Family Connex helps you build a tentative parent agreement and implement parts of it that you can. For example, as co-parents you might arrange a night for each parent to have special time with the kids while the other parent leaves the home or has a break in the home. This can help you right now because it can reduce your adult tension by turning the focus away from your adult relationship toward thinking about the present and future well-being of your children. Family Connex gives you guidelines on what you need to discuss and address, and it can guide you toward dividing time you will each spend with your children.
Meanwhile, understand how your tension affects your children:
- Kids are like sponges; they absorb tensions and begin to sense when there are problems betwen parents. Many of their friends or classmates may have gone through a transition. They may be wondering about their own family: "Will my mom and dad get divorced?"
- If parents are arguing and the children are aware of it, they can become hyper-vigilant in not saying or doing anything that would exacerbate the tension.
- Kids may feel stuck in the middle. They may worry about a parent, be angry at a parent, or feel badly when they are told they are "just like your mother or father."
The Family Connex program can help you prepare for a separation now even though the separation may occur down the road. You'll begin working on a parenting plan that you will develop and implement once you divorce.
Be honest with your children in an age-appropriate way. Do not give your children adult details but indicate that there are problems between their parents if they ask. Reassure your children that you love them and will be there for them. Assure them that anything that occurs between their parents is not their fault.
Put your marital or adult issues aside and begin to communicate as co-parents. This is a gift you give to children and yourselves as loving, responsible parents. If you want to save money and avoid hurting your children, Family Connex will guide you and your partner in what you need to discuss with regard to your children.
Posts
1 comment:
Speaking of economic hardship, we have a situation that might be called "When the Prodigal Child Returns..."
A famous humorist once wrote that parents ruin the first half of our lives and our children ruin the second half. If that is so, why is it that in our “golden years” we permit our children to return home?
This humorist and parent believes that, for better or worse, the paradigms that were omnipresent when we were growing up are no longer relevant in today’s society. We grew up believing that we needed to prepare ourselves to become integral members of the great society. Get an education, some training, find a job, a partner, buy a house, have a family, save for a rainy day, and eventually retire and spend time with our grandchildren. Mom and Dad are currently suspect that our children share the same desires and goals.
It appears to have all changed over the last 30 years. Blame it on the economy, the price of an education, the exorbitant cost of rent, the cost of purchasing a home, the changing job market or video games. Whatever the reasons, children now believe that at some point in their young lives it is all right to come back home.
Typically, the return home is only temporary (although in my case it was more like a revolving door), but nonetheless, they’re back! My kids are willing to put up with their parents for a few more years in return for free lodging, food, auto insurance and electricity for video games. At some point between high school and college, the drive for independence and freedom made a U-turn and life with Mom and Dad doesn’t seem quite so bad.
One asks the obvious question: what did we do to them during their early years to make this return trip so seamless? Did we make life too comfortable for them, provide them with too much financial and emotional support, or did we just raise lazy, unmotivated children that believe that a partnership with Mom and Dad is better able to cope with the difficult issues in life? Whatever the reasons, the message is clear that the doors are always open.
Certainly, we love our children and welcome them back with open arms. Occasionally, we even feel proud that they enjoy being back home. But are we really helping them or just allowing them to remain children without responsibility, a good job, a loving partner, a home of their own and/or plans for their futures.
Tough love is a good thing, so why is it so tough?
Parents of Prodigal Children
Post a Comment