Reply to Divorcing : what to tell kids?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Talk to the experts about it and stop getting advice here. This is too important.

I told my children the standard, "when parents get married they make promises to each other, and your father broke those promises" line.

I was given this line by several psychologists, and it worked well. It gave my children enough information, accurately and truthfully, without letting them know how terrible their father really is.

It also helped them to stand up for themselves with him several times.

This was a long time ago, and they are both doing well and thriving. [/quote]

I totally agree the OP needs to get professional advice on this because it is crucially important.  But, as an adult child of divorce where there was an affair with my parent's marriage, I am surprise you got professional advice to spill the affair to your kids (what you said was cryptic but obvious and I don't mean to be insulting, but it seems passive aggressive and begs the question of "what promise did dad break?)  I absolutely loathed when my mom would feel the need to tell me it was my dad's cheating that wrecked the marriage.  It made me cringe so deeply to be dragged into their bullshit, I eventually would just walk out of the house when she brought it up (I moved out on my own when I was 17 to avoid them).

Thing is, I have no idea why my dad cheated, and as an adult who is now married I know affairs don't happen in a vacuum.  But I know my dad remained a great dad after the divorce, and how I hated my mom for burning into my head that he was the reason my home was broken.

[/quote]

[b]Maybe but anyone who would hurt and betray my mom, ain't "great."

Even/ESPECIALLY if it's my Dad.

So you still are missing something.  You are still in denial of what your Dad did to you and your mom.[/quote][/b]

Exactly. This is the sort of fairy tale craziness that was going on for a while in the 1990s - don't tell your children the truth. Don't tell them the obvious. Don't explain why their "perfect family" imploded one day.

The awful and sad thing is that children know the truth. They are not dumb. They overhear things, and they observe things, and they know when something awful has happened in their family. And when they ask their parents why their family blew up, and why they got divorced, and their parents don't tell them, they lose their faith in adults, and in the truth. They can no longer trust their guts. They can't trust their instincts. And they are damaged behind believe. And so this is why experts today advise to tell children some version of the truth that is age appropriate.

[b]This poster above ran away/moved out of her home as a teenager. There is more going on here than a divorce. Her anger at her mother is palpable, and I have to wonder what her OWN marriage history is. I feel terribly sorry for her, but I don't think she's being honest and telling the whole story. [/b]

[/quote]

I am the poster you are quoting.  I won't get into it, since there are obvious subtleties to every situation.  And I researched whether to tell the kids "the truth" and it does appear, in general, that psychs recommend some version of age appropriate truth, so I stand corrected to some degree.

What I still believe and I am adamant about is that you do not badmouth one parent in front of the other.  It is toxic.  Perhaps I shouldn't have, but I took it personally when mom trashed dad.

FWIW, I am professionally successful, married with kids, in a good marriage so I think I turned out fine, kids are resilient and all that (and moving out young forces you to be independent).  But I rarely speak to my parents, they still hate each other and I can't stand being around them.[/quote]

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