As a domestic relations mediator, I see my clients struggle with how and when to tell their kids about their upcoming divorce. I've recently come across a helpful article on the subject by Sol R. Rappaport, Ph.D., a Licensed Clinical Psychologist, in the Summer issue of the ABA's Family Advocate. Id., Telling Your Children About the Divorce. Here's some of his excellent comments and suggestions.
First, Dr. Rappaport notes that "telling your children about your divorce is one of the most emotionally challenging and difficult things you will ever do ... [T]he manner in which parents tell their children about the divorce will set the stage for how the children perceive and interpret everything that will happen over the coning months and years relative to the divorce. This day will forever alter your children's lives. So think carefully about how and what you will tell them and plan it out. You are setting the stage for how your children cope with your divorce."
Next, Dr. Rappaport makes a number of specific recommendations as to timing, content, and the manner of telling:
- you should be in a calm state, and hopefully both parents will do this together
- you want to wait until you have information on what the kids can expect to happen next, because they will surely ask lots of questions
- the kids' age and developmental understanding may impact timing
- kids don't "need to know until a change in their lives is imminent"
- don't tell them right away just because you are having difficulty keeping it to yourself--"children don't need to know the truth about everything"
- "think about what your goal is in talking with your children"--is it to "tell your child the whole truth or is it to help your child cope with the coming divorce and foster the best possible relationship with both parents?"
- notwithstanding the arguments in favor of delaying telling them, you want to make sure your children hear about the divorce from you, not from other family members
- the goal will be "to help your chidren understand that your are geting divorced" but "that you both love them and always will, that the divorce is not their fault, and that they can ask questions about what is happening"
- notwithstanding that last piece, remember that 'letting them ask questions doesn't mean telling them the unbridled truth about everything (e.g., marital infidelity)"
- if the Court directs you to undergo a custody evaluation, explain that ya'll are "having a hard time deciding which days/nights you should be with each of us"
Although discouraging "too much information," Dr. Rappaport does believe this is conversation that must be had. He notes that "[i]n one study , 23% of seven- to seventeen-year-olds said that no one had talked to them about their parents' divorce. Of those that were spoken to, only 17% ... were told by their parents together, and 45% of them reported learning very little, such as "daddy is leaving." Only 5% felt that they were fully informed and could ask questions." He adds, "[y]ou want your children to be in this 5%."
If you are
interested in child-related mediation or GAL (guardian ad litem) services,
please contact Pilar Vaile, P.C. at
(505) 247-0802, or info@pilarvailepc.com.
