Best interest of the children

[zad7242]

Hello,

I am brand new on here. I won't go too deep into my situation since I went into more depth about my marriage in the Welcome Mat space. I have been married for 3 years and we have 6 children. 2 are my stepchildren, 2 were from my previous marriage of 6 years (wife died of cancer), and 2 are our children together.

Over the past 3 years dealing with the borderline abuse, I have had great difficulty balancing what is best for the kids. On one hand staying in a marriage that is high conflict and verbally abusive, versus getting out and breaking up the newly bonded sibling group,and causing the 4 oldest children to experience the loss of a parent for a second time. Thus far, I have chosen to stay and hope and fight for things to get better and conclude that the children are all better together with 2 parents. My questions is: how do other people on here, who have children, approach the issue? If you got out with small children, what was your breaking point, or how did you know the hardship of divorce on a child was better than the continued chaos in the home?

Thanks!

[bloomie]

zad7242 - I read your intro post which offers further context. I was thinking about the bigger picture components of the difficulties you are facing in your marriage.

If I am correct, all fairly young children, some postpartum challenges for your wife, and a new blended marriage, grief and unexpected loss for you and your children from your first marriage. A lot of changes and moving parts in what seems to be a very high demand season for both you and your wife.

Given all of that, I would imagine it is very difficult to cleanly identify what you are dealing with exactly. Even with diagnosis, it has to be confusing.

What I know can improve things is developing and living out healthy boundaries within your marriage and in how the children are spoken to and treated. It would be ideal if you could get your wife to agree to working through her outbursts and toxic responses within the home from a trained professional. And support for you as you develop how best to protect your kiddos and yourself. I believe you said she won't do that, but it doesn't mean you can't pursue that for yourself.

Ultimately, you can equip yourself to move and respond from a settled, consistent place. Independent of how anyone else chooses to act. What that looks like for you might be very different than it looks for me.

Something that never hurts is to find a way to give a struggling parent some respite and help. If there is a way to have some consistent, regular help with the kids and household and give your wife some time and relief that is a wonderful to investment and support for your entire family.

And for you to find time for the same. Respite, rest, relief.

Begin building tools and healthy ways of engaging and limiting what you accommodate and allow in behaviors toward both you and your children.

Most importantly, don't go this alone and don't make any rash decisions. You are very wise to realize there is a lot at stake here for all of you.

Keep coming back and sharing.

[zad7242]

    Thank you bloomie! You are correct, there are so many layers to the onion of our situation, throw in my own woundedness and grief that allowed me to find myself in this situation despite the clear road signs along the way.

    I have made an effort to help my wife reduce the stress in her life and she has taken some significant steps in self-care including regular exercise and volunteering at church. That has really helped with a reduction in symptoms of psychosis- which mainly took the form of delusions. We did agree on getting more babysitters, but at first, she was angry that I was lazy and took so long to find sitters, now she is upset that we have one, and she feels she is getting kicked out of her own home every time the babysitter is scheduled to come.  Bottom line is she needs to feel more supported by me. She keeps coming back to her belief that she doesn't need outside help, she just needs me to be nice to her. I know I can do a lot better, but I also know it's not that simple....