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Children are egocentric by design. When they are involved in divorce situations, they naturally assume that they have somehow played a crucial role in the destruction of their own families. As a parent, it is up to you to talk to your child and explain that no matter what the child is thinking or feeling, the divorce is not the child's fault.
First and foremost, a child in the midst of a divorce situation needs to be reassured that he/she is loved. Next, the child needs to know that he/she is going to be taken care of, and that he/she will still have a home. The child also needs to be told repeatedly that the divorce is between mommy and daddy. The child needs to repeatedly hear that, although it will affect the child, the divorce is in no way the child's fault.
Your child will experience a range of emotions during the course of your divorce. As a parent, it is your job to make sure that these emotions are validated and dealt with in a healthy manner. How do you do this? Here is one example scenario (for ease of reading I am writing this with the mother as the comforter, but it could be either parent in each role) to help you understand how:
Suzy, a bright young six year old, tells her mother that she is feeling angry with her daddy for leaving them. She stomps off to her bedroom and begins destroying anything and everything that she can find that her father has given her. Suzy is yelling that her father is a dumb lying jerk that doesn't love her, as she does this. What should her mother do or say?
The last thing that a mother should do at this point is to join in Suzy's critical tirade about her father. The mother needs to console Suzy and reassure her that her father loves her. (This excludes situations where the father has abandoned the children completely, which will be dealt with later in this article.) At this point, what Suzy needs is to be led to expressing grief over the loss of her family.
A savvy mom might say, "Suzy, I know that you feel angry with your father right now and that's ok. I don't think you really want to destroy all of the nice things that he has given you, though. You father loves you very much. I know that this is a confusing time for you. I'm sorry that your father and I have put you through this. It must make you feel very sad to lose your family, as you know it. You aren't losing your daddy, or me, though. We both love you very much. We are each going to try to work on helping you spend as much time with your daddy, as you spend with me."
If the mother, or father, has completely abandoned the child, then the conversation might go something like this:
"Suzy, I know you miss your father. It is not your fault or my fault that he left. We often don't understand why people do the things they do. I want you to know, though, that it is important for you to realize that you are a great girl. Your father is missing out on seeing you grow up and I feel sorry for him. Now, do you really want to wreck all of the things that he bought you? You may decide that you want them someday. Maybe, for now, we can just pack them up and put them away, if they upset you. What do you think?"
The most important thing for you, as a parent to remember, is that even though divorce may be difficult on you, you owe it to your child to minimize the effects it has upon your child's life.
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