Rebuilding a life following a divorce requires parents to put away their memories of the past with the former spouse. Yet, in their efforts to erase these memories parents close down conversations with their children about their own memories.

The paradox of divorce is this: Forgetting the past with an ex-spouse gives the parent enormous relief but is extremely destructive to the children. What brings about parental health causes children terrible hardship.

Take a child whose parents divorced when the child was thirteen. From the point of divorce on, any happy and loving memories of the child with the ex-spouse are silenced. Even if the child brings them up, because of the stony silence (or hostile reaction) of the parent, the child quickly learns never to bring them up again. Forgetting past memories may be good for the parent but represent a tragic loss for the child!

And it gets worse.

Divorced parents must also distance themselves from the current life of their ex-spouses. They cannot allow themselves to dwell on what their ex-spouse is doing. And contact with the ex-spouse must be kept to a minimum. Yet, in their efforts to remain uninvolved, they ignore their children’s experiences at the other household.

What parent can deal non-emotionally with stories about how cool the mom’s boyfriend is or how classy their dad’s new car is? Hearing great things about the other parent causes emotional heaviness for days. Children quickly learn to keep information about the other parent to themselves. The rule is: What goes on over at the other house stays there. So children learn to keep quiet not only about their past but also about their current activities with the other parent.

And it gets even worse.

Enter the stepparent. What stepparent wants to hear about all the good times the spouse had with the ex? As far as the stepparent is concerned, the less discussion about the parent’s past the better. And most stepparents are not at all interested in their stepchildren’s experiences over at the ex’s house.

Stepparents want a clean slate with their new partner and the children. It would be much easier for everyone—parents and stepparents—if the kids could just forget their past and keep to themselves anything to do with what goes on at the other parent’s house.

What is happening among separated households is that the whole child is not being appreciated. Such a loss for the child! The only experiences that are appreciated and acknowledged are the child’s time with one particular parent.

Resources: Building Emotionally Healthy Children: Gatekeepers, and Loving Your Stepfamily: The Art of Making Your Blending Family Work. by Dr. Donald R. Partridge. For a more comprehensive list of materials please go to our store.

The worst parenting in the world is when parents or stepparents on both sides of a divorced family oppose a parent/child relationship. It is this one-two combination that will ruin a child. To explain this clearly, we’ll use Barbara and Jim, a divorced couple, and their son Peter.

Peter’s mother is still single but his father recently married a woman named Jennifer. Barbara, furious with both Jim and Jennifer, shares her grievances with her son. Peter is being taught to favor his mother and have little to do with his father or new stepmother. Because of his mother’s influence, Peter is unpleasant and disagreeable when over at his father’s and Jennifer’s home. Returning with negative reviews Peter is roundly praised by his mother for seeing the “truth” about his “bad” father and stepmother. Peter’s favor toward his mom and disfavor toward his dad have not gone unnoticed by Jennifer.

Jennifer has decided she will not put up with Peter’s rude behavior. Sick and tired of his mean disposition, Jennifer denies Peter access to their home. She tells Jim that until Peter can behave respectfully, he can just stay at his mother’s house.

Furthermore, Jennifer opposes Jim seeing Peter away from the home. She argues that to see Peter only justifies his rude behavior and dishonors her as the stepmother. And because she feels that she and Jim are a marital team, Jim should not try to see Peter without her.

Jennifer wants Jim to join with her in condemning Peter’s rude behavior and to separate from him until the boy learns better manners.

So there we have it, the parent on the one side and the stepparent on the other, both hostile to one another but strangely in agreement about keeping Peter and his father apart. For one parent to influence a child against another is bad enough, but when two conspire together, a parent on one side and a stepparent on the other, it all but spells doom for the stability and emotional health of the child.

If the parent/child relationship is damaged in any way, positive characteristics in the child like loyalty, flexibility, endurance, kindness, and a sound relationship with God will be threatened. And the child will take these dysfunctions out into society.

This is why Scripture stands against anything that would hinder a healthy parent/child relationship. The relationship between parents and children is one of the most critical messages in all of Scripture. In fact, the Prophet sent to the earth to prepare mankind for Christ’s return has as his message the restoration of the parent/child relationship. “And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse. [Malachi 4:5,6]

Nowhere is the parent/child relationship more vulnerable than between divorced parents.

And the worst parenting possible is having a parent on the one side and the stepparent on the other ganging up against a parent/child relationship.

Because of the terrible parenting going on between the mother and Jennifer, Peter and his father are pressured to remain separate. How tragic for Peter. How tragic for the father. Under these strained circumstances, Peter and his father need each other more than ever.

Resources:

Building Emotionally Healthy Children: Gatekeepers, and Loving Your Stepfamily: The Art of Making Your Blending Family Work, by Dr. Donald R. Partridge. For a more comprehensive list of materials please go to www.ifre.org.