yes
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used to be but not anymore
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Is divorce really that bad for children?
My parents split up when I was 11? I think and entering high school. It was already a time full of change and chaos and the change at home only made it all worse. The main thing was I longed to sit as a family and eat dinner together. I watched the show ‘Friday Night Dinner’ which is a British comedy, but honestly it just made me sad because I wish I had one house to call home/my childhood home and my whole family there. Christmas was hard because I would go to both houses (still do) on the day, because Christmas is such a big thing for my family and my mum is still single so I always had incredible guilt leaving her on her own on Christmas Day (all her family live really far away and her parents passed years ago). It’s the feeling of guilt and having to choose one over the other sometimes you know? And now I don’t really feel I have a childhood home. I’ve moved out now, but when my parents split up my mum had to rent as she didn’t have much money and then we got put in temporary accommodation and were moved around loads. My dad found another partner and has a toddler right now and a baby on the way, I don’t feel like I can be comfortable or 100% myself in that house anymore and it’s made me grow distant from my dad.
Overall I know it’s for the best because they were unhappy, and they tried their best to do it in the best way they could, but ultimately it had a huge impact on me in my teen years
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not necessarily… growing up with divorced parents who have a healthy coparenting relationship is better than growing up in a house with married parents who are in a toxic relationship
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- 1.1K opinions shared on Break Up & Divorce topic.
Divorce can devastate a child but much of that lies on both the parents. If the parents make time for their child, rather than move on with their lives without regard for their seed, then the effects can be lessened.
A disregarding parent greatly increases the probability of suicidal thoughts, anxiety. angry outbursts, substance abuse, violent acts, suicide, and/or incarceration.Divorce is not bad for children if there is sexual, physical, emotional, and/or substance abuse individually or collectively harming the child’s Person. Even in such cases, the judge decides the amount of time child and parent shares. Divorce does not mean removal of negative stimuli from child’s life.
- 2.4K opinions shared on Break Up & Divorce topic. u
Don't you think growing up in one home with a mother and a father is a distinct advantage?
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No it's not that bad. I never went through it myself, but the thought of being able to have each parent all to oneself sounds like heaven!
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i feel like this is an empirical question which isn't subject to opinion
i typed "divorce children outcomes" into Google Scholar and the first result was a meta-study called Parental divorce and the well-being of children: a meta-analysis, Keith & Amato 1991 (click). 1991 is actually too long ago to take it at face value since the conditions of divorce and upbringing could have changed in that time. but it's where i'd be inclined to start. according to the abstract,
"Children of divorce scored lower than children in intact families across a variety of outcomes [...] For some outcomes, methodologically sophisticated studies yielded weaker effect sizes than did other studies. In addition, for some outcomes, more recent studies yielded weaker effect sizes than did studies carried out during earlier decades. Some support was found for theoretical perspectives emphasizing parental absence and economic disadvantage, but the most consistent support was found for a family conflict perspective."
if i decided i can trust this paper's conclusions then the answer would seem to be 'yes,' although it's interesting that more recent studies show less of an effect (of divorce on children) and i'd obviously like to see something more recent to see if that trend continued. there's also a suggestion here about the reason why—that it has to do with the effect of family conflict. this would lead me away from what OlderAndWiser (divorcee) takes to be the commonsense approach, ie. that it's simply better to have both parents together in one house, because if the explanation for the problem w/r/t children of divorce is family conflict that isn't going to apply in other situations where both parents are not together in one house, for example in a household where one parent died.
please don't take this to be an actual answer to the question. i am talking about how i would approach finding an answer to the question. i 1. didn't actually read the paper, 2. don't know how much i can trust this paper, and 3. didn't follow up with anything more recent. but if i did all those things i figure i'd end up with an answer to that question which was likely to be correct.
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Most of the time. The children will take the blame as well feel sad when they can’t be with the other parent.
I work with a lot of children. It’s easy to sense those who come from strong family unity where they are alert, ready to learned because they are loved and emotionally stable.
I had one last year, who was inconsistent, she seek attention and did not care about her school work. When the parents reunited, she was happy as a bean and was able to catch up with her school work.
this year, the little boy wrote in his journal daily that he is sad because mom doesn’t want him to see dad. He also shows his sadness. One day, he hid behind his chair. When the class was doing their independent work, I pulled him aside to talk to him. He wants/needs someone to talk to, I try to take time to hug him and tell him both parents love him.
one day, I checked his homework. His father wrote his phone number and asked me to call. I spoke to the father on a weekend. He was thrill to hear from me on a weekend and that his son got a 100 on his math test. He didn’t believe it and test his son separately to be sure it’s not a mistake.
I ensured him that it’s important to be able to encourage his twins (yes twin boys) if he can that both parents love them even if they are in two separate homes. -
kids of divorced parents are not at all disadvantaged. They're just rather struggling to cope with a life environment and lifestyle.
The only negative effect is that the kids will miss the fun family environment of having both parents together: the jokes, the silliness, the coziness of having a big family. Even though this might not seem like a huge thing. It still hurts the kids because its something they have grown so accustomed to that they just don't know how to live without it.
A similar analogy:
A rich kid who is used to driving cars instead of having to take the bus. Being able to buy whatever he wants from the store instead of having to beg his parents for money. Once you strip this rich kid out of his credit card, free spending. Now he needs to stand at the bus corner to wait for the bus 15 minutes every day. He will sink into depression. He will feel like he cannot live without his credit card and car. Thus, this will negatively impact him. But reality is, waiting for the bus, and begging our parents for money is how the vast majority of children grow up in the US. We are not disadvantaged.
Its just that when these kids are used to being accustomed to a living a certain lifestyle, they can't cope to living another lifestyle.
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Definitely. Divorced families are dysfunctional. Divorce robs the child of the right to grow up in a family where his/her parents set a good example of what a good relationship should be like.
A child without a good father does not have a teacher of emotional stability and a source of security and fun memories; he/she has no idea how a man should treat the people around him.
A child without a mother does not have a place of comfort and solace, and the glue that keeps a family together; he/she has no idea how a woman should treat the people around her.
Divorce is traumatic. It teaches children that relationships are likely to fail, and fails to give children an understanding of how healthy relationships work. Divorce robs children of a person that they share a strong bond with, or leaves the children with the parent that does not treat them right.
Yes, in cases of domestic abuse, divorce is beneficial even for the children. But in most other cases, it is not. It is harmful. -
They were already on the brink of divorce when I was born, and to be honest I didn't really care.
The only real bad thing I could say is when my mother literally showed up one day when I was 14 and took me to live in her apartment. It was a shock going from a beautiful house with garden to her small apartment.
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I think it depends on the situation.
My best friend and her mom used to get hit by her dad. She would pray that they'd get a divorce all the time, but said her mom wouldn't because they depend on him financially.
My mom and dad were separated for a while and lived in different places. I didn't care if they divorced or not because I still saw my dad frequently 🤷🏾♀️
My other best friend's parents were divorced, but she was also fine because she saw her dad frequently.
I think it depends on the maturity of the children and how parents explain and deal with splitting up.
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Divorce is the lesser of two evils. I can't tell you how many people I know who are messed up because they grew up in loveless homes where their parents were just roommates. This also has a tendency to repeat in children when they get married. Just like a male child of a man that physically abuses his wife and kids more often than not will grow up to be an abusive man. Children are not stupid. They can figure out things a lot better than grownups can ever imagine. This basically is the moral behind the old story about the Emporer has no clothes. I will NEVER apologize for being old school about marriage and bringing children into this world. Back years ago an 18-year-old was much more stable and grownup than today's 18-year-olds are. We are having more and more people with childlike minds being parents. Divorce is horrible for children. What's MUCH worse though is a child growing up in a dysfunctional home.
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As bad as this sounds, if my parents had divorced when I was a chid, I wouldn't have cared. I was TOO SELFISH and worried about my OWN life. I had nothing to do with their love life! I was just a child! The people who say it ruined a part of their life are insane. How can they put the blame on themselves, when they were just a child and had NOTHING to do with it!
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I always wanted a family like all my friends had. But my parents divorced when I was only four. He didn't pay child support either, which made my childhood even harder. A kid needs clothes and food!
It didn't really bother me most of my life, but now that I am much older, for some reason all my resentment is showing it's ugly head about my feelings for him.
He should have never had any children!
Yes, divorce is really bad! -
I think it affects children like I have two nieces (8 years old/6 years old) and they appear more withdrawn and wish that both their mom and dad were still together. Before the divorce both girls were happy and everything seemed perfect. They now have to spend time between both parents house and I just think that the sad part is they won't get to have both parents in one household. They understand that both parents still love them. They don't get to have the experience of having both a father and mother under the same roof and have to alternate between both other every weekend. Though I think it's the best for both parents if things couldn't work out between them then stay in a marriage where neither partner is satisfied and tired of how things turned out.
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There is no yes or no response to this plain question.
I know a child that had a better life when their parents split up and never seen their father, by choice and that child lived happily with their mother. Their mother worked hard and provided (without receiving child support) and didn’t sleep or party around and didn’t move around and also did well helping the child go to school and study for the military.
Each situation is very different in itself.
Many factors can either make or break the outcome. The child’s age, the maturity of the parents or parent the child lives with, the parents job security and sooooooo many things. -
not necessarily, it's more how the parents cope with it that affects a child. sometimes it's better to be divorced than together if the relationships is really resentful/abusive which is good for a child, but if you divorce and it's just years of court cases and going from one house to another without any sort of structure or help it could be bad. i have a few friends whose parents are divorced and they're fine because their parents still get along and they cooperate
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When my parents divorced I immediately started to self-harm, gain weight, isolate myself and became outwardly violent.
I was only 9. -
Divorce leads to a poorer financial landscape and single parent environments which are known not to benefit children. And children tend to blame themselves and feel the loss profoundly. The parent's attitudes may also not help.
It's a disaster for the children. -
Divorce is impactful on children, but I do believe a huge part has to do with not the divorce itself but everything surrounding it, like the conflict between the parents, the anger being taken out on them, the attitude of people around them, and then having to move constantly... I believe hypothetically a divorce handled well won't impact the child as much.
Divorce can absolutely be BETTER for children in situations of an abusive parent, so the children can be safe from that parent.
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Divorce is just a legal proceeding. It's how the parents behave and work together as parents.
If the parents can't handle themsleves as parents, after the love and marriage is gone, the kids are going to suffer. Same way if a parent is abusive or neglectful.
Other kids can be in a family that lives happily under two roofs, if the parents are committed to raising kids after the paper on the decree dries.
- 662 opinions shared on Break Up & Divorce topic.
I am the product of a broken home. My parents got divorced when I was in high school but many years before that it was no picnic either. I never saw up close a good relationship and it affected me later in life. You always see on TV how when parents get divorced they try to buy the affections of their kids with nice cars and fancy vacations. Alas, that was not the case with my brother and me.
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