My point was not the fact I dealt with a moron and I didn't meant to make it sound that way. Rather it was you can choose to fight the custody and not feel an ounce of remorse due to "jealousy." You may have more options here than you may realize.
I'm not completely familiar with your sitch. But if your son is really unhappy about the situation, that should be telling you something. Your STBX sounds like a real dipwad and he's not making intelligent life choices right now. While his current GF may not be a "bad person" in that she isn't a crack ho, it does sound like she too may be the type to go from man to man just to have her meal ticket, too. She may not be all that great of a mom and their home environment will be very chaotic if her children move in and they have such a new R. She probably washed and folded the clothes just to make herself look good. I'd take that for what it is. A simple task and be grateful for that. Still you do need to look at the whole picture.
Yes, their behavior DOES affect the children. And if you believe you can provide a better, more stable environment than the one your STBX is in, then I would say you should fight the custody arrangements without fear of feeling you are doing it out of a false motive. Remember too custody and visitation are usually two different things in most states. Custody here in Ohio usually means refers to the parent who basically provides the "legal residence" of the children and is their primary guardian and who provides most of their physical and financial needs...I may not be explaining this right cause I'm not a lawyer but you can check with your L. Not having custody wouldn't remove your STBX's rights to his children or his rights as a parent. You can still have a visitation schedule. This may be a way to circumvent or minimize your STBX's GF's parenting...
Just some thoughts. I realize each state is different and each situation is different. Trying to figure out if you could have done something different is useless...it's just an exercise in frustration for you. Like I said, I just wanted to provide an alternative possible viewpoint for you, so that you didn't feel as if you had to avoid pursuing custody out of a false sense of "jealousy" or a false motive. I do believe you have to put the children's needs and desires first and what you feel you are most comfortable with while raising young children--in ways that are most consistent with YOUR morals and YOUR ethics. Looking back when your kids are grown, you will feel much better if you took the road YOU most desired in your heart concerning your children. I got some of the same advice as you with my ex when it concerned custody--my ex actually WAS a good dad before PayPal ho and when he wasn't around her. However, I objected to the woman's lifestyle myself and my ex's midlife addiction lifestyle. Unfortunately, no matter how you do slice it, kids ARE affected and do come into the middle of some divorce issues. How you handle that is what makes the difference. I was thoroughly happy to do what I did, no matter how hard I had to fight my own internal feelings and defend myself against others who felt I was "keeping my kids" from my ex out of some jealousy or revenge thing.
Your sitch doesn't sound half as strange as mine was. Still, the whole GF/R drama our WAS can go through is unnerving to kids. A lot of WAS get involved with very emotionally unstable people and get a lot of drama sucked into their lives. The kids get into the middle of that too!! I cringe when I see young kids in the middle of that stuff.
