Well, MIL moved in with BIL and his wife for the separation period, so I’d say yes, it’s affected them a lot.

I was in my early 30s when my parents divorced. My father’s health started declining a few years later and he passed about 10 years after their divorce. After my father’s passing, my mom re-married and that’s all well and good, but she tries acting like we are this blended family, when that dynamic isn’t really applicable when the “kids” are all in their 40s with families of their own. I finally had to tell her after 1 too many attempts to re-create family Christmas traditions, I appreciate that they are your family now and that they are nice to you (they all live in the same city, my brother and I do not live there and I am 7 hours away) but they are not my family, I barely know them. As another poster said, she also has to realize that when something happens to her husband I will of course be sad for her, but I will not be caring for him, etc.

When my dad remarried, I was almost 30. We were never close, but the new marriage accentuated the divide. My husband has experienced the same thing. His parents divorced right after we got married, and his dad started seeing someone new not long after. He was close to his dad, but is now not as close.

Anonymous wrote:I can’t stand adults that think their parents should stay married for the sake of the adult kids. So selfish. Yes, life may be harder, splitting holidays is no fun; it may be upsetting to realize your parents aren’t happy, but seriously, people deserve an opportunity to live the end of their lives as they see fit. Mind you, parents that choose the divorce have no business guilting their kids about sharing holidays, or however else they are negatively affected by the divorce; it’s a two way street.

I don’t know any adult children of divorced parents who aren’t guilted or expected to bear the burden of sharing holidays or visits. The OP asked whether divorce negatively affects adult children. It does. You can diminish this impact by being the one to travel to them, being mindful to keep or make things equitable if step kids or second set of kids come into the picture, and not forcing blended delusions but this seems really unnatural for the type of people who divorce and remarry.

Anonymous wrote:I can’t stand adults that think their parents should stay married for the sake of the adult kids. So selfish. Yes, life may be harder, splitting holidays is no fun; it may be upsetting to realize your parents aren’t happy, but seriously, people deserve an opportunity to live the end of their lives as they see fit. Mind you, parents that choose the divorce have no business guilting their kids about sharing holidays, or however else they are negatively affected by the divorce; it’s a two way street.

Completely agree

Love it. Finally I enjoy visiting because the tension is gone. They are amazing fun people I never knew growing up!!

It’s fine if parents of adult children want to divorce and remarry. However, they need to understand that their pursuit of happiness doesn’t mean that their adult children will sacrifice their happiness to enable this.

You will end up with less time especially if you live far away. It probably will not be equally divided nor do you and your ex get to dictate who gets what holiday or how many vacation days. It’s cute if you and your ex decide he gets Thanksgiving and you get Christmas. Your adult kids may not be in the position of spending $$$$ and PTO to travel at both Thanksgiving and Christmas, they may be married and have another set of demanding elders in the mix, they may want to go on a vacation themselves or just chill at home. The divide visits equally crap is a living hell with parents and in laws, if one set is divorced the concept has to go out the window.

If you remarry and add in a step parent, step siblings, or another set of kids there likely will be issues. Do what you want but don’t expect your original kids to love being disinherited as you leave everything to the step parent and lavish gifts and money on the step siblings while doing nothing for the original kids. Awesome that you get a do over but be mindful that the originals will be hurt.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm five years out from my divorce, my kids were 15 and 21 at the time - now I am past the emotional roller-coaster my ex and I went through (and inevitably put them through) I have reason to believe they see us both happier than when we were married, and they see us getting along better apart than we ever did married. The ex and I live a mile apart and we agreed he gets Thanksgiving and I get Christmas, so holidays don't cause the hassle they would otherwise cause. All in all, it was a gauntlet that we all got through and learned from the experience.

So what's your plan for holidays when your children have significant others? Because it won't be you get every Christmas and your ex-husband gets every Thanksgiving. Sorry.

I hate to say it, but the parent with the great ski house with plenty of bedrooms gets the adult children every Christmas Break. It's how I saw it play out with a friend.

As someone who married into this, both had ridiculous expectations about how much we saw them and didn't even factor in my own parents. My spouse was not raised by his father after the divorce, barely saw him and got no funds for college and his father started a new family and sent kids to private school and paid for college. His mom felt the kids interrupted her dating life and resented them. She even at one point decided grandma should raise them. Needless to say DH had to figure out how much time he wanted to spend with them and what he felt he owed them and set limits when one would demand we see them if we see the other one. He also had to make it clear we will not hold separate events to please them and if they are all there, they are expected to be respectful to eachother.

Sounds like the acod kids aren't happy with the divorce. But it's not about you.Parents have the right to live in peace with whomever they choose. They shouldn't be putting demands on you. But you shouldn't be putting strain and demand on them. A lot of these complaints sound very selfish. How about when you get married and have kids, and you have to visit your parents and your spouses parents too, on holidays? Is that a pain pain pain too? This is life. Don't visit, stay home and entertain your own immediate family. Chances are that your parents will be relieved thst they don't have to work before during and after the holiday to entertain your crowd.

A divorced friend (10 years out) invites her ex to all the holiday dinners she hosts at her house. However, neither of them have remarried and the finances were settled amicably so that makes things less awkward.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm five years out from my divorce, my kids were 15 and 21 at the time - now I am past the emotional roller-coaster my ex and I went through (and inevitably put them through) I have reason to believe they see us both happier than when we were married, and they see us getting along better apart than we ever did married. The ex and I live a mile apart and we agreed he gets Thanksgiving and I get Christmas, so holidays don't cause the hassle they would otherwise cause. All in all, it was a gauntlet that we all got through and learned from the experience.

So what's your plan for holidays when your children have significant others? Because it won't be you get every Christmas and your ex-husband gets every Thanksgiving. Sorry.

This. Then factor in if your child’s spouse has divorced parents too. Now they have 4 separate households to try and get together with. Then factor in if one both of you remarries someone with adult children. They are going to want to plan things separately with their own kids too. There is a LOT of family time sacrifice and splitting that results from divorce. But it isn’t your children’s fault so be sure to never complain or ask for visits. They will make time for you when they are able to and want to.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Self-centered are the parents who divorced while expecting that they won’t shoulder any of the inconvenience. A lot of these so-called parents could use a dose of shut up. That’s not being a martyr. That’s an adult child sick of listening to their parents’ childish whining.

Yes, because it certainly is not an inconvenience for the parents to go through the huge changes that divorce brings into their lives (who you live with, where you live, the finances
etc etc + divorces tend to be emotionally difficult even when they're 'easy'). That is NOTHING compared to you having to visit two households during Christmas!

The fact that you fail to see how everything you listed above also trickles down to the children involved (at home or adult) shows just how self-centered you are. Easy to see why your marriage didn’t last. If your finances are so bad, are you going to quietly live in poverty, or are you going to guilt your children into supporting you somehow. Given your self-righteous grievances, you don’t come across as someone who will help themselves.

+1000. If only it were just having to do two holiday visits! It's way, way, way more complicated than that. It's trying to care for two sick old people having simultaneous health crises in different cities. It's when they're broke because they couldn't really afford two homes so you have to bail them out. Or when they remarry badly and are miserable and their awful step-children move in and mooch off them and drink.

You can say "boundaries!" all day long, but not seeing them means my children don't get to know their grandparents, so that's a hard choice to make. And when you're dealing with people who are old and becoming cognitively impaired, there's very little choice other than to deal with them and their problems and drama. It's either that or the horrors of the public safety net. It has been really eye-opening.

DP, but no one has said setting and maintaining boundaries is easy. I'd love for my kids to get to know my mom better. But her current partner has been arrested for possession of child pornography, so, no, I'm not dealing with their problems and drama, not when it puts my kids at risk.

Of course it's hard to step back from older and cognitively challenged adults. The social safety net in this country is, indeed, horrible. But I only have so much to give. Between my parents and my kids, I'm choosing my kids. Neglecting your kids to care for your parents doesn't work, either, at least not if you're a responsible parent. Most of us don't actually like setting boundaries, but we do them because we have to, and because we know what our priorities are.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Self-centered are the parents who divorced while expecting that they won’t shoulder any of the inconvenience. A lot of these so-called parents could use a dose of shut up. That’s not being a martyr. That’s an adult child sick of listening to their parents’ childish whining.

Yes, because it certainly is not an inconvenience for the parents to go through the huge changes that divorce brings into their lives (who you live with, where you live, the finances etc etc + divorces tend to be emotionally difficult even when they're 'easy'). That is NOTHING compared to you having to visit two households during Christmas!

DP here. I’m not visiting twice as many people on the holidays. If you choose to divorce, you get half as much time. That’s how it works. I will rotate but I will not twist my family into a pretzel. And I don’t feel guilty - this is what you chose.

So they're gonna get half as much eldercare from you too? Half-manage their medical care when they're too old to do it? You're gonna half-sell their house, half-find them an assisted living?

Actually, yes! I can only do so much, and I'm not taking away from my husband and kids an unreasonable amount to do the above things. Choices have consequences.

Ok... I totally support you in setting boundaries. But sometimes elderly people get really, really high-maintenance and it's hard, because there are things you really absolutely do have to deal with or there will be real-world consequences like losing the house.