[user104658]

Just to throw another perspective into this Alf/Annie debate here...

My parents fell completely out of love/or even like when I was about 10 - if they ever truly loved each other I don't know. They did at least talk/get on before that. I never saw them being genuinely close though.

They "stayed together for the kids". We all lived together, very middle class life, very middle class house (1600's, old detached house). They didn't talk to each other except when they had to. From when I was 13 onwards they slept in separate rooms. In fact they barely spent more than 10 minutes in the same room at all. But we had plenty of food in the cupboards, plenty of "stuff", a lovely house.

It is a miserable existence and I will adamantly state that no one, ever should have to live like that. I look back on my early teens as an absolutely joyless void. I loved my late teens ... because I developed a social life and independence so most of the time I simply wasn't there and didn't have to deal with it. I have a vivid memory of being in the car with my stuff packed up moving away to University and it literally feeling like the sky was brighter and the whole world was lighter.

Living with parents who simply don't want to live together is worse than having parents separate... honestly I can only say that it must be.

If people want to divorce and separate, just let them. And if anyone happens to be reading who ever considers staying together "for the sake of the kids" I hope you remember this post and trust me when I say it's not for the kids. Living with parents who can't stand each other is a cold, dark nightmare of a "home".

Happy Sunday .

P.S. My mum was rapidly descending into alcoholism for the last 3 years of this and was dead within 10 years of them splitting when I was 18. So I suspect it's not good for anyone!