Children and Divorce

When you explain divorce, children are likely to be emotional, completely detached, or somewhere in between. Whatever their reaction is their reaction is perfectly normal for them. Some children are truly fearful about what it means to get divorced. Children, for the most part, are generally familiar with some idea of alternative family lifestyles. However, they may have the wrong impressions.

Your children might know single mothers who never take their children to see their fathers. This might give them the impression that they are not likely to see their father after the divorce. Children often associate what they know with their own parallels. If your child knows that their friend’s daddy went to jail for being mean to their friend’s mommy, they may not clearly understand what divorce is between people who are not abusive to each other.

Listen to their questions carefully and do not assume that children of divorce really understand what divorce entails. They might show concerns about where everyone is going to live, including the family pets, and they want to know that they will still feel safe in the morning when they wake up. They want to know if their parents are going to come through for them. They want to know if they are suddenly going to be poor because their classmate has a deadbeat parent. These are real concerns for children that might not have anything to do with the reality of your divorce.

Even the youngest of children need to feel secure. They might want to know that the parent that is moving out is going to be happy, safe, and involved. The parent that breaks their promise to stay involved is the parent that breaks the trust of a child who needs security. Parents need to work together to give children of divorce a feeling of security and love while still being parents and disciplinarians.

Children of divorce are not destined for emotional problems, and parents should not start treating them like they have emotional problems just because they are now like half the other kids in the world. It is not impossible for parents to assume that their kids are taking the divorce harder than they are. Many kids are aware that there are serious problems between parents well before the divorce. Listening to children is vital during and after the divorce. If you listen to the concerns and the worries of the child, you will have a better idea of which concerns to address.