It’s obviously hard to know how my childhood would have been had my parents divorced, but my main “benefit” from them staying together is that I saw who I didn’t want to be. That’s not much. It soured my views on marriage, which only got worse when my long-term partner’s parents started pushing for it. Both my now-in-laws were remarried, telling me how important marriage was, while also having a relationship with each other as contentious as my own parents. (Eventually, I had 8 friends get married in one year and the whole thing clicked for me with much, much healthier examples)

Would life have been worse with split parents? Who knows. No way of telling. Lose some negativity, potentially add a ton of instability.

I can’t recommend one way or the other. I only ask you consider your own mental health and attitude and how it affects your family’s home life. But the one thing I can say pretty confidently (and of course don’t know if you do this): as frustrating as shit gets, do not trash talk your spouse to your kids. And if you’re really trying to explain to them why your spouse is hurting you, you better be as innocent as you portray yourself. I took my dad’s words to heart and despised my mom through my teen years, only to come around in my 20s and realized it was my dad who was the mean one. The stories didn’t add up. I mean, he literally complained to me once (after I saw the truth) that my mom withheld sex for 2 years for some bullshit set of reasons that included everything except himself. It was pretty clear at that point she had no interest in the miserable old man he became, along with him watching political “news” all day, complaining about dinner not being done, not cleaning, etc.

Kids see everything. They aren’t naive forever.