Here are 7 problems that children of divorce have to deal with:
- Parents are aware that divorce will hurt their young children, but they don’t think about how it will affect them when they’re adults. These children will have an increased risk of divorce, may develop an inability to trust, have insecurity in adult decision making, and could develop an obsessiveness to never get divorced even in abusive situations.
- Divorcing parents stress is revealed through their communications with their children and others. During the divorce and after adults process with others on the phone, texting, and emailing creating a toxic stress. Children feel and receive this stress when they listen and read such conversations. After the divorce the infusion of toxic stress continues when parental issues impacted through the divorce (holidays, discipline, name changes, forgotten items at visitation, etc.) arise. These stress producing communications affect their child’s longterm emotional wellbeing (trauma) and feelings of security.
- Divorcing Parents tend to overshare intimate details of their marriage and new dating lives with other adults within ear-shout of their children. This makes it more likely that the kids will take sides creating insecurity and mistrust in childhood and adult life.These intimate details create uncomfortable feelings ( repulsion, resentment from forced relations, anger, jealousy) for their kids.
- When there is no court-ordered parenting schedule, it’s often harder for children to repair broken relationships with an absent parent. These wounds can fester creating struggles in many relationships for the kids as children and adults.
- Divorce can threaten an adults’ financial security. Their children are often left having to face a life of financial insecurity and may feel hopeless or obsessive regarding their ability to support their own family one day.
- A divorce strips children of the natural social support system that is ingrained in the human subconscious. The kids spend much of their childhood trying to rekindle or find this support system through outside relationships. This searching behavior increases their risk of abuse by others.
- Children of divorce often carry incredible amounts of anger and guilt over their parents divorce and this spills over into their adult relationships and marriages.