Advice Needed

[VIDEO: "What is parental alienation?"]

I'm planning on talking with my S6 tomorrow, telling him about his step-mom and I getting  a divorce and I'm not sure exactly how to handle it.  I'm going to have him stay with his mom for a few weeks (we alternate every week currently, his mom and I have a great relationship) until I either a) convince uBPDw (step-mom) to move out (unlikely) or b) bite the bullet and find a place of my own and just let our house go (uBPDw cannot afford house on her own, she knows this and I suspect that is why she is refusing to leave - shes pretty confident I won't leave).

I have no idea how to even begin to tell S6 what is going on, why he's going to be staying with his mom for a while... .I'm just sick to my stomach.  Part of me knows it's in his best interest to be at his mom's and away from the tension in our house but at the same time I'm so scared of how he will handle it and if disrupting his schedule is really the best thing.

Anyone been through this before?

 

[ts919]

I'm planning on talking with my S6 tomorrow, telling him about his step-mom and I getting  a divorce and I'm not sure exactly how to handle it.  I'm going to have him stay with his mom for a few weeks (we alternate every week currently, his mom and I have a great relationship) until I either a) convince uBPDw (step-mom) to move out (unlikely) or b) bite the bullet and find a place of my own and just let our house go (uBPDw cannot afford house on her own, she knows this and I suspect that is why she is refusing to leave - shes pretty confident I won't leave).

I have no idea how to even begin to tell S6 what is going on, why he's going to be staying with his mom for a while... .I'm just sick to my stomach.  Part of me knows it's in his best interest to be at his mom's and away from the tension in our house but at the same time I'm so scared of how he will handle it and if disrupting his schedule is really the best thing.

Anyone been through this before?

 

[starshine]

I don't think you need to put too many details in your conversation- if you and his mom have a good relationship, then ask for her help.  Kids are really resilient, and if you send him cards, have phone contact or can him to the park,dinner- some sort of playdate over this time then he will be fine.  A couple weeks of separation is not really a long time in the grand scheme of things- it could just as easily be an overseas work trip you are taking. 

I might be wrong here, but it might be easier to tell him about the split after she has moved out of the house.  It would buy you a little time, and it might seem like a less disruptive event.  All he needs to know is that you will be there when he gets home- that you are the constant in his life, and that you love him more than anything in the whole wide world.  By the time he's 10, your current wife will be a memory.  He might find it easier to adjust if he comes back to you and feels the peaceful difference in your home with her gone.  I would do a little research or talk to a counselor about how to tell him.  Even if he loves her, I am sure he feels the tension and unhappiness that she generates. 

Thank goodness you and your wife are co-parenting effectively.