Childhood Stressors

Divorce

Divorce can be very hard on a person, but can be even worse for a child. I don’t believe in divorce but sometimes people just can’t work things out and it may be healthier to separate than to be together. I disagree with divorce when there are children involved because I know how hard it can be on a child. I just never understood why you would want to leave your children and in many cases never have anything to do with them anymore. It seems as if divorce has almost become a norm today in the U.S.

Divorce to me was a childhood stressor and sometimes I still think about how it affects m life 25 years later. My parents divorced when I was 4 years old. My sister and I would go visit my dad upstate for a few days during the summer up until I was bout about 9 years old. I don’t have much of a memory of my dad because I was so young when he left. I do briefly remember he from my summer visits. From the time I was 4 years old until I was about 7, it was just my mom, my sister and I. I enjoyed it just being the three of us and got comfortable in that style of living. My mom did go on a few dates here and there. My mom remarried when I was 7 years old. It was very hard for to me except someone new in my life. I would finally have a male figure back in my life and it was very hard for me to like this idea. I called my stepfather by his first name as opposed to dad. It took me some time and my mom talked to me making me realize I should call him dad because he is taking on the responsibility of becoming my stepfather. As I got older and was able to understand more, I was spent time wondering what made my father leave us.  I consider my stepfather to be my dad and nothing less than that. He has played such an important role in my life and has done so much for my mom, my sister and I. He was there for me growing up and was very involved in my life. Now at 25 years old, I still find myself thinking about how different my life would have been had my parents’ stayed together or if my mother never remarried. I am very happy with the life I had growing up and the person I have become because of it, but I still can’t help but wonder.  I also wonder if it makes me a bad person because I had such a good life growing up and I think of those things.

Divorce in Europe:

“Dronkers (1996) found that effects on the well- being of Dutch youth are not only found in a short period after the divorce but are also found long after the parental divorce has occurred. These long term effects are clearly connected to the degree of parental conflict, which continues often after the divorce.” (Dronkers pg.2)  It seems as if in Europe the idea of divorce is being passed down to the children. “Spruijt (1993) found that young people between the age of 12 and 24 from one-parent families created by divorce, when compared with young people from stable and unstable two-parent families, had already had more relationships, had their first sexual experience at a younger age, had had sex with people more often, had more often had their first sexual experience with a casual partner, had less traditional ideas about relationships and were less likely to say that they wanted to start a family.” (Dronkers, pg.4) Children seem to thinking that divorce is okay and if their parents did it why cant they. It is very important for children to look to their parents as role models but only when it is positive behavior and actions.

“England and Wales have the highest divorce rate in Europe and it is estimated that 41% of all marriages that took place in 2000 will end in divorce. At the moment over 25% of children under 16 experience their parents divorce, and an additional 3 million children are living in step-family situations.”

References:

-The Need. © 2008 Growing Through. Site by QM Consulting Ltd. Retrieved from http://growing-through.org/theneed.html

-Dronkers, J. Following in their parents' footsteps: intergenerational transmission of divorce in the Netherlands?. SCO/Kohnstamm Institute, University of Amsterdam. Retrieved from http://www.eui.eu/Personal/Dronkers/English/interecht.pdf