Parting company

• Depending on what’s gone before, you may say something like, ‘We’ve tried hard to stop arguing but it hasn’t been possible. We’ve decided we need to live in different homes’ or ‘We love you very much but for a long time now we haven’t been happy living with each other’.
• Then explain what will happen and what has not yet been decided. Children will often be scared that everything will change and they may lose their friends, go to another nursery or never see their grandparents again.
• You need to reassure your children that the parent who is leaving is still ‘your dad’ or ‘your mum’ and will still visit regularly.
• Give your children a chance to express their feelings and possibly be cross with you both.

Children will be most distressed if they face the prospect of losing everything: familiar home, nursery or school and their friends, as well as the parent who has left.

It’s hard, but you need to resolve the adult issues between yourself and your partner