The promised rewards were great:  We would not have to worry about money because Mom would marry a rich man who would take us to Disneyland and let us buy treats like Snack Pack Pudding.  Little did I know Mom already had the man lined-up.  All I knew was that she assured me my Dad didn’t have much use for me and I would be much better off as a result of the divorce.

Well, as far as fairy tales go, I did get a rich stepfather who, to his great credit, is a wonderful man, and I am confident that he loved my brothers and me as he did his own daughter.  He was a widower with one child, and my mother’s former boyfriend — the man my father stole her from a dozen or so years earlier.  To this day he has been proud of winning her back and for that my mother is a lucky woman.

Unfortunately the rest of the fairy tale is not so pretty, because we did, in fact give up our father.  I was always very proud of my dad’s tall, handsome good looks.  He was a great dancer and he knew how to have fun.  He could be childlike and fatherly all at once, and what child doesn’t like that?

The problem was that I was an accessory to the crime.  I was on Mom’s side.  When Mom first broached the subject of divorce to my father it was on a telephone call when he had moved ahead of us to take a job elsewhere.  At some point in the conversation she asked me to pick up the phone and tell him that I wanted them to get a divorce.  When I heard his sobs on the other end of the line, I couldn’t, not even to win my mother’s approval.

Somehow he won her over and she agreed to move with us to join him.  That was at the end of May 1974, and the marriage ended the week before Thanksgiving.  My mother remarried three days after Christmas that year.

We did go to Disneyland and eat Snack Pack pudding.  We were also expected to do everything we could to make our new stepfather feel welcome and apreciated.  We were instructed to be nice and ask him if we could call him Dad.  But he, being a good man, explained to us that we had a father, and he deserved that title.  I really wanted to blurt out that mom told us to ask anyway, but I knew we were supposed to play the part, so I said I understood and agreed to call him by his first name.

One would think, with such a nice, not to mention well-to-do, stepfather around, life would be perfect.  Still, I missed my dad, but when I voiced those concerns I was reminded that I had wanted the divorce as much as my mother did.  I was afraid to argue with that logic because I was told I’d be packed up and sent to live with him with the implied message that all manner of horrible things could happen to a girl living in an apartment complex.  My maternal grandmother even went so far as to make sure I knew I should tell my mother if my father ever touched me inappropriately.

Therefore, I did not go visit my Dad on one of the first opportunities we were given.  I believe he may have been told I was angry with him.  I was just frightened and eventually I assumed even more guilt about the divorce.

The following years were reasonably good as far as where we lived and what we wore.  My mother had severe stress and panic attacks that seem to have been triggered by the divorce.  I was the target of much of her frustration because I reminded her so much of my father’s family.

Ironically, when my dad remarried, I reminded his new wife of my mother.  I believe that is one of the greatest tragedies of divorce, it seems like you are always compared to your parents in the negative sense.

The strange thing is that I had a good life.  My parents had a good divorce. They are still friendly toward each other. My Dad came to see us every two weeks and we visited him at his house on a regular basis.  We had a good time, and still, I was empty.  I felt torn.  I felt cheated out of having my dad be my dad, and I felt the weight of my mother’s anxiety.

To this day, if my mother were to read this, she would remind me of how good I had it, and shame me for my complaints.  I think that is why I never really dealt with it and now every divorce — even with those fickle celebrities — breaks my heart.

I’ve revisited a lot of this dealing with my own marriage issues.  I know that my background makes me needy and the thought of leaving my children the legacy of divorce produces a sort of posttraumatic stress disorder.

Our culture of divorce creates victims, but we don’t like the label.  I am a victim of divorce.  My heart was broken when I was 10 years old and I have spent the better part of 35 years trying to fix it.  Saving my own marriage may not fill my void, but it could save my children from some of this pain. I just know there is no such thing as a good divorce.

The author is a 45 year old mother of three, who wishes to remain anonymous out of love for her parents.

“I’ve come to envy young children going through a divorce. Everyone worries about them. They’re sent to psychologists. The adult child’s grief isn’t taken as seriously. Many of our parents stayed together because we’d be more mature once we headed off to college, walked down the aisle, or had our first baby. 

Parents expect us to shrug off their split, as if the breakup of our family should no longer concern us because pieces of our adult life are in place. Even I felt I was overreacting. I’m an adult, I figured. I should be able to handle this.”

That’s a quote from Brook Lea Foster, who wrote the article “The Way We Were” featured in the Sept/Oct 2006 issue of AARP Magazine. She was talking about the difficulty of coming to terms with her parents divorce even though it happened when she was an adult.

Even though you are an adult, it doesn’t mean that you don’t still feel immense pain because you realize that “things will never be the same.” As Brook said in the article:

“My life suddenly seemed a series of “lasts” —a final Christmas, an end to eggs together at the breakfast table. I’d never again find my parents standing side by side on the porch, waving to me as I pulled into the driveway.”

There are a lot of “lasts” an adult child of divorce must go through in letting go of the past and a lot of “firsts” to adjust to as you visit your parents one-by-one in different locations and often different states. There’s also the “firsts” to adjust to as you meet new people they are each dating. This adjustment doesn’t necessarily come easy just because you are supposed to “be adult about it.”

In another article posted in the Washingtonian Magazine, Brook had additional thoughts to say on this subject. She wrote,

“When a younger couple gets a divorce, they worry about how it will affect the children. My Mom told me that’s partly why she and Dad stayed together for so long. Did it mean that what I saw as a perfect childhood was a lie?

“There’s a notion that an adult child won’t hurt as much as a youngster, that a 26-year-old isn’t as likely to be affected by her parents’ breakup. That she’ll understand. It’s not true. Understanding what your parents are going through is even worse. I began obsessing about their growing old alone. I pictured them in separate houses without someone to make them tea if they had the flu. They could come live with me, but I’d have to choose one.

“My parents and I reversed roles. I became the worried one, the one wanting to make sure they had a good weekend or that the birthday present I’d sent was perfect. ‘I told a friend after the holidays that my family felt dead to me.’ ‘I think you’re exaggerating,’ my friend said. But I wasn’t. I was in mourning. My family as I knew it was dying.”

As you can surmise, it’s not as easy for many adult children to adjust to their parents’ divorces even though many people may thin they should. That’s why we want to lead you to some additional  thoughts on this subject, hoping that they will help those who are dealing with this issue.

The first resources we want to direct you to are a series of interviews conducted by the ministry of Family Life Today with Dennis Rainey. This series was aired October 23-27 of 2006 where Dennis interviewed Jen Abbas and Elizabeth Marquardt.

To make the choice to either listen to or read the transcripts for each broadcast, please click onto the links provided below:

• Surviving the Aftermath of Divorce

Series Title: Adult Children of Divorce: Healing the Pain That Lives On (Day 1 of 5) Guests Include: Jen Abbas, Elizabeth Marquardt. On the broadcast today, Elizabeth Marquardt, director of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values, and Jen Abbas, author of the book Generation Ex, tell Dennis Rainey about their experience growing up without both a mother and a father in the home.

• The Emotional Hurdles of Living Through a Divorce

Series Title: Adult Children of Divorce: Healing the Pain That Lives On (Day 2 of 5) Guests Include: Jen Abbas, Elizabeth Marquardt. Divorce not only dramatically affects the couple involved, but also their children. That’s according to authors Elizabeth Marquardt and Jen Abbas, both adult children of divorce. In this broadcast, Elizabeth and Jen talk about the reality of divorce emotionally for children with FamilyLife President, Dennis Rainey.

• The Sleeper Effect of Divorce

Series Title: Adult Children of Divorce: Healing the Pain That Lives On (Day 3 of 5) Guests Include: Jen Abbas, Elizabeth Marquardt. In this broadcast, divorce survivors Elizabeth Marquardt and Jen Abbas tell Dennis Rainey how their parents’ divorce nearly 20 years earlier has affected them throughout their lives and continues to affect them today.

• Forgiving Our Parents

Series Title: Adult Children of Divorce: Healing the Pain That Lives On (Day 4 of 5) Guests Include: Jen Abbas, Elizabeth Marquardt. In this broadcast, Jen Abbas, author of the book Generation Ex, and Elizabeth Marquardt, director of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values, talk about forgiving their parents for the divorces that catapulted them as children into a strange new world often difficult to navigate or understand.

• Approaching Marriage

Series Title: Adult Children of Divorce: Healing the Pain That Lives On (Day 5 of 5) Guests Include: Jen Abbas, Elizabeth Marquardt. Divorce has a dramatic impact on the lives of children. But how does it affect a person’s approach to marriage as an adult? Today on the broadcast, Dennis Rainey talks with Jen Abbas, author of Generation Ex, and researcher Elizabeth Marquardt, both adult children of divorce, about how how their parents’ divorce affected their thoughts about marriage and family.

As well, there is another series of broadcasts conducted by the ministry of Family Life Today with Dennis Rainey that deal with the subject of adult children and how their parents’ divorce has affected their lives. Please click onto the links provided below to either listen to or read the transcripts for:

• The Beginning of the End

Series Title: Six String Rocketeer (Day 1 of 3) Guests Include: Bill and Jesse Butterworth. In this broadcast, award-winning communicator Bill Butterworth and his son, Jesse, talk to Dennis Rainey about the divorce that changed both of their lives forever.

• The After Shock of Divorce

Series Title: Six String Rocketeer (Day 2 of 3) Guests Include: Bill and Jesse Butterworth. In this broadcast, father and son team, Bill and Jesse Butterworth, tell Dennis Rainey how they felt as they struggled to get back on their feet emotionally and spiritually after Bill’s sudden divorce from Jessie’s mother.

• The Worst of Both Worlds

Series Title: Six String Rocketeer (Day 3 of 3) Guests Include: Bill and Jesse Butterworth. In this broadcast, well-known author Bill Butterworth joins his son, award-winning singer and songwriter Jesse Butterworth, to talk about life many years after Bill’s divorce that rocked both their worlds.

The above article was put together by Cindy Wright of Marriage Missions.

After my husband and I first reconciled, my daughter Laura walked in the door one day, her dancing. “I heard a new song on the radio by Shania Twain. It should be Daddy’s and your song! It’s called ‘You’re Still the One.’”

A warm glow spread through me. Laura was right. The agonizing nights were over. The fears, the doubts were behind me. But as I looked into her smiling eyes, I remembered that this story wasn’t just about my husband and me. The story of our daughters and the impact all of this had on them was there too. Their lives and hearts were affected just as ours were. But because of their youth, they often didn’t know how it was affecting them or how to respond to it.

When we are buried in our own grief, it’s hard to see the pain of our children. We think of ourselves as the victims and our children as mere bystanders—observers. But they are victims too. What they thought was rock has turned to sand. The safety net that should protect them and give them security has sprung a gaping hole.

As we reel within a world that is turning upside down, so do they. Whether they are toddlers or young adults, our children walk along behind us, the dust we kick up flying in their faces, the garbage of our words becoming sour food in their minds, our silences and insensitivities spinning a web of confusion and disconnectedness over their souls.

Sometimes their confused emotions cause them to drift into actions that alarm us. They may pull away in rebellion or sink into depression or isolation. These are the innocents we love with every fiber of our being. How do we keep from hurting them?

First and more important, seek God to make sure you are going in the direction he would lead. You need to stay in his will. And each day, pray a hedge of protection around your children.

It is hard to comprehend the vulnerability children feel, which causes them to think your marriage problems are their fault. It is important to continually reassure them that this crisis is not their fault. Reinforce this to them throughout the turmoil —because they may not hear it or believe it the first time you say it.

In this out-of-control setting, keep life as normal as possible to preserve the children’s sense of security. Be available, listen to them, and let them express their own upset feelings without judging them. This will give them the freedom to deal with their grief more honestly. Since you may not be able to listen to their pain without being distracted by your own, give them the freedom to share with friends. It may seem awkward, but remember that this is their crisis too.

You also need to keep them in the loop, letting them know the general scope of what is going on without sharing details they don’t need to know. Resist the temptation to demonize their father or disparage or minimize their father’s love for them. They need his love just as they need yours.

Your own intense anguish needs to be expressed in healthy forums. This is an opportunity for them to see God’s supernatural power at work in you as you meet each day. If they see you looking to God and finding healthy outlets, such as friends or counselors, during this time of distress, your present pain can eventually bear fruit in your children’s lives in years to come.

But in the midst of it all, you also need to give yourself a lot of grace —forgiving yourself for failures and asking your children for forgiveness as well. You cannot —and will not —be perfect. Pray with them for wisdom, strength, mercy, and understanding. They have their own path to walk, and as they navigate around the shards of their mom and dad’s broken relationship, they too can use this part of the journey to learn and grow. You can diminish their pain by giving God center stage and letting him lead in his way and on his schedule.

Lord, protect my children. Place a hedge around them and keep them in the circle of your love. It’s hard for me to see their pain when I am in the midst of mine. Give me the wisdom and sensitivity to listen and affirm them and steer them around the potholes in the road.

The above article is written by Linda W. Rooks and comes from the excellent book, “Broken Heart on Hold… Surviving Separation” published by Life Journey. As Linda writes about this book, Broken Heart on Hold is meant to be a friend to walk beside you through the labyrinths of your confusion and pain. It is not a quick fix or a prescription for how to solve your problems. It is intended to be a daily companion in your crisis. It is not a book to be picked up and read through once and then set on the shelf. Rather, I suggest you read one selection each day and let the devotional thoughts sink into your heart and mind. Mull it over. Chew it up. Then the following day go on to the next.”

You can also visit Linda’s Web site at www.brokenheartonhold.com where she has “individually formatted a number of Bible verses for your strength and encouragement.” As she says, “From my Web site you can download full-color pages of whatever Scripture you choose and post it on your wall, mirror, or refrigerator so you can see it regularly and be encouraged. When our minds are spinning in different directions, being reminded of a Scripture can lead us to a more peaceful and healthy path.” Preview or Buy This Book Now.

Tragically, many who are reading this article find themselves in marital situations where they believe that the only solution is to divorce their spouse.

Because we don’t know your individual situation, we can’t tell you whether your situation has biblical grounds to divorce and whether this is your only alternative or not. That is between you and God.

But what we can do is give you information which will help you to determine whether you and your children truly will be better off apart from your spouse —as you might believe up to this point. But as the saying goes, “The grass always looks greener on the other side.”

We’ve known of many, many people who have fallen into that trap. They’ve told us that they were sure they would be better off divorced than living in the situation they were living in, only to later find out differently. They now live with great regret for the decision they made.

As a ministry dedicated to trying to help preserve the sanctity of marriage and reveal the heart of Christ within marriage, we attempt to give you information that will help you so you don’t make the same mistake these people have made. You will find lots of voices in today’s world saying something different, but we want to make sure that you know what we’ve heard as well.

The following article is to give you more information, so you truly can make the wisest of decision concerning your marriage and your family. Children are the silent partners in your family relationship and their “voice” is often over-ridden and misunderstood when a family is in turmoil.

So to give “voice” to their concerns and well-being, we’d like to refer you to an article posted on the web site for AMFM Online on the subject of myths concerning divorce and some ways in which your children could be affected.

Every situation is different, and every child is different but the following article gives voice to some facts that you need to consider. To read this article written by Jeff and Judi Parziale, please click onto the following link:

• DIVORCE AND REMARRIAGE MYTHS

— ALSO —

Another article you may find helpful was written by Drs. Beverly and Tom Rodgers. You can read it by clicking onto the web site link below to read:

• PAIN AND TRIUMPH FOR CHILDREN OF DIVORCE

Not only is the family divided between two worlds as far as where they physically live. But the children are divided in how they emotionally live between the two worlds where their parents live.

For a lot of them the question is, “How do you love them each without causing problems with one or the other?” How do you juggle their differing life-styles and approaches to how they treat you and straddle their “divided” world?

As author Elizabeth Marquardt says,

“Children of divorced parents are more apt than those living in intact families to feel divided between two homes with different values. They’re asked to keep secrets about the different households. They’re left without clear guidance on what’s right and what’s wrong, turning instead to friends and siblings. And they’re ‘more apt to struggle with loss, isolation, loneliness and suffering.’”

To learn more about this, the ministry of Family Life Today has posted an article on their web site that you may be interested in reading. To do so, please click onto the link below:

• A CHILDHOOD LIVED BETWEEN TWO WORLDS

If you are caught up in one of those circumstances, please know that our hearts cry for you. It’s tragic that there are circumstances where one spouse has the leverage to negatively change not only the fate of the marriage, but also the fate of the children and whole family structure— splitting it apart by divorce.

And what’s also sad is that children are usually the last ones who have a say in this restructuring, even though it greatly affects their future.

And some of you are caught up in violent and abusive marriage relationships where your very safety, and/or the safety of your children is involved. And others of you are in a marriage where there has been unfaithfulness and adultery involved. Again, our hearts go out to you in sorrow. We understand that there are toxic marriages like this where you feel you have no choice but to leave the marriage for those reasons.

If any of those are the case, this article is not for you. This article is pointed towards those who are in “low conflict” marriages where you have children, and you are considering divorce because you’ve “grown apart” or you’re” bored” and want more out of marriage than you’re getting, or you just don’t want to be married anymore, or any number of other reasons that don’t involve violence, or infidelity, or a spouse who is making the decision to divorce without your say in the matter.

We would like you to read an article written by Elizabeth Marquardt, who has done extensive studies on the subject of divorce and how it effects children. We are hoping that it may bring a different insight into your decision-making concerning your marriage and divorce decisions.

To read this article, please click onto the web site link below:

• CHILDREN OF DIVORCE: Stories of Exile

“The children of divorce are handed a really big job. When parents are married, it’s their job to do the hard work of making sense of your different values, your different beliefs, your different backgrounds. When they get divorced that job doesn’t go away, it just gets handed to their child instead, who is 4 or 8 or 12 years old. Their child is and always will be, throughout their childhood, looking to their mom and dad as the first and most important role models for their own moral and spiritual formation.

“The child is wrestling with the differences that the child sees in each of their worlds. And the conflict that used to be between the parents has now gotten transferred to the child’s inner life. And it’s within the child’s own life in a very lonely, overwhelming way that the child is trying to confront these big questions. It’s the distinctive experience of the child of divorce.” (Elizabeth Marquardt, The Emotional Hurdles of Living Through a Divorce Broadcast Date: 10/24/06 – This FamilyLife Today Transcript is located at: http://www.familylife.com/fltoday/default.asp?id=8838

If you are considering divorce and you want to know what some of the questions are that they’ll be wrestling with, or maybe you’re trying to help a child of divorce, there is an article written by Angela Elwell Hunt, which is posted on the Today’s Christian Magazine web site, that may give you some great insight.

To read this article, please click onto the link provided below:

• WHAT CHILDREN OF DIVORCE REALLY THINK

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What do you say? What went wrong? As shocking as a divorce may be, you can navigate through the changes that come with your child’s divorce announcement and help him or her through this trying time.

Reacting to the news
If there is any chance to help the couple receive counseling, seek reconciliation or postpone divorce through a separation period, encourage them to do so. Your stable wisdom in the midst of emotional turmoil could save the marriage.

Unfortunately, often the couple has already decided to divorce, and your reaction is important. First, you may want to have a good cry. You are grieving the loss of dreams and a marriage. You may also find yourself feeling shock, anger, guilt, shame and powerlessness. Get your thoughts and emotions in order before responding or reacting. Your child will need your stability.

Helping with transition
Divorce seldom ends with a decree from a judge. Fractured emotions and fault-finding often get tangled with issues such as the division of property, custody of children and visitation rights.

Consider how your role could change with those involved. How can you stay connected? What will family mean after the divorce is final? Help make it as smooth as possible.

Invest healthy energy in deciding how you can be a positive influence by standing as a role model for them. This is a great time to illustrate what age, maturity and experience can do when melded with God’s love. Carefully choose your words and actions in these volatile times and defuse the emotions, pain and confusion through your example.

Modeling forgiveness

Battles regarding custody and visitation can be brutal. Your reactions can lessen the trauma. Blame doesn’t really matter or help. It just gets in the way. Blaming, and all that accompanies it, will thwart the process of forgiveness, reconciliation and healthy healing.

You may be the only godly example among everyone involved who shows what it means to forgive and forget. You can also show them how to learn from the past and build more soundly for the times ahead.

Setting boundaries
There are practical considerations that may affect you and your household directly. Prepare for them in advance to avoid the consequences. The decisions you make can be the difference between enabling problems to continue or empowering your child to make healthy changes.

For example, what about your child moving back home? Some counselors caution parents about the implications that come with putting out either a “Vacancy” or “No Vacancy” sign. Perhaps your child should explore other options, such as moving into a smaller apartment or taking on tenants, instead of returning home.

How much financial or material support can/should you offer? Consider conditions on your help, such as whether your giving should be a gift or a loan, and for how long. Other legal and financial questions must also be considered, such as your will and raising grandchildren, directly or indirectly, if the need arises.

How you respond to these questions and what boundaries you set could make the difference in decisions your child must make, such as whether or not to reconcile if she knows she can’t run back home. Can divorce be avoided if you say no to them in a firm and loving way? Seek advice from trusted church leaders or a counselor.

Advising and praying
Harv Herman, pastor of the over-50 Prime Ministers at New Life Church in Colorado Springs, identifies two keys for parents helping children through divorce.

“First, give advice only when asked,” Marv says. “It’s too easy to want to tell them how to run their lives, and it can cause problems in your relationship if you do. Ask for their permission before speaking to them, even about critical issues.

“Second, pray,” he says. “Intercede for them. Pray about everything, including whether or not to give them counsel. Your peace of mind, and theirs, is at stake.

“Pray like you’ve never prayed before for them,” Marv says. “Your wisdom and knowledge of life give you a special perspective. Thus, your prayers can be more effective than anything lawyers, marriage counselors and judges can do.”

Help them reconcile if at all possible, keep a stable mind, prepare for change, forgive and set boundaries as your child and grandchildren go through divorce. Then influence them for good as you model godliness, and you will make it through this season together.

For years, our national debate about divorce has focused on badly damaged children. Most studies show that children of divorce are two to three times more likely to end up with lasting social and emotional problems — things like addiction, mental illness, an arrest record, or a teen pregnancy — but the majority are not scarred in this way. For parents considering divorce, the take-home message has been clear: Divorce might hurt your kids, but most likely they’ll be just fine.

But now the debate — and the questions — are changing.

Today, one-quarter of young adults between the age of 18 and 35 are grown children of divorce. These 15 million young people across America have a very different take on divorce. Most of them are relatively successful. They don’t see themselves as victims or damaged goods. Most have graduated from high school, maybe gone to college or beyond, gotten jobs, gotten married, had kids. When they hear the debate about damaged children of divorce, they cringe. “That’s not me,” they say.

But in a first-ever national study of grown children of divorce, which I conducted with professor Norval Glenn at the University of Texas-Austin, these young people told us that, even if they were not forever damaged by their parents’ divorce, they were still deeply shaped by it in ways that should make parents think yet again before divorcing.

It turns out that any kind of divorce, whether or not it’s amicable, gives children an entirely new and burdensome job. After a divorce, the parents no longer have to confront their different worlds— their different values, beliefs and lifestyles. In fact, their inability to handle that challenge may have led to the divorce. But the big job of making sense of the parents’ two different worlds does not go away once the divorce papers are signed. Instead, this job gets handed to the child alone.

Many grown children of divorce told us they had to grow up negotiating two wholly separate worlds. They rose to the challenge by becoming a different person with each of their parents. They had a mom-self and a dad-self inside them and pulled out the one they needed depending on where they were that day. They had to grow up fast and often felt much less emotionally safe than their peers with married parents, even compared with some whose parents were unhappily married.

Being the lonely link between two different worlds made the grown children of divorce more often feel they had to figure out the big questions in life —What is right and wrong? Where do I belong? Is there a God?— alone.

But doesn’t it matter how the parents divorce? If divorced parents don’t fight, doesn’t that help? Sure, to a point. An amicable divorce is better for kids than a bitter one. But it turns out that only one-fifth of the grown children of divorce say their parents had a lot of conflict after the divorce. Instead, the grown children of divorce told us that the divorce itself made their parents’ worlds seem forever locked in conflict, even when their parents did not fight.

This silent conflict between two worlds went to the heart of the child’s identity. The children of divorce come to feel like divided selves. When they grow up, some wonder whether they can be their whole, true self around anyone.

There’s a new debate about divorce emerging, with the grown children of divorce leading the way. I’m one of them. My parents split up when I was 2 years old. At 35, I’m speaking for my generation when I say this: Most of us from divorced families do not see ourselves as “damaged goods,” but neither are we willing to be held up as convenient proof that kids don’t need both parents. We needed our parents, living together, married to each other, and preferably getting along well.

And if our parents could not stay together — and some cannot— we needed to grow up in a culture that didn’t focus on only the most tragic outcomes and dismiss the rest of the kids as being just fine.

We may not have been broken by divorce, but our identities were deeply shaped by it. In the national debate about the impact of divorce, our stories matter, too.

The above article is originally titled: CHILDREN OF DIVORCE: WE’RE NOT DAMAGED GOODS, BUT WE’RE STILL DEEPLY SHAPED BY DIVORCE, which was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer December 11, 2005 and was written by Elizabeth Marquardt.

If you are considering getting a divorce we encourage you to read what some of these adults now have to say concerning their growing up years in a divorced home. You could find their testimonies to be quite enlightening and helpful in better understanding what your child could experience. May the eyes of your heart truly hear what God is saying to you.

If you are the child of divorce, you may be able to relate to what is written below and it may be helpful for you to share some of your thoughts afterward in the Comment Section. We pray God will empower you to work through whatever issues you may have and help others to do the same.

If you are already divorced and there is no possibility of reconciliation, please know that in posting this article we are not intending to make your living situation more hurtful in some way. We truly are sorry if you are experiencing pain over your situation. We never want to add to someone’s pain, but rather participate with God in ministering to and shedding more of His redeeming light upon those who need it.

We hope you will read the following testimonies to use them to pray through and try to help your children overcome obstacles they may be experiencing which are similar to the ones that are written below. May God help you in this mission.

The following letter was written to Diane Sollee, the founder and Director of Smart Marriages Smartmarriages.com from someone who has lived through such an experience. It’s something that we all should pay attention to:

I have to comment on the subject of children of divorce. I just have to say that no matter how many “rough spots” my husband and I have encountered (just the normal marriage stuff) I made a decision long ago that once we brought kids into the world divorce was a taboo word, I would never let these little creatures that I adore so much have to go through what I went through, with parent’s multiple ex’s, remarriages, too many step-siblings to count and just basically the loss of a family.

Although my parents divorced 40 years ago when I was 10 it still affects me today — no memories of happy family growing up, getting to know extended family and so on whereas my husband who is from a HUGE intact family full of love and closeness serves as such a contrast to what I missed.

Fortunately my kids are very close to them. I wish more people would simply come out and acknowledge the harm to children when parents have a bitter divorce. I am sure this is why I am so pro-marriage.

I had a couple yesterday with five children meet with me the first time and told me that two other therapists told them they should divorce (which I find appalling!) and instead we focused on strengths and reasons to stay married after 21 years.

We also of course discussed the hard issues they need to fix, but they left my office very pleased and hopeful.

If parents could put children first, divorce rates would go waaaaaaaaay down!

—Katherine Robredo

— ALSO —

The following article contains the extensive testimony (both positive and negative) of someone who grew up in a divorced home and lived in a step child situation. Plus, you might find it helpful to read the responses to what was written afterward from others who as children, have lived in divorced homes. Please click onto the following web site link to read:

• THE PRODUCT OF DIVORCE

If you have additional tips you can share to help others in this area of marriage, or you want to share requests for prayer and/or ask others for advice, please “Join the Discussion” by adding your comments below.

But what happens when these children, who delight your heart so much, are torn apart by divorce? What happens to your ability to be able to be such a big part of their lives in the present and future — particularly if your son or daughter doesn’t have custody of the children (and there is a huge relationship strain involved which puts you on the “outs”)?

It’s heart-breaking enough for all involved — especially the children. They are no longer able to have both parents living with them in the same home. But then, not to have the ability to have their grandparents as involved in their lives like before (or maybe not at all), it makes life even tougher for them.

We would like for you to read an article, written by Rachel Pollack, which was posted in the St Petersburg Times, so you can gain a clearer understanding of this situation. Prayerfully you can make a positive difference for some grandparents and their grandchildren in the future by learning what you will.

To read this article click on the link below:

Grandparents Struggle to Hold on After Divorce