Telling The Kids About Your Divorce
08 Jan 2010
Surviving divorce can be one of the most challenging times in an individual’s life. When children are included in the relationship a divorce becomes that much more complicated. Not only does the permanent separation of two parents have a major effect on a couple’s offspring, but it is even harder to swallow considering the children have no other choice but to hang on and survive the ride.
Like their mothers and fathers, kids need assistance during divorce. While most parents realize that telling the children about the divorce is the hardest part of the process, they do little to prepare for the life altering moment they are about to face. Many parents are preoccupied with their own hurt they fail to think out how they will tell their children about the divorce.
In fact, for divorcing parents who have a lot of descent between the two of them, telling the kids in a way that is less hurtful is often the farthest thing from either adult’s mind. More often than not, the kids are brought into a room – typically after their parents have been arguing – and told they are no longer going to be a family. Most often this revelation is shocking and saddening for the children involved.
When a kid is given the news of an impending divorce without proper preparation by the parents it can be confusing and spark anger, sadness and a variety of other emotions. These feelings are similar to those parents experience as they struggling in understanding the divorce process. Essentially the children need to hear the news in a way that is premeditated.
Parents who are willing to take the time and make the effort to explain their decision to divorce in a gentle way are more likely to deliver the news in a less harmful manner. There are resources such as eBooks that can give parents the information needed to inform their children about the divorce. These tools typically provide basic templates that include age appropriate text for parents to read. The resources also help guide the parents, step-by-step, in preparing a personal family storybook, in a photo-album format, that the children will want to read. Basically, these resources not only tell the parent what to say, but says it for them. By utilizing online resources such as a family storybook, parents are considering their children’s feelings and delivering the worst of news in the best of ways.
