what did you do with this stuff?

[kryztuh]

So I have a decade's worth of photos, both digital and printed in albums, special occassion cards and other trinkets, christmas ornaments, etc. of/from H.

Did you just throw these out and double delete the electronic stuff right away? Save any of it for the kids? Pack it up and deal with it later?

FWIW the earliest the divorce will be final is June, but there is no hope of reconciliation. Also, my children are very young and likely won't have any memory of H and I together.

What about email address? Mine has his last name in it, which i doubt I will keep after the divorce. Anyone know how much of a pain it will be to start using a new email addy?

[Minxie]

I would wait awhile before making a decision on whether to get rid of it or not. Pack it up and put it away in the attic. Take a year or so to get past any lingering feelings and then decide what you want to do, especially if he continues to have a presence in their life.

Changing email addresses is fairly simple but a pain at the same time. I would keep the old address for the next year and start a new one now. Notify everyone you can that you have the new email address. You are keeping the old one for anything that will come in over the next year, such as a quarterly or annual message from an account, but don't use it. Use the new one and gently remind family and friends if they do use the old one that your addy has changed.

[JunipersMom]

I would get a new email address - and just message all your contacts and let them know. People change emails all the time.. no problem there. What I did is took my wedding album and a few shots with their dad and put them in a folder in the way way way way back of my daughters closet. Then I erased the rest of the pictures of the two of us - or even of him doing pretty much anything. I think since my children were young as well when we divorced - he can be in charge of collecting and keeping photos of himself with the kids. Also I moved out of the house and he kept it.. so I did leave quite a bit of memorbelia for him to go through and decide if he wanted to keep it or not.

[MsChatsAlot]

We split when I was pregnant with my youngest so he has never seen us together as a couple. I've kept everything -- pictures, memorabilia, etc. and now my kids (12 and 8) absolutely love seeing pictures of us together, seeing things that were our 'family' things, etc. It really matters to them to have these family things and I'm so glad I kept everything.

[incorrigible]

Originally Posted by MsChatsAlot

We split when I was pregnant with my youngest so he has never seen us together as a couple. I've kept everything -- pictures, memorabilia, etc. and now my kids (12 and 8) absolutely love seeing pictures of us together, seeing things that were our 'family' things, etc. It really matters to them to have these family things and I'm so glad I kept everything.

My kids' dad was beyond horrible to them in the rare spurts he was around at all. Now he's passed away, so he's never bad to them anymore. They don't live in a fantasy that he wasn't awful to them, but it means SO much to them to have pleasant ideas about him to hold onto. He wasn't a real life monster. He was a person. There really were good times. He really had positive traits, even if they were well hidden those last few years. They don't like the reminder of having pictures on the walls, but they both have a variety of pics of him stashed away in their rooms...and know where the wedding album and box of old photos are kept. They like when I take them to, and tell them about, places that were special to their father and I before his mental problems became insurmountable. A part of their identity is tied up in their family, and that includes even dads that aren't there. What they know and see of their father effects their self esteem and sense of self. Focusing on his negatives, or even just trying to erase all memory of him...creates obstacles they have to overcome in order to develop a healthy sense of self. They CAN do so, sometimes with ease if they have good support...but... set it all aside until things aren't so raw. I went from the anger and hurt at seeing such things, to complete apathy and disinterest, and now I am finding myself at a point that I can look back and smile at the happy memories. 7yrs later, I'm glad I have those pictures and can share the good times that were with my children. It gives them a legacy of happiness to cling to, instead of just those final experiences.

[Ruthla]

I kept all of my wedding photos, photos of us together, etc. DH1 and I have two children together, and are currently friends again. My daughters watch the wedding video maybe once a year and pull out the wedding album about as often as they pull out my high school yearbook- it's part of their history (and it's fun to make fun of 80's hairstyles!)

I didn't have as many photos of DS' dad, as we were only together for 3 years and we split up when DS was under a year old. DS doesn't remember him at all, but it's important for DS to have photos of his bio dad and to know that he has a history too.

I suggest you box up the photos and keep the box. Don't open it until you feel you're ready to, but keep them available for the kids.

But go ahead and make a new email address for yourself. Email your whole address book with the new email addy and keep checking the old one periodically for a few months to a year so you don't miss any emails from people you don't contact frequently.

[Purple*Lotus]

I have no children. I waited one year after we separated, then I threw all of the pictures away. I would have burned them, but the part of the yard that is used for that was growing cucumbers so my Dad said I had to wait for the growing season to end first. I didn't want to wait, so I threw them out. I feel fine about it.

[Minxie]

Also wanted to add: my son has pictures of his dad in his room. It doesn't bother me and it helps him to keep that bond between them strong.

[lilyka]

I kept one album of us together. for the girls sake. Everything else went in the garbage. the letter and stuff right after he moved out. the wedding stuff just recently. actually a friend of mine was helping me clean up my basement after some flooding and he threw it out while I cried. Some of the wedding clothes went in the dress up box.

[La Sombra]

I have all our old photographs saved but I haven't had the heart to go through them since the divorce. Just thinking about it makes me depressed. I do have an idea that I will save a lot of the photos of the wedding and us together as a family for our dd. I can't imagine, personally, just throwing those things away. Maybe it depends on the relationship? My ex was a real UVA in a lot of ways, but he certainly wasn't abusive and the hurt certainly came from both sides, so maybe I haven't been as quick as some others to throw everything out.

What's really hard, I think, is that we have a lot of shared memories that are a really cherished part of my life. We lived abroad and traveled for several years together and there are probably hundreds of photos documenting those years and those adventures. To throw those photos and bits of memorabilia out would be, to me, like denying these beautiful, life-changing memories away. It hurts that he is a part of those memories and we aren't together anymore. But I also could never forget this part of my life. It's hard to reconcile the failure of my marriage with the beauty of those experiences. That is to say, holding on to this stuff is definitely bittersweet. But I see no other choice, for me at least.

[DeerMother]

Trashed the printed pics except for one or two. The rest are saved in a disc.

Things he bought me have been given away, sold or trashed. My dc are young though. If they were older I would check to see if anything was sentimental first.

[elsie123]

I got rid of everything. ds has one pic of his dad in his room that his grandparents gave him.

Ex-h actually went through all the photo albums when he moved out and removed all pics of himself, said I couldn't have him in any form. he missed some- the wedding ones mostly, and I trashed them.

[MaWhit]

I packed it up for the kids to go through someday.

[Halfasianmomma]

I put away all printed pics of XH and have the digital versions saved on an external hard drive that isn't connected to my computer. XH was a photographer for a while so there are a lot of very beautiful pictures that he took on that hard drive. I'm currently putting together a box for DD with this stuff, along with the few things I kept from XH (my wedding band, a mirror). To this, I plan on adding long letters sent from ex-MIL explaining XH's childhood, pictures that she sent of the extended family living in Phoenix and Las Vegas, as well as letters/pictures sent from DSD and from babymama #3. I'm trying to put everything together for DD, so that if/when she has questions about her father and his family, it's all together in a neat box. XH's family history is rather complex and I'd like DD to have as much information about them as possible.

[doubledutch]

i've kept photos for my kids. in fact, when cleaning after stbx moved out, i found a photo album of us when we were first together, and immediately gave that to my kids to look at! i just thought they would like it. i'll declutter junky pictures (like i throw out not-great pictures of anyone/anything). we have one family photo and one of stbx & ds2 on the wall still (in a group of photos mostly of just the kids).

i've never kept cards. trinkets/ornaments? i would just keep something if i wanted it. i don't think that stuff holds a ton of sentimental value for kids but i could be wrong. i don't personally have any stuff like that. stbx didn't really give me that sort of thing (or cards for that matter). the only things of value that he ever gave me, he took when he left. we got married at the courthouse, normal clothes, no formal photos (i have photos but not from a professional photographer).

changing your email address isn't hard. just get a new one and start using it. go through your contacts in your old email address and send a mass email saying "this is my new email address, don't use the old one anymore". you can probably have your emails forwarded from your old to new one for a while as people transition, and then delete the account when you're ready.

i do love my parents' wedding photos. they're all candids - our house burned down when i was a baby, so their wedding photos, my mom's dress, and most other sentimental stuff of theirs was destroyed. my mom's wedding veil was at my grandmother's house. my mom let me wear it for halloween when i was about 10, lol. i think she still has it, even though she's remarried now.

[secondimpression]

Originally Posted by incorrigible

My kids' dad was beyond horrible to them in the rare spurts he was around at all. Now he's passed away, so he's never bad to them anymore. They don't live in a fantasy that he wasn't awful to them, but it means SO much to them to have pleasant ideas about him to hold onto. He wasn't a real life monster. He was a person. There really were good times. He really had positive traits, even if they were well hidden those last few years. They don't like the reminder of having pictures on the walls, but they both have a variety of pics of him stashed away in their rooms...and know where the wedding album and box of old photos are kept. They like when I take them to, and tell them about, places that were special to their father and I before his mental problems became insurmountable. A part of their identity is tied up in their family, and that includes even dads that aren't there. What they know and see of their father effects their self esteem and sense of self. Focusing on his negatives, or even just trying to erase all memory of him...creates obstacles they have to overcome in order to develop a healthy sense of self. They CAN do so, sometimes with ease if they have good support...but... set it all aside until things aren't so raw. I went from the anger and hurt at seeing such things, to complete apathy and disinterest, and now I am finding myself at a point that I can look back and smile at the happy memories. 7yrs later, I'm glad I have those pictures and can share the good times that were with my children. It gives them a legacy of happiness to cling to, instead of just those final experiences.

I have to completely agree with this!

My own father was what I can best describe as passively neglectful of me as I entered into adolescence. Once I hit adulthood, our relationship blew up and we now speak to each other about twice a year during family get togethers. He was horrible to my mom when they split (I was under 2) and still treats her like the scum of the earth. But it doesn't change the fact that I have a lot of wonderful childhood memories of camping, traveling and even digging in the dirt in his backyard. My mom never went out of her way to save anything but I'm thankful to her that she never went out of her way to destroy anything either. It's part of who I am.

I left XH when DS was 4.5 months old and he pulled a vanishing act 6 months ago and no one has heard from him since. The man is an emotionally abusive leech and while I'd love to erase everything about him since DS will never remember him, I just can't do it. If he never reappears (I certainly don't have a problem with that!), the shoebox full of trinkets and pictures will literally be all DS will have of his bio-dad. To me though, it's just stuff. Sure, it can dredge up some ugly memories but as long as I leave the box alone it can't do that. If DS decides he doesn't want the stuff hanging around one day, that'll be fine with me if he gets rid of it.

I like some of the PP's suggestions to move digital media off your computer and onto a seperate hard disk. That had never occurred to me so all of the pictures and home videos of XH are just sitting in an untouched folder on my desktop