My H after being caught not ending A has agreed after my insistance to move out. We're struggling with what to tell our child who's a teen. Also, he seems to think he'll come by as he pleases to spend time with the kids, I need space to heal though, want to be fair with kid time, and not to be accused of "keeping" them from him. How do I make him understand that this is a repercussion of his actions, not me being mean. We've agreed to work on a schedule, third party involvment to exchange the kids isn't feasible where we live. I really need to be away from him. 2-3 days fair? How have others handled this? I want the visits to be elsewhere too, fair?

Tell your Child the truth. Plain and simple.

Who cares what's fair?

Is fair your husband spending his time w/OW?

No. He moved out. File abandonment. Make him fight for visitation.

Do NOT make this easy for him.

A teen can be told the entire truth. Daddy has a girlfriend he chose to replace mommy with.

I agree. The child has to know, so he/she won't repeat the behavior and will know it's immoral and wrong.

Tell your H that you will visit a lawyer together to set up visitation. You do NOT have to be his friend right now. All the time, wives try to be nice to their WHs and get messed around. You don't have to be nice to him right now. Later, after he has tried to earn that back, maybe. Stay mad!

Dr. harley advises that the child/children be told the truth. he says that it is much more damaging to children to lie of tell half truths.

i asked him this question directly.


good luck, sf

Yep, I agree...tell them the truth.

Harley, our MC and both school counselors said telling them the truth is much better than letting them think they are to blame, or letting them fill in the blanks about why daddy moved out.

W2W, of course HE is struggling about what to tell your child. He does not want to look bad.

My D15 knows the truth. Did it hurt her -- very much. But it was much better the crap that H told her when we sat her down for the "talk". H told her that he was moving out because Mommy and him were not getting along and were probably going to get D. Then I told D15 that this is what daddy wanted and not my decision. That I loved her and I loved Daddy but we would take care of each other. WH was upset but then left to go buy cigarettes for over an hour and found out later he called the Pig for 40 minutes probably telling her he was now free.
The next day D15 asked me if her Dad was having an A and I said Yes and she said I thought so by all of his crazy behavior and she even guessed who it was.

My D has not recovered about this. H told her in Sept (great guy telling her 2 weeks into school), she went from a honor student to 60s/70s and struggled. She went from almost perfect attendance to being out sick with migraines more than 12 days. She went from a happy carefree kid to have anger. We spend our time going to doctor appts, counseling and she is getting a handle on everything. He was her hero and now she has no respect for him.

I know it is tough to hear but you need to be prepared. As for your child they might chose not to see their father and you will need to respect that. At the beginning I "forced" my D to see her Dad thinking I was doing the right thing. BIG MISTAKE. Validate what they say and want.

I agree that your H should not be in your house. take care.

Tell the child that WH is dating the OW.

All of your children need to be told the truth.

Daddy has a girlfriend and that's not OK in a marriage and has hurt me very deeply.

Then, answer questions honestly.

About visitation, set up an every other weekend schedule. He picks up kids at say 6 p.m. Friday and returns them at 6 p.m. Sunday.

Have you considered Plan B?

Your H needs to see what life without YOU is going to look like.

You need to have a visitation schedule that would be similar to what the courts would arrage if you divorce. This will give WS a taste of what reality will look like if you divorce.

When divorced, an X does not come over at will..... He has a schedule.

Your H has not had a reality check yet, he is cake eating and wants it all HIS way.

Are you willing to tell your teen the truth they deserve and sit down and create a schedule for visitation that is conducive for YOU and your teen......

Your teen may want to make a the decision not see WH at all. This would not be bad. WH is damaging the relationship with your teen, not you. My DD13 refused to spend time with me while I was wayward, and it cut like a knife. It was one of many events that cut through my wayward fog, but helped save our marriage, all because my wife was honest with ALL of our children.

I just noticed in your post that you say "kids".

I must assume that you have more than one child.

You need to tell ALL of them the truth!

My wife said it well, (so I quoted her) and this is exactly what she did while I was wayward!

I am planning to tell our 9 yo son almost word for word what SMB posted. I pray I do it right. He is out of town right now with friends...I will be blowing this all open this weekend. So...I'm nervous about when to tell ds.

Smiley I'm so sorry you're in this position (but thanks for letting us know; it explains a lot).

You need to tell ds before the exposure to others. He needs to hear it before all the trauma starts. Given your H's nature, you may want to see if he can go stay with someone else for the weekend or the few days after the exposure. You can keep in contact with him, but please don't let him witness the exposure.

Sounds like she did that. Son is out of town.

I thought she meant her H is out of town. I can't imagine her letting her son go out of town with friends?

Cat, you're probably right. I re-read that and realized I'd misinterpreted it.

And given the circumstances, I wonder what 'out of town with friends' really means...