Do you ever feel as if your ex is acting like the proverbial grand marshal of the parade at Disney World, fiercely entertaining and wooing your kids, while you are the one who is left pushing the stroller and carrying the diaper bag?
If this sounds familiar, you might be dealing with a “Disney Dad”! Disney Dad is defined as the “fun parent” or the person who does not worry about the day-to-day grind.
How to Cope When Your Ex Is The Fun One
A Definite Lack of Fairy Dust
It may appear your ex has set up shop in The Happiest Place on Earth and turned you into the villain, but think about it this way: He feels terrible about the fact he is not home when the kids go to bed each night and is incredibly focused on making up for that in any way he can. Now, realize that some of these feelings may be intensified and heightened if he is the one who was responsible for your split or who initiated the divorce.
I can guarantee that while a forty-eight-hour, all-inclusive trip to the Magic Kingdom is a lot of fun in the heat of the moment, when they are tired and done at the end of the day, they just want to fall asleep on Mommy.
How to Avoid Feeling like the Runner-Up
This new dynamic in your life can be hard—and it can feel bad. I am quite sure you have thought, “Well, I could be ‘Fun Mommy’ if I had to parent only every other weekend, did not have to worry about homework getting done, and did not have to think about a million other responsibilities day in and day out.” However, your life right now requires you to care about the minutiae—“the stuff that is not fun.”
I encourage you to think about your role in your children’s lives and what that means to them. Remind yourself that love cannot be bought and that children understand when a parent is there to support them, nurture them, and comfort them. Learn how to cope better by creating a barrier and not worrying about what happens when your child is on Disney Dad’s time. This might go against your most basic instincts as a parent, but for your sanity, I encourage you to master this.
Yes, Disney World is a very fun place to visit, but at the end of the day, a child craves stability and consistency. As your children grow, they will develop an appreciation for the parent who got it done, day in and day out.
They will admire the parent who took time out of her day to get them to soccer practices and ballet rehearsal; they will appreciate that Mom helped them with their homework and made them brush their teeth before bed. Take comfort in the thought that while a weekend vacation might be nice, there is no place like home.
the best solution is to keep both parents fully equal. alternating weeks, or two week periods, have both parents take equal shares of cooking, laundry, homework, walking to school, have both parents attend all parent-teacher conferences together, etc. (i recognize this might not be possible if one parent moves too far from the school.)
I believe in equal parenting time but that, in no way, solves the issue of one parent having more money than the other. This article isn’t about parenting time, it’s about one parent being able to afford activities the other can’t.
Actually I agree with FCCDAD. Your article mentions NOTHING about this being an issue over one parent having more money than the other. That is supposedly what child support is supposed to alleviate, correct? The whole point of the non-custodial parent paying child support to the custodial is to make it to where the child can enjoy the same standard of living that they would have if the parents hadn’t separated.
While your article mentions nothing about money, your article does however highlight the parenting time disparity and I’ll quote you “Well, I could be ‘Fun Mommy’ if I had to parent only every other weekend, did not have to worry about homework getting done, and did not have to think about a million other responsibilities day in and day out”
As FCCDAD pointed out, this would all be alleviated by shared parenting. Or there’s nothing that says that the custodial parent can’t do fun things with the kids on their time.
Child support does not assist like when two parents were together. The daycare is no more paid 50/50, the bills are not split 50/50 anymore, as a single mother the $500/month of child support does not compare to when we split bills 50/50. Out of that $500 $250 goes to some of the $790/month daycare. $147.56 goes to my son’s medical insurance, the other $104 goes to what ever little extra thing my son may need/want. So it is very difficult for the custodial parent to have extra $$$ to go do fun stuff. I have missed a lot of things that were my sons firsts like see an ocean things that require travel and extra money. So when the noncustodial parent would rather give up parenting time in the custody agreement to not have to pay as much child support it does suck. I just do stuff with him around the house outside and parks. I love my son and he loves me and I know he just enjoys me no matter what. It is.
Any chance you could’ve made the article a bit more gender neutral? The Term Disney Dad was coined decades ago. Things have changed since then.
As a dad who is not as financially well off as the mom, and although supposedly there is child support, she is still able to take the kids on multiple trips to Mexico and out of state every other month.
I appreciate what you are saying about being the stable parent. Being the dad, I’ve dropped off/picked up my daughter from every one of her dance lessons. I’ve had to fight the stereotype that dads/guys know nothing about making ballet hair buns or makeup or costume fixes. This is not something that comes naturally to me, but I have learned because I love my daughter. I want her to know that I support her and that I’m there for her every week. Similarly, my son plays basketball, and I’m there every weekend whether or not it’s my weekend with the kids or not. Is their mother there? No, she is not. She’s only there when it’s her weekend.
But yet, I have to deal with my kids telling me that “Daddy, you don’t take us on a lot of trips. Not like Mommy. She takes us on a lot of trips!!” If I had the means, i would take them on trips. But through her small business shady accounting, she has minimized her child support payments.
This article had a good foundation, but i really wished you’d taken it further and made it into 2019.
For my child support simply pays bills while my ex lives at his girlfriends house and has no real expenses.