Tag: divorce

Featured

Telling the Children

On By BarryIn Before Separation, Children

Our experience working with over 600 parents finds that telling the children about the breaking up in a meaningful and purposeful way is rarely done. Parents find many excuses for NOT doing so:

  • they hate tough conversations
  • they worry it may lead to tears or fighting
  • they are feeling a sense of failure
  • they wish to avoid open parental conflict
  • they assume the children probably know
  • they feel ill prepared
  • etc., etc.

Stumbling about is not an effective parenting strategy, and not talking to your child(ren) is a serious misstep in the long term. As parents you want to mitigate their fears, insecurity and uncertainty as best as you can. To do this, you need to work together to  prepare a plan for how to inform your children while also anticipating their fears and questions.

The joint concepts of a no-fault divorce and family renewal are valuable tools as you enter the unfamiliar world of separation. Together, you can use these concepts to prepare a script to help you navigate the emotional and often unpredictable family conference with a common goal: helping your family to heal and grow through the changes to come.

Common Questions by Children:

  1. Where will we kids live?
  2. Where will mom live? Where will dad live?
  3. Who will keep me safe?
  4. Will we go to the same school?
  5. Who gets the dog?
  6. Will we see grandma and grandpa?
  7. Will we be poor?
  8. Who will take care of me when I am sick?
  9. Who will take me to piano lessons?
  10. When will I see mom or dad?
  11. Who will sign my permission slips and my report card?

Older children may be more pointed!

  1. Why?
  2. Why can’t you work it out?
  3. How could you just stop loving her/him?
  4. How am I going to be able to go to university?

Explaining the reason for separating is often very difficult.

There are so many possibilities and for the listener some may seem to be simply a lame excuse and for others perfectly acceptable. Perhaps the most difficult explanation could be infidelity. Do you ignore the question or rip the other parent? The following is offered by Judith Wallerstein: What About the Kids.

‘If you have the courage to do so simply tell them that their mom or dad loves another person more and they cannot live together anymore. Leave out details like, “they have been sleeping with someone else”.

Finding an acceptable framework for explaining the separating is helpful in the long-term. It allows you to confine your anger or guilt so that it doesn’t damage your day to day parenting. An explanation that I found helpful is that as intimate partners we stopped taking care of each other over a prolonged period of time. This is what I call the mutual no-fault explanation or the mutual both parties at fault explanation. Good people, good parents, who tried their best together; and hopefully will do their best as parents going forward. My experience is that my children appreciated my approach in the long-run.

Is it Ever Too Late to Tell the Children?

It is never too late to tell the children with the no-fault approach.

This is your opportunity to be the parent you wish to be at a time when you may feel like a failure as a parent. It is the first and most important step toward family renewal for your now changing family!

Open Letter: Personal Recovery

On By BarryIn Fathers, Mothers, Open Letter

Recovery

Where are you on road to recovery? What does the choice to separate feel like? Does it feel like a necessary, but difficult choice? Does it feel like a weight has been taken off your shoulders now that your unhappiness is in the open? Are you feeling overwhelmed or paralyzed by the decisions that have to be made? Do you feel like a failure as a parent, intimate partner and provider? Are you surprised by your partner’s reaction? How did the children react to the news? Did each child react very differently and as such display different parenting issues? Are your extended family and friends supportive or judgmental? The questions about personal recovery are never-ending, but important.

A Personal Story

I thought that I was prepared for the separation. My children’s mother and I had a civil conversation about the separating process and how we would tell our parents and friends in a no-fault explanation. I had agreed (for no reason other than caretaking) to leave the matrimonial home for a room in a friend’s parents’ home.

As soon as I started the 30-minute drive to my new place, I became desperate, lonely and overwhelmed with grief and loss.

I would describe myself normally as a rock, but the next day as I drove past a swamp on my left it took everything not to swerve off the road. It was the first time in my life that I had such dark thoughts. That troubled moment has remained in my memory for 30 years.

Separating and separating by leaving your children and family home is an experience that we are ill prepared for no matter our gender or our position on separating.

I offer this anecdote because it is a common experience.

It is important that a plan is in place for future, sharing/spending time with your children before leaving the home. DO NOT ASSUME that it will all be worked out . . . eventually. Recovery is more difficult for a parent who is not seeing or assured that they will be with their children on a predictable, regular schedule, sooner than later. Consider a mediator or another suitable professional to work out an interim parenting plan prior to anyone leaving the family home, if possible.

In this site’s resources there are readings that may meet where you are in the separating process. Dealing with the different stages of grief—similar to the death of a loved one—may be the best starting point. Many authors focus on the journey that most separated parents go through in some way.

Resilience

Your resilience is perhaps the most important gift that you can showcase to your children. Resilience will serve you well. Included in the readings are research on the prevalence of depression for fathers and mothers going through a separation. Remember, for many parents the separation often follows many months, even years, of feeling low or worse. Many parents experience what is called situational depression depression directly triggered by the separation and the many negative outcomes that are directly related.

The most significant of these outcomes are almost always connected to the challenges faced in every important relationship.

Going Forward

Included among our resources are book recommendations and personal stories that our 600+ clients found to be supportive in their journey to personal survival and even family renewal. Please take time to consider the resources on mental health and depression, as these things can have direct consequences upon your children and your workplace. Many of the resources available on this site are intended to inspire or to awaken us to the changes taking place in every intimate, family relationship. There is going to be a great deal on your plate for some time, and many will be parenting or relationship problems you have never before encountered. Support groups or educational seminars may provide similar understanding and a sense of comradery with fellow travelers on this journey of separation.

Books and resources can provide an understanding of what was going on in the chaos of your family’s life. I considered those books I encountered in my own journey to be lifesaving, for they provided insight that cut through the chaos and restored some form of equilibrium. I found comfort in learning that those things that were happening in my life had happened to many others. It didn’t always solve the specific issues, but it removed doubt about my own sanity and what I was facing going forward. That was very important!

Featured

The Family Conference

On By BarryIn Before Separation, Children, Fathers, Mothers

The family conference—coming together and discussing the coming changes for the family—is a scary and unpredictable time. Every member of the family will bring their own particular vulnerabilities to the discussion, which makes it all the more important that you as parents feel as prepared as possible.

There is, in our view, a parenting obligation to do a script and for both parents to participate in talking to the children. The parties do not need to be together in the room. One can follow the other in talking to the children. The common script for ‘difficult’ situations can be done with the help of a family counsellor and they can provide additional support or context in the conference. Intimate partner abuse, child abuse allegations and mental health concerns are a few situations that may require additional support in this phase.

Preparing a script for navigating the family conference

  • Remember the no-fault approach
  • Each parent should assess the challenges facing each child prior to the conference. Consider their age, childhood stage, uniqueness of each child, relationship with each parent or sibling, etc. There is an impact on every child in every stage of life.
  • Parents can then compare their thoughts prior to a family conference. This will allow them to begin the process of creating an appropriate interim parenting plan and the groundwork for a long-term plan.
  • Decide on an interim parenting plan prior to the family conference. Practical questions need to be answered and explained. A parent that suddenly disappears does not support shared parenting. An interim parenting arrangement should maximize parent-child engagement in the now changing family. In some ways this is a trial agreement. Be flexible based on the feedback from the children.
  • The agreement should be initialed by each parent and witnessed. If this is too formal, it is perhaps a good idea to inform parents or good friends of your initial plan. You may need an outside support to help you live with the agreement in the short run.

The Family Conference Dynamics

  • If possible, do the conference together, and take as much time as necessary. You have developed a script using the no-fault plan and have anticipated possible questions. The key and most difficult question is why you are separating. There are of course many difficult explanations where one partner feels aggrieved by the other partner. There are ways to do an explanation that follow the no-fault concept.
  • If possible do the explanation conference at a minimum of 2-3 days ahead of either parent leaving the family home.
  • Children at different ages, stages, gender, special needs and attachments may have very different reactions. Your preparation may still fall short. Remember the framework that you and your child’s other parent developed.
  • Often your sense of personal unhappiness and damage to the family is not the child’s view of their world. Children only know their family’s dynamics i.e. they understand their family and have no real comparison. Children generally choose an intact family over separation.
  • Some children (usually over age 10) have a distorted view of one parent and have already entered this family conference with their own judgment of blame or blamelessness. The separating had begun months earlier by one parent and this had the consequence of isolating one parent from the children. Both parents have an important challenge in this situation. The blamed parent must not be thrown off and hurt; the favoured parent has a responsibility for the child’s sake to gently move the child to a healthier place.
  • At the conference it is possible to remind the children that the family continues on in a changed form. Both parents are going to continue to be part of the child’s activities and school life, etc. Don’t minimize the change but don’t exaggerate the complete separateness of the children from either parent or extended family.
  • The atmosphere that you create in the meeting hopefully allows the children to express their feelings of anger and sadness; anger and sadness are natural emotions here. It provides an opportunity to be reassuring. Be the best listener. It is a valuable skill going forward.
  • If the children are quiet (very possible) anticipate questions that are unasked.
  • Plan a second meeting with a specific time i.e. two weeks later. It is easy to let it go because it is so uncomfortable for you as parents. Some of this discussion will simply be a blur to children. It is likely that the on-ground changes will prompt more questions and a need to review and even adjust the original plan.
  • Take a moment to assess the meeting and don’t be afraid to compliment the other parent for the way they managed the meeting. This is laying the groundwork for future success as separated parents.
  • Do your own post meeting assessment- a parent feedback session. Keep it civil.
  • Small successes need to be recognized. This is very tough ‘stuff’. Your interactions are observed by your children. They see and hear everything in their changing world. They can become a caretaker for one or both parents or isolate themselves from both parents. Neither option is healthy. Many children have friends that are from two homes and may appear accepting of this dramatic change. There is likely much more going on inside the child.

No-Fault Divorce and Family Renewal

On By BarryIn Before Separation, Fathers, Mothers

Even at the worst of times, each parent must keep in mind the twin concepts of no-fault divorce and family renewal. The first supports parents in achieving the goal to discover calm out of the chaos of emotions that are swirling inside each parent. Renewal is about optimism about what is achievable. Together, these concepts can help you to navigate the challenging conversations ahead—with each other, with the children, with friends and family—by uniting your efforts in a common vision. The alternative is simply to act in survival and to live life in and out of chaos for years or even a lifetime.

The No-Fault Approach

The reason for a separation for most parties is normally irrelevant to the legal process. Almost every former partner eventually gains perspective for the reason for their failed intimate relationship. Research indicates that women/mothers are more likely to trigger the actual separation. This doesn’t mean they were the cause—only the eventual decision-maker. Dads are more likely to be out of the home (at least without the children) than mothers when the separation begins.

The legal concept of no-fault divorce is an effort to end drawn out litigation over the cause of a separation. Unfortunately the good intention of no-fault divorce often is lost to conflicts over parenting access and a legal process that is adversarial and combative. It is, however, a worthy concept.

Collaborative law has become an alternative legal approach that has recent favour. The collaborative process is endorsed by this project and you are encouraged to access the Legal section. We are not necessarily proponents for the legal system’s version of collaborative law.

The question for every professional from you:

“Do you (professional) have the tools to help our family make it through the chaos and anger so that our children have the best opportunity to have the love and support of both parents and extended families forever?”

Family Renewal

Renewal is possible if each parent truly takes ownership of their most important focus as separating parents—namely, that each parent loves their children more than they are angry with the other parent.

If either parent is unable to affirm that statement then they need to find support that helps them to meet their parenting responsibility.

To separate or not to separate?

On By BarryIn Before Separation, Parents

The initial reason to end an intimate relationship with children is often unclear to one or both parties. It may simply be the accumulation of factors that have resulted in the gradual end of intimacy and supportive caring. 

The consequence is that the actual process of separating may take many different forms. They may range from a single, precipitating event to a drip, drip, drip separating i.e. continued co-habiting without intimacy. Some separating parents have an opportunity for a ‘rebuild’ and others less so.

Second thoughts in a calm environment can lead to finding the right professional services to support this process. Even if the parents decide to separate, a calm approach is more likely to create conditions for a parent and child friendly future.

If one parent is very comfortable that separating is the right decision, then that must be accepted and should not cloud respectful decisions re: parenting the children.

 If getting past the choice to separate by the other parent is too difficult or blocking your way to compromise or personal recovery, then you need to seek professional support. In addition, it is often helpful to find a friend that is able to provide trusted feedback to you re: your state of mind and the choices that you are considering. This has risk for your friendship and needs to be done with agreement on the rules for openness. An honest discussion about what you need could open the conversation. On the other hand, continuing, destructive behaviors may have serious consequences on the friendship and many other relationships. Many family member and close friends can be lost to a chaotic process.

 This is a critical moment for many significant relationships in your life- not just your (former) intimate partner.

Entering the FRRP with an expectation to rebuild an intact relationship potentially is going to have negative outcomes (anger/frustration). Let the relationship play itself out. Rarely can you persuade the other person to make a different choice. The other partner has to come to that choice.

 Time is often required! If both parents go through the FRRP and one person decides that separation is right for them, then finding your path to acceptance and personal recovery is necessary. The final decision by one party to separate can trigger a return to anger, despair and sadness. This is the time when poor choices are often made.

Separating: Is there a better way?

 Remember the obvious- separations rarely occur because the partners are feeling good about the other partner. In fact, many signs have likely been available for some time about one or both party’s unhappiness. Sometimes this lack of togetherness has been masked by busyness at work or through a focus on a child (ren) engaged in activities. One or both parents may have found it convenient to deny the reality of a distancing intimacy.

A few considerations to avoid negative triggers:

  1. Don’t put off a conversation about your intimate relationship. It may feel dangerous; but ignore at your own peril. Many couples have been sleeping alone upstairs/downstairs for months.

This ‘arrangement’ can change in a moment i.e. ‘a dead relationship walking’; so we need to be aware of that possibility and the anger that can accompany such a change. Separating needs to be done by agreement, not following a heated argument that can have lasting, negative outcomes.

  • The matrimonial home: Preferably I don’t believe that either parent should leave the family home unless they have negotiated and signed off on a basic, interim parenting plan. A possible interim parenting plan is offered in the attachments.
  •  This site provides a process for the parents to explain to the children in an age appropriate way what is taking place and to answer any questions. See the sections on talking to the children and stages of development.
  •  There needs to be no rush to finalize anything! An interim parenting plan may provide some breathing room. An interim plan is not a comprehensive, separation agreement and not considered problems may surface. The principles of the agreement and the ultimate goals should govern these concerns. It is important to remember that children need their parents to be a model of civility. The mere fact of your separation triggers uncertainty, doubts and questions often left unasked by you children. They are constantly sensing everything that is going on.
  •  Remember that common parental fear re: losing your child in the separating process. A small success leads to further successes. Can you both attend school or extracurricular activities? Can you communicate about medical issues re: your children? Can you make the occasional parenting switch to deal with life? This immediate transition period is about rebuilding parenting trust at a time when relationship trust has been damaged.

             ‘The act of divorce in itself is not dishonourable; but we are meant to be conscious about the manner in which we conduct ourselves during the process of recanting our vows.’ (Carolyn Myss, Anatomy of the Spirit)

A Personal Story of Separating

It was a sunny March afternoon when I departed the family home. My three children (ages 12, 16, 19) were doing what they do on a Saturday afternoon. My wife and I had deferred the separating or not conversation for some time; but for some reason the conversation had begun anew in the past few days and I for some unknown reason agreed to be the one to leave the home. In some ways, that most important second decision (who would leave) was taken for granted. I insisted that everyone that mattered understood that there was no fault by myself or perhaps more accurately that fault lay in equal portions between us. For some reason it seemed important in the lead up to this day that friends and extended family understood this no-fault/mutual fault thing?

The leaving for many fathers is a default position where we are still in our caretaking role and our belief that we can handle living with less comfort and without children.

I had arranged to stay at a colleague’s in-laws’ home. What I thought was a basement apartment was a small Room with a shared bathroom.  I unpacked my bag of a few items and sat there pondering the future. I had spent no time preparing for this moment!

Leaving the family home without my children was immediately devastating/overwhelming. I was totally unprepared for the impact. Sleep would not be my companion that night as I processed the past decisions. The night before leaving I slept on my 12 year old daughter’s bedroom floor beside her bed. I prayed that she would somehow sense that I loved her forever …through whatever. I feared that she was at the most vulnerable stage.

I decided to return to the family home the next morning to tell my children’s mother my plight. She was insistent that we had made an agreement and that I should honour it. It was an emotional conversation!

 I recall the journey home that morning and my emotional vulnerability after that first night outside of ‘our’ home and my children. The familiar drive took me by a swamp that I barely noted in the past. I had this powerful urge to drive straight into the beckoning darkness and simply end the pain. Most people who know me would suggest that I was normally the rock in the family; yet within twenty-four hours I had entered a dark place, unknown in my pre-separating life.

 One change had taken place following my short return ‘visit’ to my family home. My 16 year old daughter chose to live with me. She packed a few things and returned to the Room. I don’t know if I was supposed to tell her to remain in the family home with all her middle class comfort.  I was probably selfish at that moment. I knew the role of being a parent. I desperately needed to be reminded that I was indeed a parent and that just maybe that would not disappear.

That night as my daughter slept in our 10 by 10 Room, I pondered from my bed on the floor what the next step would be. I remember the mixture of feeling like a failure as a father, an intimate partner and a provider.

My daughter’s choice brought on that second evening thankfulness over despair. I had my swamp moment for the only time in this journey. I recall it still as if yesterday and of course the blessing of my daughter who reminded me that I was still a dad! I have never forgotten that gift.

Lessons

 My personal story is about thinking that you understand what is about to take place. Probably not! a) The swamp moment was not in my plan; b) life without my children-even for a day-was not in my plan; c) life outside the family home was not in my plan; d) my daughter moving out to live with me was not in my plan; e) splitting the children was not in my plan; f) etc.

The decision to separate triggers emotions that can shock and disappoint you about yourself and/or your former intimate partner. At the same time, life continues in ways that you may be ill-prepared.

Judith Wallerstein (What About the Kids) suggests there are three immediate challenges that every separated parent faces simultaneously with the emotional turmoil that may grip you in the first days, weeks, and months.

  1. Getting your life under control. Restoring yourself and rebuilding your supports.
  2. You must prepare the children for the break-up and support them through the crisis.
  3. Create a new relationship between you and you former intimate partner and the other parent in your children’s lives.

Comments

Many (most) parents are dealing with at minimum a low level of depression prior to separating. The actual triggering of the separation often unleashes more emotions and may deepen depression.

As parents, we often at this moment focus on our children (rightly so); but this can add to our own sense of failure. We feel an obligation to take care of everyone else –children and grandparents.

Caring for ourselves must be an ongoing process; it is important to find moments immediately where you build in your day activities that distract you from your current day-to-day crisis.

Make a list of 3-5 such activities that could fit your daily schedule.

Obsessiveness. It is very easy to fall into this trap. You may become very easily a non-stop talker and non-stop thinker about what is taking place in your family life. Your time with the kids is more nervous than ‘normal’- even interrogating children. Your time with friends and colleagues is about bending their ear or hearing them armchair quarterback your situation.

Self-Discipline. Allocate a limited time to focus on the different relationship problems. Obsessiveness leads only to circular thinking and saps your energy. Find time that is free from your normal routine.

In our section on talking to the children, there is an approach that reinforces a no-fault explanation and advocates for a two- parent involvement approach. The more that you own this approach you will be supporting all parties through the crisis.

The children’s health has positive consequences on your mental health.

Accept that parenting is much harder in a separating family on almost every possible front. It is also doable!

Both parents need to make a list of significant others in each child’s life who should be updated on the family situation i.e. teachers, coaches, caregivers, etc. They can be a valuable resource. Again, a no-fault approach should be employed. Do not enlist people in personal day-to-day updates re: perceived failings of the child’s other parent.

Accept that you can’t make everything perfect for your children. You weren’t able to do so in the intact family – don’t add unnecessary emotional baggage. Don’t turn the children into your comfort blanket. It is too easy to do and it is likely to turn them off the other parent OR lead them to escape your smothering.

Your relationship with your children changes in many ways.

List how it has changed already!

 If you try to insist that there is to be no change, it is likely that you are insisting on pushing the other parent away.

The new relationship with the other parent begins with how you separate and the approach on explaining the separation to the children.

Our emotional state can have long-lasting consequences. You must ignore the hurtful, emotional response and remain focused on positive outcomes for the children and thus yourself.

adult child and elderly mom on beach

Older Children and Separation

On By BarryIn Before Separation, Children
adult child and elderly mom on beach

The Forgotten Children in a Family Separation

Older children are a growing and somewhat forgotten age group. Many separating parents wait until their children grow to a certain age (late-adolescence or early 20s) to make the separation a reality. They expect their ‘adult’ child to be able to accept and manage the separation. After all, these young people are rarely at home and often appear remarkably independent.

I would advise separating parents to take a few moments and make a list of all the disruptions and concerns that your child will likely have to accept or endure from your separation. Below are a few possibilities, though they don’t exhaust the reactions of this group. Recognize that the optics of the separation may play an important part in their reaction , such as who appears responsible for causing the separation and who is the ‘victim’. The concept of ‘no-fault’ divorce is unlikely to find quiet acceptance here.

A family unit that has only known being intact, even through considerable parental unhappiness, is all that the children have known. For some parents at this stage there is a defiant ‘I have been unhappy long enough by remaining in a loveless marriage, it is my time to find happiness’ position. That is not an unreasonable feeling but one also needs to be sensitive to where your children are on this parental ‘failure’. Otherwise your search for personal happiness may be cut short by guilt and loss.

Anticipating Challenges

A parental split rarely if ever goes as planned in what I would call an ‘adult’ or ‘no-fault ‘way. In addition there is the added likelihood that families with two or more mid-adolescent children may see the children live with different parents. The intact family can often become the ‘splintered family’ with many unintended outcomes that can become too long-lasting. Regaining an enduring life-long parenting relationship may have to be accomplished within limited, reduced opportunities with your child. Different perspectives among older children can cause serious rifts that can be long-lasting.

This is a reminder that every relationship is tested by the way parents separate. Unintended negative outcomes are more likely to endure when older children are no longer under the same roof because there is less together time to repair the damage and to work it through. In addition each sibling relationship within the intact family has its own history based on age, personality, parental connection, etc.

Planning to Tell the Older Children

Below is a partial list of reactions. Please compile your own list for each child and if possible bring those lists together as parents prior to a more formal separating conversation with your child. Reactions are very individual and may include many mixed reactions:

  • Older children often believe in ‘rescuing’ the ‘wronged’ parent.
  • Older children often blame one parent and see the other parent as being abandoned.
  • Older children may also decide to live their life separate from one or both parents.

When discussing the plan to separate with your older children, please consider these points:

  • Offer older children a grown-up, age-appropriate explanation that is honest without defamation.
  • Let your grown children know that they are not expected to take sides in the separation process.
  • Let your children know that the shared history you have built together as a family will not be forgotten or dismissed.
  • Find ways to manage family events and include extended family and grandparents.
  • Plan in advance how matters such as inheritance, education, and financial support will be managed so that any practical questions can be answered.

Resource Recap: What about the Kids by Judith Wallenstein and Sandra Blakeslee

On By BarryIn Resource Recap

The book What about the Kids by Judith Wallenstein and Sandra Blakeslee is a good place to start when unpacking the personal impact of separation. See my notes here that I recorded while reading and using this resource in support group facilitation.

Introduction

  • After a divorce, you find yourself feeling alone, confused, in a state of shock. You struggle to get out  of bed each day, and must deal with your whimpering, red-eyed children who haven’t slept.
  • A divorce can be described as technicolour. What lies ahead?
  • A marriage licence makes any kind of marriage possible, and a divorce sets in motion the post-divorce family.
  • How will you and your spouse get along after the breakup?
  • The first challenge is to get your life under control, to literally restore yourself and rebuild your social supports.
  • The second challenge involves you and your children. You must prepare them for the breakup and to support them through the crisis.
  • The third challenge is to create a new relationship between you and your ex-partner.
  • All three challenges begin the day you decide to divorce and lasts until death. It’s for this reason that divorces can be so hard and have no benefits.
  • If you meet all three challenges, you open yourself up to new opportunities in life and put the disappointments of marriage behind you.
  • The turning points are numerous, the danger points are unexpected, but so are the opportunities.    
  • Many things change when you divorce and go to college graduations, weddings, visits with grandchildren, etc.
  • Parenting is always a hazardous undertake.
  • Parenting in a divorced or remarried family is harder. You are blinded by emotions and events out of your control.
  • How could a child not be affected by the major changes that divorce and remarriage bring?
  • Divorced families are altogether different from intact families.
  • Your relationships with your children change the day you separate.
  • Crisis peaks when divorce papers are filed.
  • Does an outgoing personality help?
  • If you’re in the thick of a crisis, you can look up specific ideas about your three-year-old who won’t go to bed, your eight-year-old who is having trouble at school, or your fifteen-year-old who is angry all the time.
  • One reason divorced families have problems is because most people don’t have the help that they need.
  • If you’re a child of divorce, your own journey down this road will be complicated by your earlier life experiences.
  • Stay cool when telling the children; avoid the blame game but take responsibility for the breakdown.
  • Be honest and recognize the gravity of the situation; this allows children to begin the process that they must inevitably go through without feeling guilty or responsible.
  • Explain to them that they will always have their family- the family will change though.
  • Encourage them to say what they are fearing, or questioning-children are often very pragmatic and as they reach adolescence can be judgmental.
  • Provide the short- and medium-term plans; but be prepared for pushback- especially from preteens onward.
  • Consider their feedback seriously- appreciate their input- be receptive but don’t forfeit your parental responsibility.
  • Try to maintain routines in the short-term plans- commitments to activities, etc.
  • Try to be appropriately positive about your joint commitment to ensure joint parenting in some form.
  • Be pragmatic with an element of flexibility- it can be overwhelming.
  • Remember your children are very different and have different parent child relationships. Children may desire different parenting arrangements and even split with their siblings.

Take Care of Yourself

  • Parents can’t help their children until they’ve thought about themselves, about where they’re coming from.
  • Once you’ve decided that it’s really over, you’ll have set into motion the task of becoming a different person, and to your surprise, a different kind of parent.
  • Your decision to divorce not only marks the end of a marriage, but the formation of a new kind of family.
  • What you’re feeling today is probably not going to be relevant to your life in three, five, or ten years from now.
  • There are steps you can take to ease our immediate pain, but the really hard work comes one day and then one year at a time with changes that ricochet into your life and into the lives of your children.
  • You can’t become an effective parent until you’ve regained your footing and begun to repair the damage done by the failed marriage and the inevitable stresses of the divorce.
  • How far or fast it all happens depends on how you respond to the challenges and frustrations that lie ahead.
  • If you get caught up in the image of having failed in your marriage your parenting will be burdened.
  • If you find yourself raging at your husband or wife, it doesn’t matter if you’re right. What matters is being enraged will eclipse your ability to be a good parent. It clouds your judgement and makes it hard to take care of your children or see your children as being separate from you. You have different needs and priorities at different ages. It also makes it harder to be a compassionate parent.
  • In a normal situation, only one partner wants to get a divorce.
  • Divorce creates two separate single parents with two homes, two sets of furniture, two refrigerators, and separate insurance policies.
  • You are responsible for the well-being, discipline and entertainment of the children under your roof.
  • Co-parenting after divorce is not the same as within a marriage.
  • Divorce forces you to become a new person.
  • A birth certificate didn’t turn you into a parent, you remade yourself into a parent.
  • You find yourself waking up in the middle of the night to carry out new and unfamiliar duties.
  • Many psychological changes occur over time in both you and your ex-partner. After weeks, months or even years, of feeling shaky and bewildered, there comes a psychological moment when you become this new person.
  • You are a new person when you finally stop feeling like a failure, and you feel free, even hopeful, and can make decisions without trembling inside.
  • At some point, every person must face up to the hurt and disappointment that go with a failed marriage and the continuing tensions of the divorce.
  • In a divorce, it’s letting go of the memories collected over many years of being together.
  • Mourning loss is a process that takes time. But you must know that after divorce you enter a new attachment with your former partner, one that is not born of love but one that arises from the role of co-parenting.
  • Divorce is the end of love and the persistence of attachment.
  • As human beings, we’re blessed and damned with memories.
  • Before you can give your children the attention they need, you need to gain control of your own emotions in general.
  • People who have been wonderful parents and rarely raised their voices in anger slam doors on their children, cry in closets, and erupt in anger over nothing in particular.
  • Your children often remind you that you have big responsibilities, and that is the last thing you want to think about. Many children are terrified by the change in a parent’s behaviour.
  • In your weakened condition, you are called on to be wiser than you’ve ever been before.
  • The more chaos, the crankier your children become, the more they scream at each other, and the more you’re going to lose self-control.
  • Men and women face different challenges when telling the kids.   
  • If you’re a man who never took care of your kids day-to-day, welcome to Home Economics 101.
  • Whether you do or don’t get along, the ties that bind you together still hold.
  • You have financial obligations with less power.
  • Your task is to make the most of a part-time role that you share with a woman who is no longer central in your life.
  • You cannot decide on an impulse to take the kids to Disneyland.
  • You can’t suddenly decide to change their schedules, diet, or bedtime.
  • If you’re a mother, you also continue to be responsible for your children but you’ll have less power in deciding how to raise them.
  • It won’t do any good to tell the something if you are worrying about it in your mind.

On Anger

  • If you’ve been betrayed, you may feel ashamed and wounded.
  • Many people find that anger makes them feel good. It can make you feel righteous, if not saintly. You can first use your anger to mobilize yourself.
  • You may enjoy blaming the other as arch villain and this can block you.
  • You’re free to organize your new life as you see fit.
  • Anger can persuade you that you’ll do things differently this time around.
  • You can regain self-control and understand the roots of the fury that had spilled onto your innocent child.
  • You can’t help your children make decisions after if you’re driven by rage.
  • No one can overcome your anger for you. Most people let go of anger to regain control.
  • If you’re alone and unhappy while your ex-partner is dating other people, your mind can turn any relationship into a torrid romance.
  • If you are the victim of jealous fantasies and threats have been made against you, you are urged to take them seriously and seek protection from the police.
  • If your energy goes into how hurt you are, how can you gather the strength to move forward in your life?
  • Anger blocks the kind of self-scrutiny that you need in order to change. 
  • There is no substitute for what you say to yourself.
  • Most people can help make the transition to the “new you”.
  • Being a good parent during this transition helps diminish the grief, guilt, and tremendous upheaval that divorce causes.

Setting Routines and Structure

  • Children must feel safe going back and forth between homes.
  • The must learn to master the calendar, going to and from houses.
  • The ability to do so depends on how quickly the household is restored.
  • Routines are disrupted after the divorce. Bedtime often becomes hit or miss.
  • Many school-aged children get themselves up in the morning, make lunch, take themselves to class, clothes don’t get washed regularly.
  • A suggestion box is a good way to share ideas and make sure everyone’s thoughts are heard.
  • A chores and rules chart is a good way to keep track.
  • Orderliness is important.
  • Young children miss you and don’t understand why you’re always gone.
  • They must understand why you need money and why it’s important for you to work.
  • If you work more hours than before, explain to your children that you’re more available to work more now and that you need the money.
  • Regular bedtime is very important.
  • People who have experienced radical changes in their lives make transitions difficult.
  • Rituals aren’t expendable just because you feel pressed for time.
  • Rituals such as kissing your child good-bye are important.
  • Children have to know who will be home for dinner, and what hour dinner is at.
  • Child who worry about rituals can’t sit comfortably through class.
  • They may be worried, having observed your frantic pace of life.
  • Assign chores to each child and reward them.
  • Provide pleasures to offset the pain of the breakup.
  • Asking older children to help with younger ones is ok, as long as you realize that they are still children too.
  • Make sure the lines of discipline are the same across both parents.
  • Reduce conflict by arranging after-school activities for each child.
  • Keep an eye on younger children.
  • After a divorce, older children are often given power to exert over younger children.
  • Dinner represents a time of coming together of the family. It should not be a dreary time, or a time of watching tv.
  • Try to get up early enough to help your children get ready for school.
  • Children of divorce often show up at school without lunches or proper clothes for the weather.
  • Strict control is more important after divorce but harder to enforce. This is the time to rein in your child.
  • Each child should know your cell number and how to reach you in an emergency. This relieves anxiety.
  • Tell them that if anything ever goes wrong, you’re only a phone call away.
  • The need for structure addresses both parents. Both of you must provide this kind of help, however, only one of you may be able to provide this.
  • Feeding your children before they leave is very important.
  • The only person you can control is you, not your ex.
  • Set aside intimate time to spend with just you and your child.
  • It is very important to bring some pleasure and fun and laughter back to the family.
  • Make a habit of stepping back and asking yourself how your children are doing in this new life.
  • Do not berate yourself.
  • If you’re honest with yourself, you may realize that in the chaos of the divorce, you overlooked your children without meaning to.
  • Many children live in distraught worlds of their own while their parents are too wrapped up in their own problems to notice.
  • Have you left them on their own?
  • Is there any real pleasure in their lives?
  • Children of all ages have fantasies of reconciliation right from the beginning.
  • “Mom smiled at dad when he dropped me off last night. I bet that means they like each other.”
  • Young children feel cut off by divorce and fantasies help them feel whole.
  • All efforts to restore routines after divorce bring needed stability to your children’s lives.
  • It’s important for them to have a sense of order and regularity.

A New Kind of Father

  • Divorce transforms the experience of being a mother or father. The fundament nature of parenting shifts.
  • These changes are different for men and women.
  • When marriage ended, no one told you what it would feel like to be a father in a divorced family.
  • You must understand the changes to enjoy the new chapter of your life.
  • This road is less predictable than you ever imagined.
  • How do you go about being a good father?
  • You always knew exactly who you were and so did your children.
  • Fathering post-divorce is different because you don’t have the supports you had in the marriage.
  • After divorce, you’re in a vacuum.
  • “How central am I? What does being a divorced father mean? What does being a co-parent mean? Am I a playmate? A Dutch uncle? A friend or guy who helps with the math homework? Who sets the discipline? What sets the goals?”
  • You may have to learn to divide your time between your second marriage children and your first marriage children.
  • “Divorce calls for a total redefinition of who you are as a father and challenges you to come up with a plan for how to maintain or surpass the relationship you had with your children during your marriage.”
  • In an intact family, you didn’t have to define your role.
  • If you had a very close relationship with your children before the divorce, you must work it out with your ex to make sure this relationship continues.
  • Your lives may demand change and flexibility.
  • Even if you weren’t ‘close’ with your children before the breakup they still cry for you. Closeness is a dangerous term for it implies a certain judgment about a parent’s relationship with their child. It is a term that would eliminate many fathers from their children.
  • Post-divorce you must consider the relationship you wish to maintain with your children.
  • You have the choice, and in the first few years after a divorce you have to renew your relationship with your children- in many ways for a dad it is a cross roads where hopefully you will do whatever is required from you to be the dad that your children require of you in these changing circumstances.
  • “Your relationship with your children is not dependent on how much time you spend together based on the divorce settlement.”
  • “Your relationship is only measured by how much your child feels your love, your commitment, and what you’re able to bring to that relationship.”
  • “An Indian legend that says the father’s job is to carry the child to the top of the mountain and face the child away from home toward the bigger landscape. That’s poetic but its only true if the father carries the child carefully and does not drop them on the climb.”
  • Organize your life so that you give the plan priority.
  • When the children are in their early years, the decisions that govern your relationship aren’t the same when they grow up.
  • A mother and father under the same roof are different than a mother and father under separate roofs.
  • Parents in a reasonably, positive intact relationship carry out daily dialogue about their children.
  • Conversation must cease between you and your ex about whether to correct the children or ignore grandma after a divorce.
  • Mothers, more so than fathers, interpret what children want inside of an intact family.
  • Mothers often play the go-between between young children and their fathers.
  • Developmental stages in your child’s life effect the tenor of your relationship.
  • They want their moms around.
  • A father may lose access to parts of his children’s lives because their mother no longer shares a home with you.
  • Fathers may sometimes take on the role of the mother with great sensitivity and heroism.
  • A father can play a significant role in the lives of their daughters even in their daughter’s adolescent years. Some experts suggest otherwise. But, it can be done provided the commitment is made to play that part in their life. (Recommend seeing the film: Eighth Grade)
  • Observe your children carefully.
  • Spend simple down-time together.
  • “What mistakes can you make? The most common one is that you can give up too soon. As an experienced father, you must learn new skills and just be there.”
  • Lots of fathers make no changes after their divorce. They expect children to fit into their lives and spend time together in the easiest way possible.
  • Shared activities have results.
  • Some fathers didn’t ever have the experience of a role model fatherly figure.
  • “What defeats many fathers is their thin skin.” When they suffer defeat, they lose their jobs. Some become easily discouraged and back away from the fathering role. “I have nothing to offer.”
  • Your child’s need for you is in no way diminished by your divorce.
  • If you lose your job, don’t let it translate to the loss of a relationship with your child.
  • You children are a priority and you can’t compromise.
  • Children never confuse their father with their stepfather.
  • Some fathers attempt to remain close with children, but end up experience feelings of loss.
  • A comment in a support group from a separated dad: “I think you’re saying that despite your great efforts, you all share the fear that no matter what you did, no matter how hard you tried, you still felt in danger of being marginalized.”
  • “Man of the house” can’t be recreated after divorce in a joint custody case.
  • Some fathers bounce in and out of their children’s lives. Some return to court to assert parental rights and blame ex-wives that their children don’t want to see them anymore.
  • If you don’t visit your children, you owe them an explanation as to why.
  • Start to rebuild a relationship with your children which takes into account the changes in their development.
  • “The greatest gift you can give your child is a sense that you’re a “forever father” who’s deeply committed to parenting.”
  • Your children both need you and need to grow away from you.
  • “The main purpose of parenting is to help children grow into independence.”
  • Your centrality in your children’s lives never diminishes, even as they move in and out of adolescence.
  • The father-daughter relationship in intact and divorced families serves as the template for a daughter’s view of men.
  • “Will you protect her? Are you willing to make sacrifices for your relationship? Do you respect her ideas? Do you have confidence in her abilities? Have you told her how proud you are to be her father?”
  • Fathers provide sons with a template as to what it means to be a man.
  • You must feel secure and sure with how important you are in your children’s lives.
  • Your role doesn’t disappear when your child enters adulthood.
  • Father-child relationships tend to grow apart as they age, way more so than in intact families.
  • Building a forever relationship is a generational journey if you get it right.

The picture on our Web Site captures the hope for every dad- separated or intact-it doesn’t change. It is about holding your child’s or grandchild’s hand, sometimes firmly and other times lightly, protecting and encouraging, educating and inspiring.

To love and be loved is the greatest human gift. The strange aspect of a separation with children is that it clarifies what is most important in our lives.

A New Kind of Mother

  • Motherhood after divorce changes profoundly your view of yourself, your children, the kind of care that you provide; and the day to day stresses create a whole new parenting environment;
  • Most mothers are aware of everything going on in their child’s daily life;
  • ‘your children remain an integral part of your psychological make-up’;
  • In the intact family, when they are with their dad, you likely feel they are continuing to be in your care; you receive a run down of their outing from your parenting partner and/or the children;
  • Post-separation this information flow may be non-existent from the other parent;
  • Children may view your questioning as intrusive or worry that it is part of the separation conflict between their parents;
  • Serious negative outcomes for children and parents occur when children sense the conflict all around them;
  • This questioning can be heightened once the dad thinks about or initiates dating; the ‘great fear’ about a parent having a diminished parenting role appears more real;
  • You are unable to provide the full-time care and awareness of everything child, as you likely provided in the intact family;
  • There is an ‘aloneness’ to parenting in a single parent home; it is a shared response of mothers and fathers, who must continue with life when the child is with their other parent;
  • Absent from the new mom’s house, dad’s house scenario, is the emotional support that is part of the intact, parenting partnership; often, the breakdown of an intimate relationship begins in the intact marriage with the loss of emotional support;
  • The loss of this support in the intact home (aloneness) is unlikely to change in two homes, at least in the early months, years;
  • Parenting is challenging and joyful; support may now be found from different sources- parents, friends, new relationships, etc.
  • ‘In the end it comes from you and no one else’.
  • Very few separated parents are satisfied with their parenting in the short term; mothers tend to judge themselves in the immediate time frame, in part, because our lives tend to be lived on a day to day basis;
  • Their will be a time when you will look back at your parenting journey and see your successes through your children.
  • If each separated parent recognizes their similar parenting journey in their changed family, the opportunity to regain a cooperative and supportive partnership becomes a possibility.
  • The ‘guilt burden’ is found in many mothers and may continue for decades; divorce is not the cause of all the perceived problems of your adult children;

‘Try to forgive yourself for your real and imagined sins of commission and omission. Try to be a gentler person with yourself. Take pride in the enormity of your accomplishment. Whatever your aspirations, you can’t do it all. Give yourself a break from your self-accusations.’ (Wallerstein)