Divorces Done Right - any nice stories?

This thread in The Pit - http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=623360- made me think of my own parents and how they did “divorce when there’s a child involved” right, similar to the OP’s situation.

My parents divorced when I was 11 and I’m an only child. I never saw it coming because they never argued or fought in front of me. Just one day out of the blue my Mom sat me down and explained “separation”, “divorce”, “joint custody”…and I said “I’m staying with Dad.” Don’t get me wrong, I love my Mom dearly, but at that age I was totally a “Daddy’s Girl”. She said, “Well we’ve discussed it and yes, it would be in your best interest to live with your Dad, but we have 50-50 joint custody so you’ll be with me on these days of the week…” etc. etc., long story short my parents remained amicable, my time was split evenly between them, and when I chose to move in with my Mom at 13 (key words: I CHOSE), there were no issues.

What I did NOT know at the time, and found out as a grown-up, was that my Mom had a HELL OF A TIME making that arrangement happen. I those days (1984) the child automatically went with the mother. My Mom said “No, I’m the one who is moving out, I’m the one who needs to work on getting healthy again, I’m not going to disrupt Juicy’s life simply because my marriage didn’t work out. She’s a daddy’s girl and I’m not going to take her away from her father and have her hate me. She’s got her home, her school, her friends, her cat and her Daddy and I’m not going to allow any of that to be taken away from her. Her dad is more than capable of looking after her. It WILL be Joint Custody.”

I also did not know that she took no end of grief and judgement for that decision - apparently people said “How could you leave her with HIM? How could you ABANDON your daughter?!” which was complete and utter bullshit because my father is an excellent parent and my mom in no way whatsoever “abandoned” me, I saw her half the week!!

Anyway, I just wanted to tell my story because while yes, there are situations where the fathers are denied rights to their kids by vindictive mothers and vice-versa, there are also situations where parents put their own interests aside and do what’s best for their child(ren).

Any other NICE divorce & custody stories out there?

I’m divorced (twice, actually, but the first time seems like another lifetime) with two kids. They were 2 and 4 when we split, and it was ugly for quite a long time. Little by little, it’s improved, and after maybe 5 years it got to a point of being pretty amicable. The kids are 10 and 12 now, and I found my ex a rental one street over so that he could be closer to them. It’s actually worked out really well–they get to see him nearly every day for a couple of hours, and it’s much easier to do the necessary schedule changes that arise fairly often.
So…it’s nice now, but it certainly took a long time to get here. I can only hope it stays that way.

Mine is about as amicable as one could expect. She pulled the rug out from under me, got home one day and told me she wanted a ‘separation’ which after about 3 weeks I realized was actually a divorce. I filed a few months later. She was cheating and left me for him which is why it all happened so fast. Ignoring the bitterness that stuck around for a while and the honeymoon period that she was in with him for the first 6 months or so that sort of detracted from her parenting requirements, the divorce itself was pretty simple. She told me I could keep the house (which I later realized was because she was moving in with him), she took her stuff, some of the things we bought together and a couple of bucks to even everything out and that was it. No lawyers involved, everything was very friendly, we even drove down to the courthouse together so we wouldn’t both have to try and find parking. The kid goes back and forth pretty much evenly, we split the expenses and we still work together 40+ hours a week (which is where we met 13 years ago).
So, it may have been ‘done right’ and I suppose it’s a ‘nice story’ but divorce still sucks.

My spouse’s first marriage was playing out in that typical nasty spatting when we started seeing each other, with Spouse’s ex-spouse new spouse along for the ride, until put my foot down one day (read “created a hellish scene in the middle of the street”). We all played nice after that. We danced together at the child’s wedding, to “We Are Family”.

THAT is nice. :cool:

We used the same lawyer, he got the house and I got the kids. Then he sold the house, left the country and we haven’t really seen him since.

It sounds bad maybe, but it was smooth for the kids and there was no fighting at all. We like to say we’re an all volunteer family.

Divorced almost one year ago. Hardly any hassles. We get along better now than we have in years. We still consider ourselves family and spend all the holidays together.

The children seem well adjusted happy and content with our scenario.

Divorced over 8 years ago, remarried and now my daughter lives with me. The divorce was amiable and we just grew apart. I got married right out of high school had a kid like 15 years later but you know at age 35 you are a bit different then at age 20. I still love my ex in many ways but she wasn’t the right person for me anymore. I am much happier in my second marriage and my daughter is one damn lucky kid. She has 3 people who love her! My first wife was perfect for my daughter when she was young and my current wife is the perfect person for her as she moves into her teen years and beyond.

In the divorce she got a lawyer and proposed a settlement which I agreed to. In fact she had moved by the time the divorce was final and so I went to the courthouse with her lawyer! Her lawyer mentioned to me at the time that we were one of the few couples she had represented where things went smoothly and the adults acted like adults.

My husband’s first marriage dragged on for a lot of miserable years. Finally, she found the button to push to make him agree to a divorce. From that point, it was over in less than six months… their only assets were the house and some savings. He spent all the savings pre-paying bills on both their places, so there wouldn’t be that to squabble over. He gave her half the value of the house, and all the cats. He hid the really good ice cream scoop so she wouldn’t be tempted to take it. He helped her move into her new place. Then he told her that he couldn’t be her “friend”, and over was over.

As far as I know, he hasn’t heard from her again since it was final.

Just to let folks know that even high-conflict divorces can *eventually *work out… after decades of my mother being about as horrible to my dad as she could – although not spiteful via the courts, just general badmouthing and bitchery which can be as bad for the kids – they both decided to be friendly again when my brother was deployed to Iraq in 2004. It was nearly whiplash-inducing for us kids, but they’re remarkably peaceful now. This works out well since their first grandchild was born in 2008.

On a personal note, my husband and I don’t have children, but we are continuing to live together until we can sell our house. Given the market, this might be a while. The first few months were difficult for me, as he was the one who wanted to split, but we’re cool now.

My cousin’s cousins (which make us not related) were two kids that there parents divorced when they were 6 and 4 respectively. Now they are in their mid 40s.

In the 40 years since those parents have been divorced, they agree that they can’t get along but will be together for their kids. The whole time they grew up, for school plays, games, then weddings and births, those two were there every time, were friendly and cordial to each other and then went back to their separate lives.

Of course, they lived in the same town and when the kids were under 18, they communicated about who stayed with who and when. There was no custody order (or if there was it was never mentioned or enforced). You want to stay with Dad tonight? Sure. I’ll pick you up after school tomorrow. Mom has to work late tonight? Dad will pick you up from school.

It was and still is the best damned divorce I have ever seen and it makes me wonder why they can get along so great, but couldn’t work out their marital problems.

My ex-husband and I grew apart to the point where we were just really close friends but with no romantic component anymore. We had both found other people we wanted to have romantic relationships with that we wanted to pursue, and we felt that by remaining a married couple we were hindering each other’s getting on with our lives. We decided to get a divorce and make it as smooth as possible for our son. I moved out and took over primary physical custody when the school year finished. He gets Dominic on every other holiday or any other time he wants him, and he gets him for a large chunk of the summer. Sometimes Rob (my ex) comes to visit us and he stays with us here at the house and we’re one big, happy family. He came to our wedding and was in the family photos, because I consider him not just a really close friend but also family.

I will always love him and we will always be family. We just didn’t have a romantic relationship anymore, and so a marriage wasn’t the right type of relationship for us anymore.

A co-worker got divorced from her husband, but they still go out to lunch every day and commute (about 45 mins) together. It’s very strange. They are best friends, but marriage itself didn’t work out for them, apparently.

Where kids are concerned, I don’t have any personal stories to share, but I do follow the blog When the Flames Go Up, which is two previously married bloggers co-blogging about what it’s like to be divorced and trying to work together for the kids. It’s pretty awesome.

ETA: OpalCat, I didn’t see your post before I posted. I almost thought you were my co-worker, but they don’t have kids together – but it’s exactly that kind of relationship.

And I would like to make it clear to the recently divorced - it wasn’t always easy and it certainly wasn’t always honest, but in the end the child got to watch two strong marriages develop, and that is certainly better for a kid than watching one wither and die.

My parents divorced when I was around twelve or so. You’d think I’d remember the date more clearly, but the whole situation was weird on many levels. I remember my parents calling me into the bedroom one night, and telling me they were getting a divorce. Thing was, nothing changed. They kept living together. Separate bedrooms, but they hadn’t been sleeping together for years at that point, so that was nothing new. For about a year, I was genuinely unsure if they were really divorced, or if I’d dreamed the whole conversations. Eventually, my mom got a boyfriend, so that cleared that much up, but she still didn’t move out of the house.

That went on for a good five or six years, during which my mom dated a couple of other guys, then she apparently decided that the other options out there weren’t much better, and remarried my dad. They’re still together today.

Still sleeping in different bedrooms, too.

One of my good friends in middle/high school married a couple of months after we graduated. Had a baby with the guy and a few years later up and divorced. Oddly, they both remarried within 2 days of each other. She’s had 2 more babies with husband #2 and he had another baby with wife #2. They all get along fine, get the kids together, she talks with wife #2, etc. The divorce itself was very simple, no fighting over money or their son – just arrangements made and that was that.

God forbid I ever end up divorced, but if I do, I’d hope we could be friendly for PandaKid’s sake.

This was smooth. My ex and I decided we didn’t want to be together anymore, so we just broke up. I didn’t file for divorce or ask for anything and neither did he. A few years later I met his second wife and that’s when I found out we were divorced.

I do a lot of divorces. Most go smoothly. Of those that are messy, one side or the other or both are seriously emotionally unbalanced, so even for those nuts and their families it is still for the best that they divorce. Often two or three years after a divorce, a past client will call up or send a card expressing how well life is going.

Very amicable with a bit of a rough start…or better said, ending. My divorce went through 2 days ago. We separated last August, but to me, I had been separated emotionally and physically for quite a long time, years even. We have two kids - a boy 15 and a girl 11. When we told them, my boy being very practical and pretty tired of his parents not getting along, was relieved. My girl took it harder. She is also a “daddy’s girl.” I left, with just the minimal things; dear friends helped me furnish my apartment. We agreed on everything from kids - we do 50/50 joint custody, to financial matters, property, etc. I just wanted out, I didn’t want to clean him out. I filed all the papers on my own, paid for it myself without asking him to pitch in, no lawyers, no child support. He’s a good guy. We just grew apart and wanted very different things in life, which can be OK, but in our case it put such distance between us that little by little everything including any passion that still existed in our relationship was totally gone. We are good friends now. We watch each others pets when we go away, he talks to me about women/dates that he’s had – mostly frustrating, but I’m sure that he will eventually find romantic love in his life again, as will I.

The kids are so much happier. Once they adjusted to their routine of going back and forth, it, became the new norm. I thanked my girl today for her patience and understanding this past year. Life goes on…

I lost 210 pounds of unwanted fat in one day - the day my first husband moved out. He wanted the divorce, he filed for it, I didn’t object, 90 days later a default judgment was filed. This was Michigan, 1994, no kids or community property to speak of. Easy on the courts, regardless of the damage it did to me that 2 weeks after the wedding he changed his mind about being married.