Newly separated. What to tell the kids?

[bov94]

I’ve had a sudden exit from a long marriage and I now recognise that it was abusive, at least for the last decade. Financial abuse with associated coercive control/emotional abuse. I’ve been left with a massive amount of debt (which I didn’t know about) and the police are involved due to the complexity of the financial abuse and associated fraud.

I am so conflicted about what to do regarding what I tell the children (primary school ages (detail removed by Moderator) years old) and what to do about contact with their father.

Contact wise, my gut tells me supervised face to face visits are fine. They love him, I’ve never had concerns about his behaviour towards them and they miss him so much I can feel their pain. They have had (detail removed by Moderator) supervised visit with him so far and other contact has been via FaceTime, managed by a 3rd party (family member).

I have people telling me I should stop face to face contact between him and the children, and keep with just video calls. It is my family saying that, but also my solicitor (who is handling the divorce). I can’t decide if this is sensible advice or coming from a place of being overly protective. Or is my judgement clouded.

So far, the children don’t know we are separated. (detail removed by Moderator) they know he is in hospital and assume that’s why he isn’t home. I just don’t know how and when to address this with them and it’s these issues that are causing me the most pain at the moment. I wonder if anyone has experience or advice they can share.

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