How Does Divorce Affect Children?
Many marriages now end in divorce, leaving children to live with either a mother or a father as a single parent
. A third of children live with a single parent, usually the mother as the only parental figure at home. How old is the child when divorce occur can affect the childs response to such family event.In general, there are various behavioural and emotional problems seen in children of all ages soon after divorce. Although very young children do not understand the meaning of divorce or separation of the parents, they do feel changes happening in the home environment and in the reactions and mood of their parents. They may show evidence of change in their biological functions, for example, in their eating and sleeping. Some children may start bed-wetting if they have attained dryness. Other children show signs of anxiety in the form of restlessness or over-activity, unexplained fears or difficult behaviour.
Older children often do not understand divorce still, therefore, they may feel guilty as if they have caused such separation between parents because of their bad behaviour. During school years, children who live in a home where divorce is imminent show deterioration in their school achievements and record. Even, adolescents may feel guilt as they assume that they have not done enough to stop divorce from happening. They believe it may have not happened if they reconciled the parents or intervened for mediation. They continue to embrace a feeling of anger, pain and unhappiness.
Many children who lived the divorce situation cherish a fantasy that their parents will be reunited one day. Such children show hostility toward the new step-parent as this reminds them that such fantasy may not be realised.
Children living in homes without fathers suffer behavioural problems which includes antisocial behaviour, delinquency and premarital sex. Children coming from divorced home perform poorly at school and in their social relations and they may cause trouble to other children at school. The divorce may affect the physical health of the child who suffers more risk of injury and illnesses such as asthma, headache and speech defects. Psychologically, children from divorced families are more aggressive, impulsive, anxious, irritable, shy or withdrawn.
It takes many years for children from divorced homes to come to terms with what happened and to adjust to the effects of separation between parents. Recovery may take longer or leave some children with lasting emotional trauma. Boys may show distress with aggressive behaviour and adolescents stay away from home longer hours after divorce. Some adolescents may be devastated by a recent divorce and attempt suicide.
For children to adjust well to divorce, parents need to try their best to avoid acrimonious relationship in front of their children. They should try hard to relate to the child lovingly although the child may show signs of anger against them. To the child recover such traumatic event, parent have to avoid exchange of hostile arguments in the childs presence. They must show consistent behaviour and move away from criticising the other person by confiding to the grown-up adolescent their bitter feeling against the divorcee.
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