How Divorce Has Affected Your Children, Need Advice

SO GLAD I got a divorce! My ex and I had a pretty 'easy' divorce. We've always put our daughter first (she was 4 when we divorced - she'll be 8 in June). When my daughter started seeing a specialist (diagnosed w/adhd w/acute anxiety - always been like this so not a thing that happened after divorce) her dad and I worked together (still are) for her. He's remarried and so am I... She loves her step-parents and I'm very grateful that her stepmom is so good to her. She's happy. She's doing well in school. My ex's family is still very much a part of our lives (I see his family more than he does!). If you two are under the same understanding... It can be very relieving for all involved.

I don't care what anyone says... Divorce can be a good thing.

ETA- Not being happy will LEAD to all those not so wonderful things that 'ATreeCalledLife' mentioned. BTDT.

From a different perspective, my parents divorced when my brother and I were ages 3 and 5 (I was 5). I am so glad they did. They were wonderful about never speaking badly of each other, and did an excellent job of being sure that my brother and I were raised in a happy environment with consistent discipline. We were not negatively influenced by our parents divorce. I think it would have been much worse if our parents had stayed in an unhappy marriage. I'm sorry you are going through a difficult time, and hope you get through it as painlessly as possible.

Being a product of divorce and being a high school teacher who saw children whose parents were divorced, I will tell you that it is the worst thing a child can go through. Not having the balance of a mom and dad is really hard on a child. They will experience a tired, exhausted mom who will not have patience for them. One or both of you will feel guilty and not discipline as often as necessary. You will indulge inappropriately out of guilt as well. The husband almost always gets a new girlfriend and often wife. New children brought into the family by your or your husband will be resented for their ability to have both of their natural parents in the home.

If you split custody evenly, your children will not feel like they live in either home but are visitors. The anger they feel but do not know how to express will likely come out in inappropriate behavior all through school and often beyond. The girls whose dads are not in their lives full-time, usually dress inappropriately and are so desperate for male affection - they will often take it from whomever they can get it.

The kids who did the best in school (their best, not necessarily the top scorers) and were the happiest were the ones (almost always) whose parents were still married and were at every event a parent could attend.

You say that you can get along now. That tells me that you might be more focused on yourself than your kids. I don't mean that judgmentally because I am a self-centered human being and I get it. Everyday I have to DECIDE to treat my husband the way I know is right. I have to ask myself what do I want to model to my kids. I can join him in an argument because I want to be right and I need to win or I can choose to act the way I did when I wanted him to ask me out on that next date. Most things can be seen as a little issue that can be worked out or a compromise made. When my husband does something annoying, I can get my magnifying glass out and make it much worse than it is, or I can look in a mirror and see that I also make mistakes.

It's up to you. Do you want to tell your kids that if they really don't feel like working hard at something, they should just walk away. Or do you want to teach your kids that marriage is difficult (two different people coming from two different upbringings with two different sets of expectations), but worth putting every effort into it.

Picture what kind of ideal husband you would like. You can make help him to become that by just doing a few things. Build him up - tell him what you like that he does (provides for you so you can be a SAHM, reads to your kids, makes them laugh, plays with them, takes pride in his work or attire, whatever), feed him the foods he likes, stop fighting (don't start it, don't notice what he does wrong, don't say anything you wouldn't say when you were dating - it takes two to fight), and go back to sleeping with him. Close your eyes and picture yourself on a fantasy vacation or something. The feelings will follow the actions. Trust me. He will slowly (or quickly) start treating you like you were a queen. Whoever said you have to be in love with your husband every day wasn't living in reality. You have to DECIDE to be in love with your husband. It is so much more fun to work at it and get to reap the rewards multiplied by billions.

Try it for a day, then another day, etc. If you have a set back, apologize and tell him you are truly sorry and that you will not do it again. Forget the past. It will only get in the way of you enjoying today. Keep picturing what you want your family to look like in a few years. Do you want to argue with some other woman and her family about who your kids will spend Christmas with? Do you want to bring another guy into the picture that your kids will never see as their real dad? Do you want to be a working single mother who is too tired to sit down and figure out why your kids took their anger out at school again? Do you want to have to discuss how your ex is not disciplining the way you do on the phone all the time because he wants to be the fun parent?

If you still aren't sure, just picture asking your kids in a few years how they like Daddy living somewhere else, married to someone else and have step-siblings. Picture asking them what they think would be better and you will have your answer.

Will it be hard? Yes. Do you want to do something hard for the sake of your kids? I hope so. Do I think you have a husband that is worth working it out with? Yes. It sounds like he only fell out of love with you because you fell out of love with him. I think it is so worth it! I'm sure your kids will.

Okay, a friend of ours went through a divorce.
She immediately got a child therapist for her kids.
She said, this was the BEST thing she could have done for them.

There is a time, when professional help is needed. And is effective.

Also, an adult or a child... will go through a "grieving" process. Because, any divorce is like a "grieving." A loss.
So, bear that in mind, per your kids as well, and for yourself.
There are also community based "Grief Support" groups. For anyone who has any kind of "grieving" they are going through.

Let your kids, express themselves as well.

But ultimately, as my friend said, Therapy for her kids was the best thing she could have done for them. Her kids were about 2 at the time.

Also to keep in mind:
there are DIFFERENT kinds of "child custody." So research this, and know what you are deciding.
Here are some links about it:
http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/types-of-child-cus...
http://singleparents.about.com/od/legalissues/a/typesofcu...

The situation you described doesn't seem like it warrants a divorce to the degree you would put your children and their emotional, physical, mental future at risk. I've experienced the trauma divorce can have on kids and it is not fun. It never fixes itself, the kids just try to adjust but it have repercussions.

Some of the problems I've witnessed
1. Boys take it out on their moms and blame them
2. They don't do well in school
3. They cry alot
4. They get angry and misbehave
5. They have eating disorders
6. They don't know how to communicate anymore, always fighting
7. They throw excessive tantrums because they can't express their feelings
8. They blame themselves for the divorce
9. Their worlds collapse as they don't have a sense of security anymore
10. Girls internalize or bad mouth others
....and the list goes on.

You have 2 young kids, your husband works at night, and that alone can be very frustrating and tiring and cause you to be at each other's throat unnecessarily. My husband worked at night for 7 yrs and I know how it feels to literally feel like you are alone and to sleep in separate beds, but don't give up just yet. I would suggest you break away from each other for a moment/days, stop expecting anything from each other as far as who should be doing what - just pretend you are both single parents raising the kids, have a date night out together, and try to do something outside of the kids. I know it's tough but I think you should work on it and really think about this some more. I believe you guys are really tired and in each other's way versus working as a couple hence the bickering.

I am the child of a divorce......3 divorces actually. There are pros and cons that weigh on the children involved in both staying together "for the kids" and getting divorced. On the one hand, my parents staying together for us as long as they could was miserable for me and my brothers. They argued and fought constantly; we would fall asleep listening to them fight. Our parents also heaped huge amounts of guilt on us....."We are doing this for you..." Seriously, if this is for us, don't do us any favors.

Watching our parents fight and get divorced over and over again had huge reprecussions on us emotionally and it carried over into our ability to pick stable partners for ourselves. I was well into my 30's before I got married because I was nervous about making the wrong decision for myself and getting divorced too; my 20's were spent making horrible decisions in dating guys and my brothers are not doing any better in chosing partners for themselves either. I finally decided that I wanted to break the pattern of destruction in my life and wanted to make better choices.

I've been with the same wonderful man for 9 years, married for 4 years. We just had a baby girl 6 weeks ago! The messed up thing is, my mother is jealous of my reationship with my husband and is teetering on her 4th divorce because she doesn't see the pattern she's chosen for herself.

I think it's wonderful that you are doing everything you can to try and work it out and resolve your marriage. I guess what I am trying to say is that divorce does have an impact on children. It makes them a little more gunshy in their own relationships. BUT, staying together when you are miserable and fighting has even more of a negative impact on children. I wish you the best of luck during this state of transition for you. I know that everything will work out one way or the other and all will be happier in the end. I promise that over time you'll see more clearly; either as a sinle mom or with your husband by your side

I, like Emily , thought it would be ok because my kids were so young when I split from their father, then I thought it would be fine because I remarried a great man and he was a great stepfather. But i have two young adult children and they WERE very effected by the divorce. I'm not saying stay with him if you're arguing all the time. I'm saying read all the books on helping them through it, read all the picture books to them about divorced families(Mr Roger's etc) and take them to family therapy when they are older. Try to do whatever you can to keep you ex on the straight and narrow and keep him INVOLVED in your kids lives as much as possible

I have to agree- you MUST put your kids first. But- I have to say, I totally disagree with the post below from 'amom2' - lots of kids both boys and girls have all sorts of problems, and that goes for kids whose parents are married too. It sounds like she has personal issues about divorce and is using scare tactics to make it sound like you will destroy your kids by getting divorced. That does not have to happen.

I don't want to burst your bubble- but no matter how friendly and easy things seem to be now- they may not stay that way. But-it doesn't matter if you and your ex don't get along or even fight IF YOU KEEP IT FROM YOUR KIDS.

Make a deal that you will ALWAYS be civil and polite to one another when your kids are there, no matter what. Sometimes it will be hard- but you must both do it, and you must insist that any other relatives or family members, etc. also agree to 'play nice' in front of the kids.

I would strongly suggest two things about your divorce arrangements:

1)Have all your child support arrangements made officially and filed through the state and directly debited from your husband's account into a separate account that you keep just for monthly child support funds. Even if things are all friendly now, they may change in the future ( please, please believe me on this, even if it seems totally unlikely now). Make everything official.

2) I urge you to use a mediator to make your custody arrangements, visitation and holiday arrangements, etc. A professional mediator can help get through the emotional aspects of making these difficult decisions and arrangements and can help both of you to find common ground when you disagree.

The mediator will also come up with issues and situations you need to make choices about that you won't even think of at the time! They will write everything up into an official court document (a joint parenting agreement) and your attorneys can file it with the court as an addendum to the divorce agreement.

Later, if disagreements come up about custody issues or money- you can have it written into your agreement that you will both visit the mediator to work things out with them again. I can't begin to tell you how helpful this can be.

Our mediator gave us some advice that I have never forgotten and I am going to pass this along to you. She said:

"Your marriage has failed. That is a fact. But that does not mean that you have to fail as PARENTS. You must get past the roles of your failed marriage and see yourselves as partners in raising your child. That is the relationship you have now that you need to make a success."

This has been totally true. Even when my ex has been a jerk and not held up his end of the parenting ( and believe me, he didn't start out that way.) keeping the idea of being good partners as parents has helped us to stay civil and make good choices for our son.

Good luck- put your kids first and they will be fine. I divorced when my son was 4 and now he is 11. He is a gifted student, happy and well adjusted with lots of friends. I remarried a year ago and my husband spent the past 5 years building trust with my son and they have a great relationship. So great, that in many ways, it hasn't mattered when his bio dad has dropped the ball on things. But the point is, the divorce happened and we sheltered him from it as much as possible when he was small and now he is fine and happy. Your kids will be fine too.

I am sorry to hear that you are in this situation. I am not divorced, but my parents were. At first things were very friendly, but then things got bad. I was stuck in the middle at times. My dad was seeing someone, and my mom was upset about it and would get upset if we told her that she was around when we were with my dad, so I lied to her. I hated that. It was not my fault that any of that happened, and I felt guilty for having a good time with my dad.

Another hard part is when my dad would date a woman, and we had no choice but to get to know her, like her, then they would break up and we never saw her again. We were continually lose people we were forced to get close to. Hopefully you and your husband will be mindful of this, and only expose your kids to someone who will be around long term.

I think the MOST important thing is to remember that YOU and YOUR HUSBAND are making the decision to be apart. Try to make things as normal in the relationships as possible! Get along in their presence at ALL TIMES, no matter what you are feeling. Do not make them think they should feel toward him what you do. Continue to parent together, even though you won't live together. follow the same rules, discipline, etc. that you always have and meet regularly to discuss what is going on with the kids. Kids need consistency.

I do think that kids can successfully survive divorce, as long as parents really make their kids the #1 priority.

a marriage is worth saving. even if he gets a day job for less pay. divorce is like a death without anyone dying. it would be a trama for the young girls and the entire family. love fizzels and flames over and over there are downs and ups. you have to work at it just like an actual fire. get that love back. work hard on it. the marriage will be completey worth it. much love for you and your family.

I am a child of divorce and I have to tell you honestly my childhood was not a happy one. I was (not to sound snobby, just giving you the facts) popular, had tons of friends, captain of my cheerleading squad, always had a lead in the school play... I had everything in the world going for me, but I don't ever remember being happy. My parents divorce was very traumatic for me and it wasn't until I was an adult that I could really get past it and start the healing process. I was in counseling, had many adult mentors, went to church with many wonderful people, but I was always sad inside. Every kid is different and will handle it differently, but be prepared to deal with the consequences. Even with the best of intentions, divorce is always ugly.

i'm going through it, we have a therapist we use to work on issues regarding our daughter, thats the best advice i could give...have a mediator or therapist that specializes in child psych you can go to when you disagree on impt things affecting her.and always be friends..thats what we're diong

I'm in the process of it right now so I have no real experience, BUT, the good thing to know is that your kids are young enough that they really don't know any better. I mean, as far as they know, this is how families work - at a certain point, Dad lives somewhere else.

If you're able to, and friendly, which it sounds like you are, I HIGHLY recommend mediation over divorce attorneys. Basicially you can make your own "rules" for everything. For instance, it's very important for both my ex and I to be a SAHM until my son goes to school all day, so we've worked out a way to make that happen (which probably wouldn't happen if we went the divorce attorney way).

My parents divorced when I was a baby and were always friendly, always together on my birthdays, etc. It was so much better than my friends who had unhappy, but married, parents.

Personally, I never wanted to deal with it. Me have good times/bad times. disagree on certain issues, etc.
But sometimes in life, you have to do what you think in your gut and listen to your inner voice. Pray about it. Talk to professionals-your pastor, therapists, etc.
Maybe try a mediator before the divorce.
But if it does happen, try not to play mind games with anyone and keep communication open and honest. But keep the honesty level at the child's level-they don't need to know everything at a young age.
BTW, my son just went thru a nasty divorce and we don't get to see our granddaughter except maybe once a month for a few hours. So remember, the divorce affects everyone in the family not just you, your spouse and your kids!!

I have been divorced for almost two years. My daughter is 5 & 1/2 & my son is 3.

They are HAPPY. We are HAPPY. It is possible.

Here is the secret...

You must put them first. I don't mean give up on yourself, but their whole life is in front of them. You have the power to make it a peaceful one for them. So, you & your husband need to make a decision to act like grown-ups & create a life that provides stability & happiness for your children.

They are little and like my three year old, won't know life "before". They will know this.

I talk with my kids, too. I explain things at their level and always make a point of helping them sort out any uncertainties.

The other thing I did was to make sure as many aspects of their lives that could stay in place, did. They stayed at the same daycare, we still saw all our friends (many whom were friends with my husband fist), our daily routine stayed the same, etc.

It can be done in a healthy, positive manner, but it is up to the adults to set that tone.

My husband and i are also getting divorced. We have a 2 yr old, 7 yr old and a baby due in May. He cheated so its a bit different. I hate him and am having a hard even seeing him. He no longer lives with us and sees girls 3 times a week. He wont discuss anything with me at all. So i have no idea what is going to happen to my children and i. I have been a SAHM for 3 years and was planning to do so until the baby was in school. I'm happy for you that you guys can get a long. I really hope we can eventually get there.
I appreciate the advice also, i'm curious to see how my kids will be effected secially my unborn baby.

Wow, loved Liisa G's comments, they really are inspired. I just want to add after being married for 11 years that I choose how I feel towards my husband. I can choose to be continually critical and annoyed, or to have only love for him. The fire you feed grows. Yes it's hard work, but nothing in the world compares to having an intact, loving family, so I would say it's worth it. Having a mate that you are not getting along with is a call to be introspective and work on your own issues, thinking, why is this triggering me? Anytime a negative thought enters your head about your mate, say a little prayer asking for assistance to replace it with a loving one. Best of luck.

They should be OK as long as you guys remember that you are the adults & that you don't EVER talk bad about the other person.
You said something that was key to me - since you decided to go ahead & divorce things have been going good & you 2 have been getting along???? I would try to analyze WHY this is.
These 2 wonderful little girls - even the 6 month old - can feel the tension in your home. Better to divorce when you can be civil to each other than when you are hateful to each other.... One thing you DO need to both consider is this - what happens if he meets someone & falls in love? How will you feel if he finds someone & remarries - what if you do? Can you still be civil to each other & the other person in their life? Those are all things to consider too.