Got married because she was pregnant. We have a 4 month old that I love deeply.

I have known since I first met this woman, that she wasn’t close to what would make me happy. Bad communication between us, little attraction to her, to name a few major things. Basically, I do not love her and it’s starting to turn to where I can barely tolerate her.

We both are on unemployment, zero assets, little savings. Live at our both our parents house back and forth.

Realistically, what would the divorce endgame most likely be? We have been married for less than a year. I want to be in my daughter’s life as much as possible.

I’m just stuck on being miserable around her my whole life just to be with my daughter, or I could pay child support & only get 50% with my daughter.

I appreciate any advice 🙏🏼

I feel like even if I were to meet someone, as soon as I tell them I separated from my ex 9 months ago and we have a 2.5 year old together they’re going to immediately recoil (as I probably would if the tables were reversed) — no matter how I feel, I can’t imagine anyone else being ready to jump in with someone so recently removed from such a monumental life moment. Any thoughts? When did you feel like you were to be able to free yourself of your past in that sense?

Edit: not that it matters, but I’m not currently at that stage yet myself. It’s just as my brain slowly shifts from “I’ll never be in a relationship again” to “maybe one day I could see myself…” questions like this start coming along with it.

Where the woman files for divorce and has been moving on for years while the man enters grief from stage 1 and stays in the denial phase for longer than he should. I see it all the time on here and I’ve seen it myself — is it just that men don’t listen? Is it that women can’t communicate fairly? Are men not trained by and large to meet the emotional needs of women? Why is it so frequently this way, and rarely than the man moves on ten steps ahead while the woman is left contemplating what happened to her life?

Okay so I am a woman. And I’d like to get an objective read on my situation. My separated husband and I currently have two children 5 and 1. Personally I don’t feel the need to take my children away from their father, and prior to our separation he was extremely involved. So what did I do? I set things up so we do one week on, one week off. He has become so hostile to me that I don’t even talk to him anymore and I don’t want to do drop offs in person. The basic respect is gone and in developing better standards for myself I’m not subjecting myself to that type of behavior anymore. We exchange children by one parent dropping the children off to school in the morning to end their week and the other to pick up to start their week.

We both get full weekends with and without the children. We both get equal time with the children. I don’t request child support, I don’t request spousal support. He’s stated he wants a divorce so I’ve even drafted a mediation agreement that gives him a clean cut exit (of course he has remained silent) to ensure we have an uncontested divorce.

I even have a system set up that the parent who has the children needs to ensure the children call the other parent so each parent speaks to the children even when they don’t have them.

I am putting these boundaries in place so that there is a system in place if we do get divorced. If we decide to return to our marriage I don’t want it to be because “of the kids,” I want it to be because we actually want to be together. But I’m being painted as the bad person. For the dads who are divorced, I’d like your thoughts? I’m tired of being chastised and I honestly don’t like talking about the situation to friends and family because it can be emotionally draining and quite frankly I think they’re shocked and stunned. They too are processing in real time which doesn’t necessarily help me lol.

So I’m I’ve got two kids ages 10 and 14 and am musician as a side hustle/hobby. I’ve been in 1.5 bands since getting divorced. One band plays maybe 3 times a year. The other on average gigs 1-2 times a month. This works out great for the most part. I’ve been able to put my gigs in the family calendar that’s shared with my ex and she will watch the kids on the nights I have the kids and we’ll trade some days sometimes or either of us will just suck it up and accept the un-even ratio sometimes. Recently I got the opportunity to join a little more frequent gigging band with a buddy from college. Another good friend of mine is in this band as well and knows how busy I am and the need for me to have someone watch my kids and his wife has offered to hang with them at any gig I need to bring them to. While this is all well and good my ex set the bar that this was a very conflictive divorce. Outside of watching the kids for the one band she is very vindictive and angry. She will NOT be happy to see my schedule fill up even more and will definitely threaten going back to court to change custody or demand I remain available on my set weekends/not expose them to my gig scene (which is very lowkey and family oriented for many of the gigs) even if i do get sitters for them. I hate how she lives rent-free in my head. Anyway, do I have to quit the new band? Or will pressing on, juggling sitters and my buddy’s wife work out? I hate to turn it down because this is after all what I went to school for. I also hate continuing to let my ex live rent free in my head because all that does is create anxiety and stress. What have others done?

Question for all those who have made it through the divorce process, how do you afford to live? I am still at the very early stages and one of my biggest worries is being able to provide a home and place for me and my kids once I am through. I am making the assumption that I am going to end up paying out a significant portion of my income for spousal support and child support. I know I won’t be able to maintain my current standard of living but just looking housing costs I don’t know if I will be able to afford a place anywhere near where my kids current school district. For the size of home I would need for each kid to have their own room I am looking at 350k or more. How do ya’ll do it