firstwivesworld - From a Child of Divorce: Custody During Legal Separation - Comments

Child of Divorce; 33 years later

elainemarleneforbes — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:02:54 -0400

I hope divorcing parents read your blog carefully. I am divorcing after my children are adult (no picnic for any of us) but I also am a lawyer acting on divorces (I have been a lawyer for 33 years but only started doing divorce work 10 years and am only started specializing in it in the last few years). You are very lucky that your mother was as supportive of your father and your relationship with him as she was. A lot of fathers are very sloppy in attending for access and do not realize the harm they do but irregular access can also be caused by the mom. Although they feel they are doing their best for their child. Their anxiety level is so high that they make short term decisions which could have long term adverse effect. Often the father was inattentive during the marriage and they worry that he will not keep the child safe. (Although they generally rise to the situation when they have no one to fall back on.) Or they hear that the father has a new girlfriend and rthey do not want their child exposed to her. Or They go to a support group where well meaning individuals will give them advice on watching for abuse which they take too literally. Or they feel the father's new accommodation is not appropriate for the children (forgetting that he is not wealthy enough to afford two homes). Or They will be upset that the support cheque is late and decide that the dad doesn't really care enough about the children to see them. Or maybe a lawyer told her that the father will keep increasing access until she no longer qualifies for full support (under the legislation in our jurisdiction if the access parent has the child at least 40 % of the time he can have the support amount reviewed. ) A very common reason is that they know that if the father has regular access, particularly midweek the court (in my jurisdiction at least) will likely not allow her to move. It is pretty well be impossible in our jurisdiction to get legal aid unless there is abuse and so some will actually say there is abuse when there is not and therefore have to stick with their story and say he is a danger to the kids. (This later is a new development. It is actually supported by studies. I blame the lawyers frankly for pushing them) I wish more were as strong as your mom and able to support your relationship with your dad under what could have been trying condtions.

Child of divorce

Guest — Tue, 06 May 2008 18:42:24 -0400

Your parents must be very, very proud of you! You are very well adjusted and your writing shows that. It is every parents dream to hear that even though the family life was derailed, their child has happy memories of growing up.

From a Child of Divorce: Custody During Legal Separation

Justin — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:22:48 -0400

My parents divorced when I was three, so my memories of that period are fuzzy to say the least. I don't remember my mother telling me she was divorcing my father, nor the day he moved out. In fact, my two earliest memories are both dreams. In one, my mother died, and I cried as I watched her body ascend to Heaven (while Chicago's "If You Leave Me Now" played!). In the other, my father tried to leave me outside my preschool. He had the ability to fly; I did not. While my knowledge of Freudian dream analysis is admittedly limited, it's pretty obvious I had some abandonment issues going on.

But you're not reading this for Freudian analysis. You want to know if and how I survived my parents' divorce, and how to navigate "the grey zone" of child custody — the period between separation and an official divorce ruling.

First, the good news: I did survive divorce. And 33 years after the fact, I'm a remarkably well-adjusted guy (and modest to boot). In fact, most of my friends are also children of divorce, and they're a damn fine bunch of people, too. So breathe a deep sigh of relief — your children aren't doomed!

In my case, custody was never an issue. My mother wanted full custody; my father didn't. So there was no tug-of-war, no ugly battle in court. The arrangement was set from the day my father moved out: I lived with Mom, and had visits with Dad on weekends.