Dad Mode: Half Time, Full Heart

We told the boys two days before she moved out.

The day after, we were both around them in case they had questions. I wanted them to feel like their world wasn’t changing too fast. Like we were still on solid ground, at least for a little bit longer.

Then the day came. I took the boys to my mum’s so she could pack her things and leave after what has been 6 months of torture for me. Being in a house with someone you still long to be with, still care deeply about, but where the feeling is not reciprocated.

Two days later and I have come back to the house — but not alone. My mum came with me, because honestly, I didn’t think I could face walking through that front door with just the boys. I knew it would hit me. The absence. The reality.

It did.

And since then, I’ve been trying to hold it all together.

The five-year-old’s had more questions. He’s still trying to piece it all together in his head. At one point, he noticed that a photo of me and her had been taken down. He got upset. He told me he liked looking at it when he felt sad — that it helped him. That gutted me. It was such a small thing, but to him, it was something safe, something familiar.

The nine-year-old hasn’t said much. He’s just retreated a bit. Played on his computer for four hours straight since we got back. And honestly? That’s fine. It’s the summer holidays, and he’s doing what he needs to do to cope.

Now that she’s moved out, I’m feeling a strange mix of relief and sadness. It’s a relief because the tension of living under the same roof, trying to co-exist while knowing the end was coming, was exhausting. Walking on eggshells, avoiding difficult conversations, trying to keep things steady for the boys — that took its toll.

But alongside that relief is a very real sense of loss. There’s sadness for what was — for the good times, the shared laughter, her energy in the house. Her laugh. Her fun. The warmth she brought. The past six months have been so emotionally heavy that they’ve clouded a lot of those memories. But I don’t want to lose sight of them completely.

Reflecting back, I’m proud of how we handled telling them. The fact that neither of them saw this coming is, weirdly, something I take comfort in. We protected them from our stuff. We put them first. We didn’t argue in front of them — not that ever we really argued at all, which maybe says something in itself. And I didn’t push her to leave before she was ready, even when others asked why she was still here. I waited until she had somewhere to go.

And I’m proud of that.

I hope the boys see it too, someday. That even when you feel hurt by someone, you don’t have to be cruel. You can still be kind. You can still show respect. That’s a blueprint I do want to pass on — even if she said the one we lived wasn’t right.

I have regrets about some of the things I’ve said and done over the past six months, but I’ve done my best to make sure the boys have felt safe and secure while my world was falling apart. I’m learning to give myself grace — I haven’t been perfect, but I’ve tried my best to navigate this as best I can.

But today has been hard. I’ve been on the verge of tears throughout the day. Trying to stay strong for the boys, but feeling anything but.

And I’m dreading Tuesday.

They’ll be with their mum for four days, and I don’t know how I’m going to cope. I’ve got plans. Things to keep me busy. But will it be enough to fill the huge void?

Being with the boys can be exhausting — the emotional highs and lows — but I love being with them. I don’t want this. I didn’t choose this.

I keep thinking about the rhythm we had. School pickups, making dinner, sitting down together to eat, playtime, bedtime stories. That rhythm gave me purpose. It gave us shape. Now, I’m not sure what fills that gap.

Yes, I’ve got work. And I enjoy it. But it’s not what fulfills me. Family was always that. And now I’m going to be sitting in a quieter house, wondering how to start again.

One day at a time, I guess.

If you’ve been through something similar, what helped you get through the early days of separation?