Eye-opening new study on the harms of divorce

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My friend divorced her husband who was extremely controlling over the whole family and especially abusive towards their oldest daughter.

I cannot for the life of me imagine that daughter wishing her parents had stayed together. She is an older teen now and the trauma has led to her developing debilitating mental illnesses. She may not graduate from high school.

I’m not sure anyone who had known this family casually would be able to see that there were serious problems going on. From the outside, the family looked normal and successful. Posters like OP and the smug ones here might see it as a “frivolous” divorce.
A lot of you do not know as much as you think you know.

I got divorced after repressing my sexuality for decades. When I was young I wanted the family and the white picket fence. I married a man and really, truly believed it would be OK. It turns out that repressing my sexuality was not sustainable and divorce was the only reasonable solution.

People like to cherry pick the divorces they see as frivolous and pretend that is representative of most divorces. It is not.

Yes, marriages based on fraud are better off with a divorce. I don’t think anyone would disagree with that.

I guess you’re not a lawyer. Go look up the definition of fraud.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think many of the posters are defensive, not sure why. I would think that parents who divorce are, inherently, not mature and normal people. As in something was wrong with them anyway. These people will destroy whatever they can, including their kids' lives.

You actually said why are people being so defensive while literally attacking people for not being sensitive to their kid’s needs. You have major issues. I guess you walk around judging half the population in your narrow view of the world, because half the adults you come in contact with are divorced.

I think some of the folks attacking divorced people are protesting too much, you know? People who are happily married don’t usually feel the need to be so judgy about divorced people.

I am not a PP who has attacked divorced parents, but I have seen some of my kids' friends who have divorced parents and they tend to tell me and my kids that they hate it while their parents tell me the kids are totally ok with it. I just nod because it's not my place to get involved. I also don't think a divorce is always the worst thing for a kid, and I don't think any sweeping generalizations are useful.

Im sorry but I really find this hard to believe that your kid’s friends are talking to you about their parents divorce and opening up to you.

DP. That is because you are a horrible person, and nobody wants to talk to you. You are defective.

We have a winner of first place for having an unhappy marriage. You have to be in the worst marriage to come across so bitter. They’re is a better side to life. Go search for it as you can find some happiness, Oh, bitter one

LOL. Narc.

[Anonymous]

One of the things that I find so fascinating in this thread is the way a handful of people (not all, but at least one and probably several) dismiss, judge, or even actively hostility to some posters out of concern for "the children."

But in this conversation the "children" are hypothetical, abstract. Meanwhile, the posters they're engaging with are real human beings.

If your morality makes you awful to actual human beings on behalf of theoretical ones, perhaps it is worth taking a second look at whether you have the moral high ground?

Fascinating, all of it. Seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think many of the posters are defensive, not sure why. I would think that parents who divorce are, inherently, not mature and normal people. As in something was wrong with them anyway. These people will destroy whatever they can, including their kids' lives.

You actually said why are people being so defensive while literally attacking people for not being sensitive to their kid’s needs. You have major issues. I guess you walk around judging half the population in your narrow view of the world, because half the adults you come in contact with are divorced.

I think some of the folks attacking divorced people are protesting too much, you know? People who are happily married don’t usually feel the need to be so judgy about divorced people.

I am not a PP who has attacked divorced parents, but I have seen some of my kids' friends who have divorced parents and they tend to tell me and my kids that they hate it while their parents tell me the kids are totally ok with it. I just nod because it's not my place to get involved. I also don't think a divorce is always the worst thing for a kid, and I don't think any sweeping generalizations are useful.

Im sorry but I really find this hard to believe that your kid’s friends are talking to you about their parents divorce and opening up to you.

Ok? I spend a lot of time with those kids in the car due to the sport they share with my kid. Kids talk A LOT. Maybe you aren't used to be around any, but 11 year-old girls never stop making noise. We also host play dates and sleepovers and I'll bake or go to the pool with them sometimes. They talk. A lot. One of them was spending the night at our house after being dropped off by her mom and was going to be picked up by her dad. She talked about how much she hates going to his house, etc. I also don't really care if you believe me or not. I find it interesting that in order to make yourself feel better you have to assume I am lying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think many of the posters are defensive, not sure why. I would think that parents who divorce are, inherently, not mature and normal people. As in something was wrong with them anyway. These people will destroy whatever they can, including their kids' lives.

You actually said why are people being so defensive while literally attacking people for not being sensitive to their kid’s needs. You have major issues. I guess you walk around judging half the population in your narrow view of the world, because half the adults you come in contact with are divorced.

I think some of the folks attacking divorced people are protesting too much, you know? People who are happily married don’t usually feel the need to be so judgy about divorced people.

I am not a PP who has attacked divorced parents, but I have seen some of my kids' friends who have divorced parents and they tend to tell me and my kids that they hate it while their parents tell me the kids are totally ok with it. I just nod because it's not my place to get involved. I also don't think a divorce is always the worst thing for a kid, and I don't think any sweeping generalizations are useful.

Im sorry but I really find this hard to believe that your kid’s friends are talking to you about their parents divorce and opening up to you.

I'm the PP who cried when my parents divorced, but look back and know I was better off. I completely believe that kids' friends talk about their experiences. But I also know I probably would have said stuff like that when I was a kid — in part because that was the vocabulary I had at the time. I wasn't yet mature enough, or had time enough, to hold or articulate a bigger picture. To be honest, there was also a quite a bit of "trying on" feelings, if that makes sense. It doesn't mean I wasn't feeling it in the moment (I was!). But it wasn't the only feeling, and it wasn't necessarily the lasting feeling. So, while I totally believe PP, I also would allow space for feelings and perspectives to evolve and gain more nuance/complexity over time.

I am the PP and I appreciate what you said here. I do NOT offer advice/my thoughts/opinions when they talk. I just listen. I do expect that things will change over time. One of them just attended the marriage of their dad to his former AP (which is what caused the divorce). It was raw for her at the time and she was upset but I do think over time she will see how much happier her mom is now (I don't really have contact with her dad anymore). But as a kid, it can be hard sometimes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My friend divorced her husband who was extremely controlling over the whole family and especially abusive towards their oldest daughter.

I cannot for the life of me imagine that daughter wishing her parents had stayed together. She is an older teen now and the trauma has led to her developing debilitating mental illnesses. She may not graduate from high school.

I’m not sure anyone who had known this family casually would be able to see that there were serious problems going on. From the outside, the family looked normal and successful. Posters like OP and the smug ones here might see it as a “frivolous” divorce.
A lot of you do not know as much as you think you know.

I got divorced after repressing my sexuality for decades. When I was young I wanted the family and the white picket fence. I married a man and really, truly believed it would be OK. It turns out that repressing my sexuality was not sustainable and divorce was the only reasonable solution.

People like to cherry pick the divorces they see as frivolous and pretend that is representative of most divorces. It is not.

My friend is going through this right now and she is doing an amazing job putting her kids' needs front and center. I'm sure it's hard on them, and may be hard on them for the rest of their lives, but they seem to be doing well (they're friends with my kids and live across from us so we see them quite a lot).

I have never seen a "frivolous" divorce. The ones in our friend group include the above, two after affairs, and one where I believe both sides cheated and they were horrible to each other. I fail to see how any of those situations would have been better had they stayed together.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One of the things that I find so fascinating in this thread is the way a handful of people (not all, but at least one and probably several) dismiss, judge, or even actively hostility to some posters out of concern for "the children."

But in this conversation the "children" are hypothetical, abstract. Meanwhile, the posters they're engaging with are real human beings.

If your morality makes you awful to actual human beings on behalf of theoretical ones, perhaps it is worth taking a second look at whether you have the moral high ground?

Fascinating, all of it. Seriously.

Gee, who does that sound like?!? Maybe the pro-lifers who care so much about the kids until they're born, and then, screw them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The three events — loss of financial resources, a decline in neighborhood quality and missing parental involvement because of distance or an increased workload required to make up for lost income — accounted for 25% to 60% of the impact divorce has on children's outcomes, the study said."

This. When both parents have enough money, many (not all) of the major causes of harm caused by divorce go away.

No amount of money can make up for the increased workload; not only do they lose seeing both parents all the time, they lose individual time with each parent. Sorry, there’s no money that can make up for not being able to say goodnight to both parents, not having easy holidays and birthdays with both parents, having to shuttle around, mom and/or dad can’t go to a school event because of the extra required work. There’s no money that makes up for time together.

Agree. The lost time with parents and the parents being focused on dating, nurturing a new relationship, balancing step kids, or making new kids all have a HUGE impact on existing children- for the worse

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The three events — loss of financial resources, a decline in neighborhood quality and missing parental involvement because of distance or an increased workload required to make up for lost income — accounted for 25% to 60% of the impact divorce has on children's outcomes, the study said."

This. When both parents have enough money, many (not all) of the major causes of harm caused by divorce go away.

No amount of money can make up for the increased workload; not only do they lose seeing both parents all the time, they lose individual time with each parent. Sorry, there’s no money that can make up for not being able to say goodnight to both parents, not having easy holidays and birthdays with both parents, having to shuttle around, mom and/or dad can’t go to a school event because of the extra required work. There’s no money that makes up for time together.

Mwahahah, not having easy holidays post divorce - you mean the ones when a parent was in the thrall of delusions?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The three events — loss of financial resources, a decline in neighborhood quality and missing parental involvement because of distance or an increased workload required to make up for lost income — accounted for 25% to 60% of the impact divorce has on children's outcomes, the study said."

This. When both parents have enough money, many (not all) of the major causes of harm caused by divorce go away.

No amount of money can make up for the increased workload; not only do they lose seeing both parents all the time, they lose individual time with each parent. Sorry, there’s no money that can make up for not being able to say goodnight to both parents, not having easy holidays and birthdays with both parents, having to shuttle around, mom and/or dad can’t go to a school event because of the extra required work. There’s no money that makes up for time together.

Agree. The lost time with parents and the parents being focused on dating, nurturing a new relationship, balancing step kids, or making new kids all have a HUGE impact on existing children- for the worse

You missed pretty much the entire point. Nobody is divorcing or leaving kids without a two parent household so they can frivolously look for other relationships in this thread. They don’t want to live with a loveless, emotionally abusive guy that they happen to have kids with and don’t want their kids to see it’s ok to be treated that way and the fact you can’t see it is baffling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One of the things that I find so fascinating in this thread is the way a handful of people (not all, but at least one and probably several) dismiss, judge, or even actively hostility to some posters out of concern for "the children."

But in this conversation the "children" are hypothetical, abstract. Meanwhile, the posters they're engaging with are real human beings.

If your morality makes you awful to actual human beings on behalf of theoretical ones, perhaps it is worth taking a second look at whether you have the moral high ground?

Fascinating, all of it. Seriously.

So it was wrong of several posters to dismiss and even mock the lived experiences and enduring pain of those on this thread who have shared that they are the children of divorced parents, and that the divorce and continued disruption hurts them? Yes or no.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The three events — loss of financial resources, a decline in neighborhood quality and missing parental involvement because of distance or an increased workload required to make up for lost income — accounted for 25% to 60% of the impact divorce has on children's outcomes, the study said."

This. When both parents have enough money, many (not all) of the major causes of harm caused by divorce go away.

No amount of money can make up for the increased workload; not only do they lose seeing both parents all the time, they lose individual time with each parent. Sorry, there’s no money that can make up for not being able to say goodnight to both parents, not having easy holidays and birthdays with both parents, having to shuttle around, mom and/or dad can’t go to a school event because of the extra required work. There’s no money that makes up for time together.

Agree. The lost time with parents and the parents being focused on dating, nurturing a new relationship, balancing step kids, or making new kids all have a HUGE impact on existing children- for the worse

Thank you. No one is acknowledging that the parents don’t just work extra and come home. They have their own social lives, which is great, but it also takes yet more time away from the kids. And then there are the kids who experience abuse or favoritism of other kids on the part of new stepparents, or a go-along-to-get-along dad who never sticks up for them and lets them be railroaded, etc., etc. I’ve seen this all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is not new or surprising, OP. And not all children to divorcees will suffer from their parents' divorce; or suffer more than what they would have suffered in the intact but conflict-ridden marriage.

This study shows statistical proof that a lot of children are significantly harmed by their parents divorce.

It’s the in between cases that should give you pause. The children from families that weren’t high conflict but divorced anyways are worse off. The only children who are better off after a divorce are in the very small percentage where the household

But the solution is to teach men (mostly) how to participate and communicate, not just provide. The solution is not "shame women into staying in unhappy relationships". Pick better partners, get better marriages.

Marriage used to last longer because women had no choices. We couldn't even have a bank account until the 1970s without a MAN signing up for you. Now women have choices and many men have not caught up culturally.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Who cares about the kids? Parents happiness and fulfillment comes first.

Yep, if the parents aren’t happy the kids won’t be so if you’re in an unhappy marriage, Wake up and Get out.

Sure, make it your kid’s fault that you made a bad choice for a spouse. Or your spouse made a bad choice.

You missed the point completely. You’re doing more harm to your kid by staying in a horrible relationship in front of them.

No, divorce is clearly bad for kids. You’re harming your kids by breaking up a marriage instead of fixing it. The data on unexpected parent deaths confirms that divorce is a bad sign.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"The three events — loss of financial resources, a decline in neighborhood quality and missing parental involvement because of distance or an increased workload required to make up for lost income — accounted for 25% to 60% of the impact divorce has on children's outcomes, the study said."

This. When both parents have enough money, many (not all) of the major causes of harm caused by divorce go away.

No amount of money can make up for the increased workload; not only do they lose seeing both parents all the time, they lose individual time with each parent. Sorry, there’s no money that can make up for not being able to say goodnight to both parents, not having easy holidays and birthdays with both parents, having to shuttle around, mom and/or dad can’t go to a school event because of the extra required work. There’s no money that makes up for time together.

Agree. The lost time with parents and the parents being focused on dating, nurturing a new relationship, balancing step kids, or making new kids all have a HUGE impact on existing children- for the worse

You missed pretty much the entire point. Nobody is divorcing or leaving kids without a two parent household so they can frivolously look for other relationships in this thread. They don’t want to live with a loveless, emotionally abusive guy that they happen to have kids with and don’t want their kids to see it’s ok to be treated that way and the fact you can’t see it is baffling.

This thread is about negative effects divorce has on children. It isn’t about specific divorced people who keep posting to justify their divorce in this thread. Every single person that has divorced that I know of, at some point with minor kids at home, heavily leans into finding a new partner and making a new life for themselves with another person- that does effect your child, often times negatively. Sure this is a generalization, but in my experience as an adult with parents that divorced and watching friends’ parents divorce and now adult friends that are divorcing, this is a pretty accurate pattern