The Children Involved

As a continuation of my previous blog post The Aftermath, I wanted to emphasize on how children are involved in a divorce. Children are the ones who are most affected in the divorce. This causes them to be confused, guilty and emotionally unstable.

Everyone wants a happy family. No child would want to have their parents separated.

The initial reaction of children towards divorce are different. Some would be in denial and pretend that everything is normal, some would be angry and become rebellious, some would be depressed, some would just be fearful, and some would experience all.

Children are very observant. It is very clear to them whether his parents are acting strange. Studies show that children who experiences questionable adult behavior are the ones who are most at risk for growing up emotional, angry and feels alienated. As I have mentioned in my previous blog, the children’s emotional and even physical needs are disregarded because the parents are focused on their situation. It is a very selfish act. I know that divorce is a very emotional and hard situation to be in. However, I strongly believe that none of this is the child’s fault. The parent do not have to pass on their pain to the child.

During the divorce process, the children does not only suffer losing the idea of having a complete family, but also loses the parents they knew. In addition to that, there are cases wherein the parent is suffering depression since one could not accept the separation. This could cause the parent to abandon the child. This is very selfish and unfair.

There are a lot of downside of divorce to children. Some loses their childhood. They become burdensome with things that they should not even be managing during their age. They are compelled to help and support their single parent by working or doing heavy chores. Some lose their peers because their parent relies on them. They are obliged to accompany and to help their parents recover. These effects causes the child to also lose their self esteem, since the child would have the tendency of thinking that it was their fault why their parents separated. Then, the child would obliged himself to put everything back again. And when he fails, he would feel that he is such a failure and he would blame himself for it.

Divorce would make a child’s life hard. It would make the child fearful of the future, causes the child to be emotionally unstable, and it would also cause the child to experience depression.

The parent should be responsible enough to make sure that he is able to fulfill his child’s needs, and not to even burden to child. It is already hard enough for the child to know that his parents are separated.

Remember, it is going to be more difficult for the child than the parent. If you are considering to separate, think about your child. Think about the massive trauma that could instill to him for the rest of his life.