I’m a 39-year-old father in New York, and I’m preparing to move forward with divorce. We have a young daughter, and she is everything to me. I’m struggling with a lot of guilt, even though deep down I feel like this is the only path forward.

The marriage has been unhealthy for a long time. There has been a lot of verbal disrespect, accusations, blame, family involvement, and emotional pressure. I’ve been called a bad father, had my character attacked, and often felt like every conflict turned into me having to defend myself as a person instead of solving the actual issue.

Now that divorce is becoming real, my wife has been trying hard to reconcile. She says she wants to change and keep the family together for our daughter. The hard part is that the same conversations still include blame, guilt, pressure, and comments that make me feel like she is trying to rewrite the history of what happened.

She has also been mixing reconciliation with co-parenting issues, supplies, access to our daughter, and emotional messages like “we are your family” and “you are hurting my feelings.” When I try to keep communication focused on our daughter, she keeps pulling it back to the marriage, whether I still love her, whether we can come back together, etc.

I’m trying to stay calm and not take the bait. I’m trying to keep everything in writing, keep my responses short, and focus only on our daughter, scheduling, supplies, and necessary logistics. I do not want to be cruel or petty. I just want peace, stability, and a healthy co-parenting arrangement.

One of the hardest parts is the guilt. I worry about the impact on my daughter. I worry about being judged. I worry that her family only knows one side of the story and thinks I just kicked them out or gave up. I also hear cultural/family pressure that being divorced with a child will make life harder going forward.

But I also know I can’t stay in a toxic marriage just because I’m scared of what comes next.

For the fathers here, especially anyone who went through divorce/custody in New York:

How did you handle the guilt before filing/serving?

Did things get worse when your spouse realized the divorce was actually happening?

What helped you get meaningful parenting time?

What did the court/mediator actually care about in practice?

How important was documentation of texts, parenting time, supplies, and communication?

What mistakes should I avoid early on?

How did you keep calm when your spouse kept mixing reconciliation, blame, and access to the child?

I’m not looking to destroy anyone. I’m not trying to keep my daughter away from her mother. I just want to be an active father, have real parenting time, and get out of a toxic dynamic without losing myself.

Any reassurance or practical advice from men who have been through this would really help right now.