Help The Kids Adjust

Gary Direnfeld is a social worker. Courts in Ontario, Canada, consider him an expert on child development, parent-child relations, marital and family therapy, custody and access recommendations, and social work.

Child Custody and Visitation: Grandparents Rights to Custody and Visitation

Steven Carlson is

If you ask to your friend or your colleagues, most of them will tell you that grandparents do not have no common law right to see their grandchildren if the parents object.

My story is long as many feel they are. I will try to make it brief as I am in real need of personal experience and advice. My husband and I were living apart for 3 years do to health circumstances with my oldest child it was best for my son to be in one place and not where we were currently living. We struggled immensely during this time but of course I never believed he was having any kind of affair. LONG story short my husband had been having an affair with a woman for two years, finally ended it just before he was finally able to be transferred where we were with his job. I still did not know of this affair. Months went by and we were trying to rebuild from being apart, but he was traveling ALL the time for his job so it was almost impossible, and still we were dealing with my son’s health problems. During these months we were trying and both decided it was time for another baby. Two months before this baby was born I found he was having a relationship with a woman from work. I go through all the usual emotion with infidelity and he assures that it is over. After enormous thought I decided our family and our relationship was worth working at and we could possibly make it even stronger after this tragedy. We began counseling and we both made our changes required of us. I just found out the relationship never ended and I contacted the other woman. After a long discussion, going from terrible to calm, she knew she had been lied to just as much and decided to take herself out of the situation all together. Of course my husband was angry with me for making her aware of his enormous lies and her image of him ruined. She of course told me more of what I didn’t know and how much more emotional and deep their relationship was. Keep in mind this is after 9 months of intense counseling and genuine trying from my husband and me. I saw the truth of what we could make of our marriage if we truly wanted to, and I know in myself when I truly believed my husband was genuine, I could move on from this and let it be behind us. SOOO I am devastated again! And I feel I am acting on my emotions to move forward with divorce, despite what I actually believe in myself. It is my husband I do not believe in, and at the moment he doesn't say much except to agree to me going through with the divorce and it mostly silent unless with the kids. This was all in the last 3 days. Today I don’t' want to change my position mainly because I haven't heard what needs to come from my husband unprovoked from me. My questions to anyone who can help, as I am desperate to do the right thing at this point, are: One- is it almost impossible to come through such a long-term infidelity (reminding that we were apart and now in the same city)? Is there much difference in recovering from long-term infidelities to short term? I know he is "mourning" the loss of his recent affair, I know this and it hurts, but I know this. So I also know much from him in this time is unexpected. Can someone truly change after years of this behavior? I believe we could be happy, I am strong and can make this work, as long as he is putting in the genuine efforts as well. I just don't know if that is possible after all of this. PLEASE any advice or experience would be tremendously helpful.

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