Let me just start off saying I have been an A+ dad...classroom time, pickups and dropoffs, field trips, homeschool for a few years, tucking her in and making her breakfast. I'm not a deadbeat looking to dump my kids off and disappear. I walked into divorce armed to the teeth to fight for a 70-30 custody and ready to die on the 50-50 hill, and STBX lined up to do the same. Hear me out.

I'm just starting divorce after my STBX left me with the kid and running off to chase a job. Called a lawyer and they say I have a case for full custody and with the ex in another state, I should be good for 70-30 parent time. I am entrenched for this battle. I've been SAHD so at first I thought good, this is what i fight for. Now the ex is back and wants the kid to go with her for high school. She decorated her room, has high schools lined up, and gifts waiting. Kid wants to go, not because these are maybe the "best things" for her but because mom is playing to her wants. STBX will win that game every time because she has money from a big career and I am barely employed mostly SAHD.

I had bigger aspirations for my girl: she loves the ocean and with me we travel around to beach cleanups and turtle rescues and so on. So I would move her to a beach town where she goes to high school but pursues that passion if it is what she wants. I haven't said anything because I don't know how this divorce is going to go, and giving her hope that won't happen isn't fair. She is still a kid.

Well, talking to my bro about kid wanting to go to high school with mom, he had a different take: we both agree kid should be able to decide. I can't move back near the ex tho--we moved to get away from stress and an unhealthy life, and I don't want to go back. I can't afford to go back unless I get a really generous spousal support. I was about to retire and spend my days bonding with the kid and the STBX, until STBX changed her mind and flushed that plan. I'm doing good now where I am, and so is the kid. We are healthy.

Bro says, go live your life. Tell your kid she's growing up fast and you respect her choice to go live with mom if that's what she wants. She can hear what I have to offer but she gets to choose. Let her know I'll be right here for her when she needs me. She can have great visits and if she sees what she likes in my life she can always come back. Mom wants to do all the child rearing that I've been doing all along, as the kid begins to break away in her teenage years, let her. STBX has never had to wake her up and get her to school, and she always let me deal with the meltdowns. That was my job and I did it for her. Homework, afterschool, summer care I did it all so she could go work. I go back and it'll be no time before she's dumping as much of that on me as she can anyway, but she says she wants it, let her have it.

This goes against every bit of advice here: divorced dad needs to be there for everything, even if it means some stupid 2-2-5-5 alternating weekend schedule, dropoffs there and holidays here BS that makes everything nice and fair for the parents but scrambled for the kid. That never seemed right to me, and this is a teenager we're talking about. I was there holding her hand in 2-6th grades, but she doesn't want or need that anymore. Most dads are less involved than I've ever been. Yes, everybody is going to look at me as being selfish and abandoning my kid. Fuck them, they have no idea.

Couple other things: reconcilliation is a no-go. STBX took a dump on that with her opening shots. Same with some nesting idea or something like that. I can technically move back in next door or w/e, but it was stressful city life that wasn't working for any of us. STBX put her hoof down and wants it, so she can have it. It's not for me.

Thoughts, both on this perspective and how to make it work.