The only reason more mothers have custody than fathers is because most fathers don't contest custody. You are truly a great husband and father for not trying to. The ones that do seem to be successful at getting custody, esp. if they have an OW and can demonstrate '2 parent family' which was the reason why my court reporter changed her mind.
She originally recommended I keep custody but then H got OW and she changed her mind and said he should have them on the basis of 'being a family' and 'being over the relationship (with me)' and being able to 'offer more in a 2 parent family structure.'
Hence, I lost my kids and he'd only known her 5 weeks. Court knew this and didn't care. I said how do you know his R will be permanent with her after 5 weeks? They said it would be, and said I was a cynical XW.
3 months after the final hearing, he was on my doorstep in a state, saying he missed me, that he 'put on an act' with her and didn't love her.
6 months following that we started dating again so he obiously wasn't 'over it' or a '2 parent family' with her. In fact, he admitted to me that he got her purely for court purposes. I wanted to hit him when he said that but I didn't because we'd just met up again and at least he was honest. I told him exactly what I thought in a rather blunt way, and since then we just don't discuss it.
It's better to focus on the future, rather than all that pain. Very clever, the lengths he went to to get them, though, very clever.
There will be a pre-cohabitation agreement (legally) before I move in with him again to pre-determine how we manage our kids in the event (God forbid) that we ever separate again in future. That way we don't run the risk of anymore court drama.
I forgive him for it, no sense in holding on to pain. I have more trouble forgiving EX-OW for her role in the loss of my children. She did apologise and say I was right but that doesn't change things for my daughters. She considered testifying against him at one point but wouldn't because he would have thrown her out of the house and she didn't have anywhere else to live so she wanted to keep on good terms with him.
Anyhow, she will be gone soon and most of this issue doesn't bother me except for a little anger when I dwell on it too much.
I sent you a private email re my work. Please note the site hasn't been updated since 03 and I am waiting for H to take it off line and re-do it. Most of the titles have been taken off line for this reason, and my breast milk book hasn't been added to the site yet but you can still get it with paypal and by sending me an email if you want one.
I hope to do a course in web design soon so I can just update it myself and not rely on H!
