Parenting 101: Divorce Style
A client recently asked how to deal with his children’s questions about the break-up — or breakdown — of their parents’ marriage.
“Easy and hard,” I told him. “Easy rules, hard implementation.”
The rules are two: Reassure, and re-direct.
Reassure your children that you and their other parent love them. Lie if you must — by which I mean, even if you don’t believe the other parent loves them, tell your kids he/she does. Then, re-direct. Depending on the age of your child, this will be of varying degrees of difficulty. The older the child is, the harder it is to re-direct them. If the break-up — or the marriage — has been loud and noisy, it will be harder also. But it can be done.
With a teenager, you’ll need to do a bit more re-assuring and a bit more strenuous re-directing, but the two rules work with teenagers also. Try it; you’ll see.
Another client asked, “Why should I agree to let my child live with my ex-spouse, when my child wants to live with me?”
Good question. Let me counter that question with some basic information gleaned from 25 years of practicing divorce law. Brace yourself:
Your child does not REALLY want to “live with” you. Your child wants only two things: To be loved, and to be safe.
If the child thinks she can achieve these goals by living with you, the child will gravitate toward you. If the child thinks she can achieve these goals by living with the other parent, guess what? That’s what she’ll say she wants. If the child thinks she can achieve these goals by refusing to express a preference, or by expressing whatever preference she thinks you want to hear, then by golly, guess what? That’s what she’ll do.
So — go back to rules number one and two: Reassure, and re-direct.
“Your mother and I love you. We’d love you if you lived with me, if you lived with her, if you lived under a rock on the moon. We love you. Now, wanna go get some ice cream?”
Or a pizza. Or go read a book. Or go to your BFF’s house. Fill in the blank.
Reassure, and re-direct.
Trust me. It works.
social and emotional development in children
Probably better to tell them what you really think. I just hate putting on an act for the inlaws, myself. Plus, it made for some interesting times at my first husband’ s parent’ s house on those long- ass visits to Tucson we had to take every year….
Trackback by social and emotional development in children — December 15, 2008 @ 5:32 am
That is certainly one approach — that is, telling them “what you really think”. If you are implying that “what you really think” is something other than the other parent loves them, I am not sure why you think it would benefit the child to hear a negative comment. If the child is a teenager, I can see that perhaps a gentle comment about the other parent’s inabilities or problems might be in order — e.g., “Your mother uses drugs, and you cannot be around her much because persons who use drugs tend to be unable to properly care for children.” But not: “Your mom is a crack addict and she doesn’t care about you.” See the difference? Of course, I am not a mental health professional; merely someone who has watched the behavior of separating and divorcing parents for many years, and my views are stated only from that perspective.
Comment by Administrator — December 15, 2008 @ 12:48 pm