The divorce thread gave me this idea....

[JackHarrison]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave. They can just be flatmates, not lovers. If necessary, their mates can move in as well. It might be a bit crowded, but there would no housing or mortgage issues involved.

 

[cloudy]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave. They can just be flatmates, not lovers. If necessary, their mates can move in as well. It might be a bit crowded, but there would no housing or mortgage issues involved.

Um...no.

I've been slapped, choked, and had furniture thrown at me quite enough, thank you.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

What cloudy said. Forcing two people who don't like each other to live together is just begging for abuse and or killing.

 

[impressive]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave. They can just be flatmates, not lovers.

Sounds familiar.

 

[FallingToFly]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave. They can just be flatmates, not lovers. If necessary, their mates can move in as well. It might be a bit crowded, but there would no housing or mortgage issues involved.

I hate to say this, but life just doesn't work that way.

If my man and I ever split *knocks on wood* which, to be honest, will probably happen once the boys are in their teens, because we're -so- not the right partners - I couldn't live with him. I love him, and will always love him, but there is no way I could stand to go through my life watching him go on about the rest of his life with me as a passive observer.

I'm not a nice person, not by a long shot, and I have a philosophy that love always balances on that razor's edge - just the right push can turn it into hate. I'd rather walk away, from him, from my babies, than risk infecting my little ones with the hate that the love I feel for him could turn into.

My parents ripped us apart by trying to hold their marraige together 'for the kids.' When my dad left, i cried, not because I was sad that he was gone (we've hated each other since I was old enough to have an opinion, which was right about six) but from relief that I no longer had to put my brother and sister behind me in the closet when they started fighting, for fear that something would hit them.

My parents never laid hands on each other. Anything else in the house was fair game - dishes, small appliances, cats (that was hilarious, even in the horror of the moment, btw), shoes... you name it, they threw it. I have scars that will be with me till the day I die from being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Thank gods my sibs were too young to assimilate most of what was going on, and I was rabidly overprotective of them, so they spent a lot of time covering their eyes and listening to Disney soundtracks on my Walkmans.

Not every child has that, someone to stand between them and that kind of hell. I did it because I didn't know how to do anything else, and they meant more to me than my own safety. Two people who used to love each other are the most bitter enemies on earth, and they get tunnel vision when that twisted love comes to the forefront - it's not that they don't care what they're doing to their kids, it's that they honestly don't see anything but each other in that moment. The rest of the world ceases to exist.

That's when the real damage happens. Not when one or the other leaves, but when the parents become more focused on hating each other than they do on loving their kids.

 

[Weird Harold]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave.

I take it you prefer sensational murder trials to boring divorce proceedings?

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

Another major issue: what if the new spouses have exes? Where will everyone live? That can be even more crowded than you think, Jack. I know that you are trying to resolve things, but, DAMN! That's just not going to cut it as a mandatory and universal policy. It might work for some, but not for all.

 

[BlackShanglan]

Divorces generally come as the result of higher expectations than one has of flatmates being disappointed in very painful ways. If my flatmate has a wandering eye and sleeps away every other night, it's not really a major problem to me. I have never had emotional expectations of a flatmate, and indeed have myself been dubbed "the ghost roommate" in my university years for my tendency to return to base only when sleep was absolutely required. I've liked many people I have roomed with, but I have also survived some very unpleasant roommates because I really expect nothing of them and never did. It doesn't feel personal when they do very unhelpful things.

Marriages and lifetime partnerships, however, involve much greater expectations. We expect that the other person will become much more emotionally involved in our lives and that this will guide this person's behavior. As a result, it's much more painful when such a partner does things that in a roommate would be a matter of relative indifference or some moderate annoyance, like staying out all night drinking, bringing home apparently random bed companions, or missing out part of the rent after spending gratuitous sums on his/her own entertainment. With the roommate, one really doesn't expect much else; with the lifelong partner, one does.

Those feelings are not easily put back into the box. Some people can manage it, especially if the split between the partners was relatively amicable. However, it's not all that common for it to be amicable; there are a very limited number of reasons why two people who like each other and have good will toward each other will nonetheless feel that they cannot resolve their relationship issues. When the marriage splits for one of those reasons, I think that the roommate structure has a chance of working. When, however, the relationship has split due to feelings of disappointment, resentment, or betrayal on either or both sides, I think it highly unlikely for the roommate solution to be practicable.

What I do like about your comments is their recognition of certain inherent truths, and the underlying suggestion that we must take responsibility for them. Children still need to be raised, housing still needs to be supplied, and there is simply no way to pay for two seperate houses on the same amount of money without making some substantial sacrifices elsewhere. I recall watching a BBC documentary on their child services organization in which a man expressed bitter resentment over the level of child support they required him to pay. They'd cost him his house, he declared angrily - his house! At first I was sympathetic; who wouldn't be to a man who lost his house? But when one considers the economics of it - of course it cost him his house. It would cost me my house if the SO and I decided that we each had to have a seperate one. We don't have the money for this house and another, and neither do most people. It's something that must be faced very soberly; living apart on the same incomes as one had when living together will and must mean having a good deal less money. It's one of the sacrifices one must make if the decision is genuinely important.

Shanglan

 

[Quiet_Cool]

Another major issue: what if the new spouses have exes? Where will everyone live? That can be even more crowded than you think, Jack. I know that you are trying to resolve things, but, DAMN! That's just not going to cut it as a mandatory and universal policy. It might work for some, but not for all.

Give the WB network about three more months. This sounds like the kind of idea that might be passing through the uppers in the realm of reality television.

"... Yes, yes, yes... I'm liking this... his ex and her ex, and the kids and... Would it be pushing things too far if we kept knives and guns in every room of the house, just in case?"

Q_C

 

[LadyJeanne]

Well, it's not like anyone is prevented from forming this type, or any other type, of arrangement...so there must be some very good reasons people aren't choosing it, donchya think?

 

[Quiet_Cool]

Well, it's not like anyone is prevented from forming this type, or any other type, of arrangement...so there must be some very good reasons people aren't choosing it, donchya think?

Shhh! Quiet with that common sense. It'll spread like a disease.



Q_C

 

[LadyJeanne]

Shhh! Quiet with that common sense. It'll spread like a disease.



Q_C

Forgive me. I don't know what I was thinking. Maybe it was that first sip of coffee - the caffeine went straight to my head.

 

[elsol]

*sigh*

Where are the kids whose parents stayed together for their sake?

I don't think I qualify because I was the 'stepchild' and they stayed together for the benefit of my little brother actually.

In the case, I am qualified...

ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!!!

At the time, it seemed like something fucking noble to do... all self-sacrificing and shit... but my little brother has been admitted to a mental institution twice and I'm not all ducky either!

Maybe it was something in the water... and maybe it was having to live with two people who shouldn't have live in the same city, nevermind the same house.

But I'm not a psychologist... so I can't really say.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[FallingToFly]

*sigh*

Where are the kids whose parents stayed together for their sake?

I don't think I qualify because I was the 'stepchild' and they stayed together for the benefit of my little brother actually.

In the case, I am qualified...

ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!!!

At the time, it seemed like something fucking noble to do... all self-sacrificing and shit... but my little brother has been admitted to a mental institution twice and I'm not all ducky either!

Maybe it was something in the water... and maybe it was having to live with two people who shouldn't have live in the same city, nevermind the same house.

But I'm not a psychologist... so I can't really say.

Sincerely,
ElSol

hey, mine tried for a few years...

See what happened?

 

[elsol]

hey, mine tried for a few years...

See what happened?

Yeah... but you were being reasonable about this. Sometimes you need to lay it in black and sienna so people will listen.

THIS IS BAD THING... DO NOT DO IT TO YOUR KIDS!!!

People think they're this 'good'... but really, most of them aren't.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[Quiet_Cool]

People think they're this 'good'... but really, most of them aren't.

Sincerely,
ElSol

I don't want to assume I properly interpretted your point when you said this, but if I did, nicely said.

Q_C

 

[yui]

I take it you prefer sensational murder trials to boring divorce proceedings?

You are brilliant.

ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!!!



Sincerely,
ElSol

What ElSol said.

 

[elsol]

I don't want to assume I properly interpretted your point when you said this, but if I did, nicely said.

Q_C

If you interpreted as... parent thinking they can actually put aside the things that caused their marriage to fail, not bring up those little pet peeves that drove them crazy but they were willing to keep quite because this was their spouse, not shove a new relationship in the face of their ex, ... and this list could go on and on.

But in all reality, they might THINK they can be this 'good'... but in reality, the shit gets really fucking petty QUICK...

Then yeah, you interpreted it correctly.

Sincerely,
ElSol

 

[Quiet_Cool]

If you interpreted as... parent thinking they can actually put aside the things that caused their marriage to fail, not bring up those little pet peeves that drove them crazy but they were willing to keep quite because this was their spouse, not shove a new relationship in the face of their ex, ... and this list could go on and on.

But in all reality, they might THINK they can be this 'good'... but in reality, the shit gets really fucking petty QUICK...

Then yeah, you interpreted it correctly.

Sincerely,
ElSol

Well, I meant the more generalized "people doing what in some blind idealized world might be best not for the best of everyone, or anyone in particular, but because they want something and this is an excuse to rationalize that want." In this particular case, they want to be good people, so they follow this blind ideal that there should be a household of father/mother with the kids, not looking past the shallow exterior for the sake of the kids, all because they beliee that if they keep up the false front, then they'll be doing "the right thing" which in turn, makes them good people. Basically, the decision they say is made for the children has only themselves and their wants as motives.

If we're still on the same page, then cool.

Q_C

 

[BlackShanglan]

Well, I meant the more generalized "people doing what in some blind idealized world might be best not for the best of everyone, or anyone in particular, but because they want something and this is an excuse to rationalize that want." In this particular case, they want to be good people, so they follow this blind ideal that there should be a household of father/mother with the kids, not looking past the shallow exterior for the sake of the kids, all because they beliee that if they keep up the false front, then they'll be doing "the right thing" which in turn, makes them good people. Basically, the decision they say is made for the children has only themselves and their wants as motives.

If we're still on the same page, then cool.

Q_C

I beg your pardon, but I don't believe it's necessary to read selfish malice into such a decision. Children require a great deal of time, help, support, and guidance, and they generally do better when they have two people to provide it rather than one. I quite agree with everything that El Sol said, and I agree that for most people, simply setting aside deep resentments is not possible and probably better not attempted. However, I believe that those who attempt to do so are generally in fact thinking of their children and not themselves, however unreasonable their expectations of their own behavior might be. I think it quite unnecessary to suggest that many people decide to spend years living with someone whose very presence is a painful reminder of failed hopes for purely selfish reasons.

Shanglan

 

[FallingToFly]

Yeah... but you were being reasonable about this. Sometimes you need to lay it in black and sienna so people will listen.

Trust me, I think I've learned my lesson.

 

[Liar]

....why not simply have the exes live together until the children are grown, at which point they can leave. They can just be flatmates, not lovers. If necessary, their mates can move in as well. It might be a bit crowded, but there would no housing or mortgage issues involved.

In the cases where this would work, the parents would have to be sensible, tolerating and generous to begin with. In which case a regular divorce would work well too. Amicably, civilized and with the children's best in top priority for everyone. Divorces in themselves are not devastating or even particulaty harmful for the children or any of the people involved. Bad divorces are.

(Didn't read the thread yet. Will do now.)

 

[sophia jane]

Ex and I actually did this for about a year and a half. It's a great theory, but the application is a real pain in the ass.

 

[LadyJeanne]

Ex and I actually did this for about a year and a half. It's a great theory, but the application is a real pain in the ass.

You moved your lovers into the house??

 

[sophia jane]

You moved your lovers into the house??

LMAO! No, not that part. Just the living together as roommates idea.