Physical and Mental Health for Children of Divorce
Children are easily injured when they see their parents arguing and being hurtful to one another. Children whose parents divorce often witness many negative interactions between their parents before and after the separation. These children are at a higher risk for poor physical health, engaging in risky behaviors, drug use, and sexual promiscuity.
In one study, approximately 20 to 25 percent of children experience long-term adjustment problems, compared to roughly 10 percent of children in first-marriage families. Clearly, the psychological effects of divorce on children is negative.
When one parent leaves the family, the quality of parenting typically changes for the worse. Instead of two adults caring for the children, there is now one, and often the sole parent is overwhelmed and resentful. A parent’s stress, anxiety, anger, and loneliness impacts negatively on his or her children. A parent fearful of the future cannot be fully present in a child’s daily life.
One British national survey discovered that one-quarter of children living with their single mother had not seen their fathers the previous year. In some tragic cases, children lose access to their father or mother. When a family breaks apart, children may lose access to grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.
Research shows that problems caused by a divorce last for a very long time in a child’s life. Adult children of divorced parents suffer from higher rates of depression and have more emotional problems than adults whose parents stayed together in a committed relationship or marriage.
Children almost always suffer when there is a divorce. When parents repair their broken marriage or committed relationship, their children are protected from the psychological effects of divorce.
What Happens When a Parent Remarries or Couples with a New Partner
Creating a blended family with your new partner’s children, and your new partner building a relationship as a stepparent with your children is difficult. For many individuals, being a stepparent is heart-wrenchingly difficult, and in spite of significant effort, it ends in failure. Children have a natural love for a birth parent — not a stepparent. As well, an individual who remarries naturally resents the perceived interference in their new relationship by ‘children who are not their own’ (their stepchildren).
The many relationship complications that arise from trying to form a harmonious blended family has ruined many new partnerships that would otherwise have been successful and unexpectedly, the negative psychological effects of divorce on children become more pervasive.
Should remarriage or coupling with a new partner be your fate, it is essential you get the help of a qualified relationship specialist to assist you in forming a blended family with your children and their new stepparent.
