How to help children through divorce and separation

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This is a very controversial topic for a number of reasons. For the sake of this Blog, I am going to keep this very focussed on the children of divorce and not on the couple involved. 

The reality is unavoidable: Divorce statistics are high. 

More and more families are experiencing separation and change and this can be difficult for everyone involved. Parents of children struggle to make the decision to leave in many cases, due to societies habit of placing the fear of death and doom on parents in regards to their children's welfare. Today I am going to attempt to dispel some myths and give you the knowledge so that you are able to make the very best decision for yourselves. I am by no means advocating divorce, my opinions on the matter are irrelevant for this topic. My goal is to help you help the children of divorce.

Children are resilient: 

Let me start by saying that children are resilient. They are able to heal from just about any trauma if supported correctly. It is good to remember that children do not get born with preconceived notions of marriage and relationships. They will adapt to the environments they are placed in with the help of their attachment figures or primary caregivers (usually their parents).

The 'damage' people describe is not actually from the divorce and actual act of separating despite popular belief. What damages the child is the lack of stability that is often created when parents go through difficult splits. Staying together whilst unhappy can be just as harmful for the child, if not worse. Fighting in front of children is a well known 'no-no'. Fighting behind closed doors and displaying passive aggression is just as bad. Children can sense the discord. They can pick up all the emotions between you and your spouse. They will become confused and feel frightened of their feelings of fear as they are unable to understand them or articulate them (complex adult relationships are beyond their comprehension).
Most people know that children often blame themselves. The reason for this is that they have not developed the brain functioning (cognitive ability) to separate their experiences from yours. To understand the concept of 'other people's emotions'. When they sense anger and tension, they will FEEL it is directed towards them. When they sense pain, they will FEEL the pain somehow involves them. You get the point.

The emotion children experience is FEAR:

The main emotion children experiencing during this time is FEAR. When the decision is made for the relationship to end and one parent leaves the home, the child will seldom resent the parent for leaving, even though they miss that parent and will feel some loss. When anger and resentment are felt, these emotions are usually modelled from the remaining parent and thus that parent has indirectly taught the child that the emotions they are experiencing are anger or resentment. What they will likely be experiencing instead will be a sense of abandonment and fear that the remaining parent may do the same thing and leave them all alone. That is why children start to act out and push boundaries. They will often find ways to create a sense of safety and if unguided by you, this can take the form of being clingy, possessive, jealous and angry (to name a few). Their homes and belongings become unsafe as they feel they may lose them too, thus issues with sharing or letting go of things may arise. NB this is really about fear of losing you. Punishment is not the answer here, reassurance is. You need to consistently reassure children, both parents, that your child is loved and will not be abandoned.

So what causes the damage?

The very WORST thing you can do, and I mean this, is talk badly of their other parent to the child. This is actually quite neglectful of the child's needs because they love their other parent, no matter what that parent may have done. Children will love their parents through all manner of atrocities, this is the human condition and not one to be tampered with. Trying to keep your child away from their other parent is harmful to the child. The reason bad mouthing the other parent or preventing them from seeing the child for long periods of time is damaging is because the child will blame themselves. They will be confused and this creates shame. They love their other parent and want to see them but you are telling them that this parent is bad, that they don't care, that they are selfish etc. This indirectly tells the child that what they feel is wrong because they value what you say and they don't yet trust their own feelings. This creates shame. Shame effects self-esteem and stability. Again, reassurance is vital here and explaining to the child that this is not their fault and that they are loved is extremely important. If you can find a way to put your needs aside and focus on co-parenting, the child will not only heal from this change, but thrive in the same way they would if you stayed together.

It is very tempting to play the 'right fight' game during a relationship break-up. We all do it. Love brings out the best and the worst in us. A broken heart can turn people into very different people. One thing I often see is the need to scramble to get people on side. The wounded party in particular will often want to hurt the other person to show them how much they have been hurt. If they are not feeling valued, they may try to get 'back up' so to speak. Friends and family become involved and the number one reason for this...the children. Everyone has an opinion but no one has the facts. In an attempt to advocate and speak up for the children, the friends and family can have the opposite effect and create more harm for the child. Any added stress on the parent targeted for being in the 'wrong' will place the child in a more unstable environment as the child will pick up on this stress. Their fears of abandonment may resurface. They will bare the brunt of that parent's unhappiness and shame (disappointment in you from loved ones creates shame). The less people weighing in, the better, for this very reason. It is not helpful for the children of divorce for friends and family to impose and pass judgement or openly take sides. I know this is not always avoidable but if that is the case, own that. Acknowledge your own hurt as a family member and do not hide behind the phrase 'I am so angry at *** because of what he/she has put the children through'. The best way you can be helpful as someone close to the family is to offer your support. Offer to help out with the children while the parents muddle through their pain and heart break and work out a way to co-parent.

Put your children's needs FIRST:

As parents, your role is to put your child's needs first. You can't always control the other parent but you can certainly control your own urges and impulses. You have all the power in how your child copes with this. It is important that you prioritise your child's needs and find a way to work with the child's other parent. If the other parent has left and will not return, you need to help your child understand that this was not due to anything they did and definitely not because of who they are. Explain the other parent's behaviour in a way that does not berate that parent but shows that they have problems that cause them to behave in that way. Remember that the child is a part of their parents and by criticising the other parent, you are making the child question if that is how you feel about them. I strongly suggest getting some professional advice with the intention of best supporting your children if you are struggling to manage your own feelings and pain. Make it a priority to gain as much support for yourself during this time so that you are able to be the best parent you can be. If you are able to do this, rest assured, your child or children will be just fine. The damage comes from reactions to divorce, not divorce itself. As outsiders to the family, no matter what your relationship, you have a responsibility to provide support not judgement. When their are children involved the decision to split is never easy. It seldom comes out of the blue and it is rarely fully understood. We don't know what people are feeling deep down, what reasons they have. Even if we do understand, it is not our place to judge.

To sum it up:

So remember that children need reassurance and the best way to combat damage is to place your own needs aside a little bit and find a way to co-parent. Try to see your ex as the mother or father of your child instead and acknowledge that your child needs both of you. You don't have to like each other but you do need to find a way to respect each other as parents. Children need consistency above all as they will feel out of control and unstable due to their fear.
Tackle that fear first and foremost! Paula XXX

Tackling MY feelings Before MY Behaviour

Wow, it's been a while since I took finger to keypad and typed out a blog! Where do I begin...

It has been a journey, I'll tell you that. The kind of journey where you thought you had most big things figured out. Then BAM you learn the harsh reality of the term 'false belief system'. I was running blind, swallowed up by my own rules and nonsense. Riddled in defence mechanisms and holding on for dear life to people and things that made me feel some semblance of safe. I mean, where the hell did all this anxiety in the big wide world come from?

LOOKING BACK...

I remember thinking certain things when in my early teens and struggling my way through hormones and heartache. I remember noticing that some days I felt on top of the world and others I felt as if no one liked me and the world was against me. I managed though. I more than managed, I wore the biggest mask around. So big was my mask that even those closest to me had no idea what I really went through. The shame, humiliation, embarrassment, fear, insecurity and anger that stewed inside me and had no healthy outlet. I am a loud, extroverted presence and I was never invisible physically (I made sure of that). Love me or hate me, you notice me. This mask bit me in the ass because people were so busy seeing the loud, falsely confident Paula, they had no idea that a scared, insecure little girl was crying out for help.

This damn defence mechanism got misread to my disadvantage again and again. I was seen as a bully because I was always the spokesperson for the group, or I was acting out. To me it was a get them or they will get me thing. I was seen as strong. I was seen as someone who didn't feel very much. I was seen as happy and cheerful. I was seen as whatever mask I chose to wear really. Most teenagers go through this in some way, it's a time when difference is feared more than anything else. It got so bad that I didn't know any other way to be.I desperately wanted to be liked, desperately wanted to be helped and blocked the very things I needed with my behaviour.  I became a people pleaser. I suppressed my needs and found it easier to do the things my friends enjoyed. This got out of hand too and I found myself in crowds I didn't fit into, at places I couldn't afford, wearing clothes I had had to borrow. I gave in to peer pressure and had so much freedom and zero structure. I got drunk, walked the streets at night, smoked cigarettes, hooked up with boys, got into verbal fights etc. During the day I captained the tennis team, sang in choir, visited my grandparents, turned pages for my piano teacher at charity concerts, spent time with friends, worked hard in school etc. I changed like the tides, trying to find myself, trying to fit in, trying to be accepted and feel loved. My shame was growing. Shame in myself, in my mum and her lack of control in the situation (I have learnt that she did it really tough and there were so many reasons for this). The real shame though, is the shame I turned inward. The shame I had in myself. To be honest this is still a work in progress.

I WAS NEVER A STRANGER TO EMOTIONS...

I am highly empathic and understand emotional experiencing better than I do any other sense or system. I am able to read shifts in people, the mood and atmosphere, people's deeper pain. Other people have always been easy, what I could never master was my own emotional experiencing. I felt like my control over my emotions was paper thin and the hard ones were deeper than I could conceive. As I delved into psychology and counselling I developed a name for this part of myself that held all my deeper emotions and pain. I called this my vault or squishy middle. I spent a lot of energy and time fearing this unknown entity inside me. So much went into the vault that I lost sight of what had gone in there. It became overwhelming. But I ploughed on.

I ploughed through incredible adversity, grief and trauma. I have always recognized my teenage years as difficult. My mother struggled and I became more of a parent then a child. I had no idea what my mother was growing through, I had no words, no support and no one to talk to. I was programmed to hide things from my grandmother and the world. I think my mum always wanted my Granny to be proud of her. My lovely Granny loved us more then anything but love was not expressed verbally. She was very critical but meant it in love. Needless to say I kept my mums secret, it became my secret, we were drowning. Financial, physical, emotional...you name it, we were in strife. I started to resent my mum and rebel in a way. At the time I would never have seen it as rebellion. Awful part of my rebellion, I was always guilt ridden and overly sensitive to my mum's feelings. I could never bare to hurt her, or worry her. I confessed almost all sins. I soon learnt that I was unguided. I was so convincing that I was in control that my own mother did not see how out of my depth I was. How much I needed her to take over and let me be a child. This way of life may have been what saved me in years to come...or the very thing that undid me.

On 3 December, 2002, I went off to celebrate the end of the school year with an old friend. I said my goodbyes to my mother and said our usual 'I love you'. That was the last time I saw my mum. That night some adolescent boys broke in and gagged her too tightly. They never meant to kill her, only to rob us blind. They came through my bedroom window. It was a blur. I learnt this from my friend the next morning, her mum got a call. My whole world stopped turning. It was like a dream, a horrible,sick dream. No one seemed to be able to comprehend my level of loss. On the second or third night after she died I was still staying at my friend's house (I wasn't ready to face my Gran's pain). I was crying in the middle of the night once again. Every time I shut my eyes I saw my mum's face and my heart broke again. I was terrified. I had no idea what would happen to me,where I belonged, where I wanted to be outside of my own home. I had all this emotion and no where to put it. My tears were gut wrenching, my soul was shattered. It was as if someone had severed off a limb. My friend, who had her own grief, cracked under the pressure and blurted out a conversation she and her mother had planned to have with me the following day. At midnight she told me that she thought I needed to find somewhere else to stay, it was too much for her. My pain was too much for her.

I didn't think I could sink any lower. I was wrong. I learnt some very hard lessons that night. I learnt that I had been 'right', people wont want to be around you if you are yourself. Even if you lose your mother, people will not cut you slack, allow you to sob, allow you to grieve. If only I had known then what I know now. These childhood masks, defences, they keep coming back to bite you. Long after they have been rendered useless. People cant be there for you because they don't know how to be there for themselves. So many of us are running blind.

I PUT A LOT OF EMPHASIS ON MY GRIEF...

I thought it was the reason for pretty much most of my problems. My anxiety namely. I was well known for being stressed. I suffered from bad back pain my whole life which was never diagnosed or treated adequately. I was used to chronic pain and tension (I still am). My energy levels are often a struggle. I couldn't tell where my back began and the anxiety ended. As the years went on my struggles with anxiety, esp the physical tension side of anxiety increased. It started to effect my work. Working with children became my thing but it kept bringing up memories and emotions I had no idea how to process. I moved to Australia and studied Masters in Counselling. This level of training forces you to unpack yourself quite heavily and confront how you tick. I confronted the edge of my inner vault time and time again. After uni I started to work with families. My clients had an array of issues with high levels of risk and trauma. Slowly but surely I became more and more impacted. It was becoming clear, families and child abuse were more than upsetting to me, this was traumatic for me and triggering a trauma I had no idea I had. I burnt out.

IT DIDN'T MAKE SENSE...

The theories didn't fit me. My mum and I were so close. She never ever forgot to tell me she loved me. She would have taken a bullet for me. She did so much for me, encouraged me, watched my tennis games, talked to me about school, always listened. Why, oh why are the signs pointing to neglect? EMOTIONAL NEGLECT!!! It didn't make sense. I started seeing a therapist who was my teacher. I would trust no-one else (I have been through many therapists, I am a tough cookie to counsel). I admire my therapist so much, professionally and personally, and listen when he talks. He identified attachment trauma. I wont go into that here if attachment is a bit foreign (I urge everyone to look it up though). My issues stem from my early childhood - my formative years. My mum, my beautiful childhood, my entire world view...aaahhhh! It was a very very difficult pill to swallow and took many sessions of revisiting this to get my head around it. I finally made peace with it when I allowed myself to start looking back at well known memories. These memories were often the fond ones. That is why I could never see this. My happy memories were still happy, they just held some vital clues to opening my vault. They helped me to finally see the roots of my problems.

CHILDHOOD EMOTIONAL NEGLECT...

It was never what she did to me. What she did to me was nothing but loving. Everything she did was intended to give me love and life lessons. The problems were in what she didn't do. Dr Jonice Webb identifies this as C.E.N - Childhood Emotional Neglect. She feels all abuse has CEN with it but not all CEN accompanies abuse. In fact most families have some degree of this because it is a generational problem. It travels from generation to generation unknown and powerful. We couple this with so many passed down and outdated parenting beliefs and systems and have become so far removed from the reasons why we do things and if they are in line with our intentions.

My mother believed with all her heart that the best way to parent was to give strong discipline like spanking etc in the early years. I remember her telling me that she hit me very early and this is why I am a good girl now. She saw my incessant guilt and obligation that was way beyond what a child my age should have felt as me being special, good and with a good head on my shoulders. I saw it the same way too. I didn't see this as being a problem. I didn't know any other way to be. Hitting me early would have translated to me that I am being punished for trying to communicate my needs. I have had these patterns with people in my life again and again because I gravitate to what I know, mistaking that for what is safe. I have recently discovered that it is not my feelings that are the problem, it is my behaviour. I am so busy trying to be a certain way, to feel in a certain way, I have lost sight of how I actually feel. I have started a new relationship with the real me and have had to confront many demons and unhealthy dynamics in the process. This has been so painful but so necessary.

I REALISED THAT I HAVE A GIFT...

I have a deeper understanding of emotional experience through personality, academia and life experience. I am passionate about parenting and helping children through helping parents. I believe that parents are the very best people to help their children. Trauma, attachment, emotional regulation and strength based work should not be elitist knowledge for the educated and professional. It is not as fancy and complicated as it sounds. It is a way of seeing the world. It is about understanding emotions and how powerful they are. It is about understanding the role parents need to play to tackle these growing societal problems, mental health issues, bullying, youth substance abuse, suicide, crime etc. It is ridiculous that this is something only certain people have access to for various reasons. I want to give this gift out for free. I want to create awareness and empower parents. Break the cycles, end the bad patterns and give people something better and healthier to try. I want the world to 'Tackle the feelings before the Behaviour'. Stop blaming children as if they are not a part of a system. No child is born evil. Some have challenges and disabilities. Some struggle with biological challenges. This does not make them evil. Lets take control back. Have the courage to see your own parents and grandparents as human. Love them through their faults so that you may see them as real and learn how to be real with your own kids.

I hope there is something in my story that is helpful :) I am proposing a parenting approach but I am not a mother. My challenge was always a tricky one. I am not coming from the side of a parent though. I am giving your children a voice because I have built a very strong relationship with and deeper understanding of my own inner child. I am also pretty trained up in this area and am not the type to stop learning. This is me, warts and all. Thank you for reading XXX

I am now helping parents to understand the importance of emotional regulation! Lets work together to prevent C.E.N.