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Spare Your Kids the Heartache: How to Get Along After Divorce
You can make divorce just a little easier on your kids by getting along with your ex
Divorce not only exacts a toll on the divorcing couple, but it also affects the rest of the family. This is especially evident if you and your spouse have children. Even though it’s very difficult to hide the negative feelings that surface during a divorce, it’s extremely important that you work at managing those feelings constructively if you don’t want them to affect the kids.
Avoid the mistake of believing that your adult problems are too complicated for your children to understand. Although young children may not understand words like “irreconcilable differences,” they’re very intuitive and impressionable. Even babies can tell when their parents are at war; the tension in the air has a way of being transferred from one body to the other.
And if the kids are older? The closer they are to adulthood, the easier it is to think they can handle hearing the details of what’s happening. But it’s just as hard on a teenager as it is on a baby or toddler to see their parents split up and offering up details doesn’t make it easier. In fact, it might make it harder as it can lead to your tween or teen feeling as if they have to choose sides based on what…
