Children of divorced parents are also more likely to experience conflict in their own marriages, and are more likely to experience divorce themselves. They are also more likely to be involved in short-term cohabiting relationships, which often dissolve before marriage.[19]
According to Nicholas Wall, former President of the Family Division of the English High Court, "People think that post-separation parenting is easy - in fact, it is exceedingly difficult, and as a rule of thumb my experience is that the more intelligent the parent, the more intractable the dispute. There is nothing worse, for most children, than for their parents to denigrate each other. Parents simply do not realize the damage they do to their children by the battles they wage over them. Separating parents rarely behave reasonably, although they always believe that they are doing so, and that the other party is behaving unreasonably."[20]
Although not the intention of most parents, putting children in the middle of conflict is particularly detrimental. Examples of this are asking children to carry messages between parents, grilling children about the other parent's activities, telling children the other parent does not love them, and putting the other parent down in front of the children. Poorly managed conflict between parents increases children's risk of behavior problems, depression, substance abuse and dependence, poor social skills, and poor academic performance. Fortunately, there are approaches by which divorce professionals can help parents reduce conflict. Options include mediation, collaborative divorce, coparent counseling, and parenting coordination.[21]
Academic and socioeconomic
Children who have experienced a divorce frequently have lower academic achievement than children from non-divorced families[22] In a review done on family and school factors related to adolescents’ academic performance, it noted that it is two times more likely for a child from a divorced family to drop out of high school than a child from a non-divorced family. These children from divorced families may also be less likely to attend college, resulting in the discontinuation of their academic career[23]
Many times academic problems are associated with those children from single-parent families. Studies have shown that this issue may be directly related to the economical influence of divorce. A divorce may result in the parent and children moving to an area with a higher poverty rate and a poor education system all due to the financial struggles of a single parent.[24]
Children of divorced parents also achieve lower levels of socioeconomic status, income, and wealth accumulation than children of continuously married parents. These outcomes are associated with lower educational achievement.[19]
Divorce amongst the elderly
According to a New York Times article, “More Americans Rejecting Marriage in 50s and Beyond”, in the past 20 years, the divorce rate has increased over 50% amongst the baby boomers. More and more adults are staying single and according to an analysis of census data conducted at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, they say the divorce numbers will continue to rise. Baby boomers that remain unmarried are five times more likely to live in poverty compared to those who are married. According to the statistics, it will also be three times as hard to receive food stamps, public assistance or disability payments[25]
Sociologists believe that the rise in the number of older Americans who are not married is a result of factors such as longevity and economics. Women, especially, are becoming more and more financially independent which allows them to feel more secure with being alone. In previous generations, being divorced or single was seen differently than it is now. This has resulted in less pressure for baby boomers to marry or stay married.
That's all good information, and I certainly wouldn't dispute that divorce is relatively harmful compared to a reasonably healthy marriage.
Look up the effects of families with emotional abuse and neglect, family violence, and an abusive parent, etc on kids and divorce doesn't look quite as bad.
(October 4, 2013 at 9:38 pm)Brakeman Wrote: In my opinion,
If humans were ducks, we'd look at the ducks switching partners and we would laugh because we would see that there really isn't much difference from the previous duck to the next.
We're not so individually different that the vast majority of first marriages couldn't last, it is simply that we don't make it a priority in life to learn the skills of how to get along with one another and learn what makes each other tick in a relationship. If you fight with your husband or wife often enough to disturb the kids, then you aren't going to be any happier in the next relationship if you don't learn how to properly relate to someone. Furthermore, you won't be able to teach your kids about healthy relationships either.
Chronic fighting is already divorced, you just haven't moved out yet.
No argument with the above except one point - sometimes it's one partner who's being a shithead and won't change. What then?
I know someone who was trapped in a marriage like that - and I've seen and heard enough of how he treats her 8 years after they split up to believe every word of what she's told me. (Some of you may recall the thread where I related the story of having to escort the creep from her home at the end of a baseball bat. Same guy).
(October 5, 2013 at 7:25 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: No argument with the above except one point - sometimes it's one partner who's being a shithead and won't change. What then?
I know someone who was trapped in a marriage like that - and I've seen and heard enough of how he treats her 8 years after they split up to believe every word of what she's told me. (Some of you may recall the thread where I related the story of having to escort the creep from her home at the end of a baseball bat. Same guy).
So in that case, do you believe that the creep was a perfectly good guy, but then BANG, with no warning he became a megalomaniatic jerk? Or was it more likely that the other spouse ignored the huge warning flags and alarms because the "victim" imagined the creep to have been something he wasn't. Then as soon as the frustration came from her side, she closed up emotionally from him and this set his insecurity alarm off, and he thus began trying to manipulate and attack her in order to react to a situation he doesn't understand and didn't have a proper response to?
But of course, a guy like that needs major help and couldn't be a suitable spouse at all.
(October 5, 2013 at 7:25 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: No argument with the above except one point - sometimes it's one partner who's being a shithead and won't change. What then?
I know someone who was trapped in a marriage like that - and I've seen and heard enough of how he treats her 8 years after they split up to believe every word of what she's told me. (Some of you may recall the thread where I related the story of having to escort the creep from her home at the end of a baseball bat. Same guy).
So in that case, do you believe that the creep was a perfectly good guy, but then BANG, with no warning he became a megalomaniatic jerk? Or was it more likely that the other spouse ignored the huge warning flags and alarms because the "victim" imagined the creep to have been something he wasn't. Then as soon as the frustration came from her side, she closed up emotionally from him and this set his insecurity alarm off, and he thus began trying to manipulate and attack her in order to react to a situation he doesn't understand and didn't have a proper response to?
But of course, a guy like that needs major help and couldn't be a suitable spouse at all.
I have no doubt there was a great deal of wishful thinking on her part in the beginning. Beyond that I couldn't say. People exhibit bad judgment, and sometimes end up with children as a result.
The guy is pretty charming when he wants to be. In my unprofessional opinion, he's a sociopath.
(October 5, 2013 at 7:25 pm)Cthulhu Dreaming Wrote: No argument with the above except one point - sometimes it's one partner who's being a shithead and won't change. What then?
I know someone who was trapped in a marriage like that - and I've seen and heard enough of how he treats her 8 years after they split up to believe every word of what she's told me. (Some of you may recall the thread where I related the story of having to escort the creep from her home at the end of a baseball bat. Same guy).
So in that case, do you believe that the creep was a perfectly good guy, but then BANG, with no warning he became a megalomaniatic jerk? Or was it more likely that the other spouse ignored the huge warning flags and alarms because the "victim" imagined the creep to have been something he wasn't. Then as soon as the frustration came from her side, she closed up emotionally from him and this set his insecurity alarm off, and he thus began trying to manipulate and attack her in order to react to a situation he doesn't understand and didn't have a proper response to?
But of course, a guy like that needs major help and couldn't be a suitable spouse at all.
I know the answer to your questions here. NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS.