February 28, 2024
Cindy Lopez:
Welcome. My name is Cindy Lopez, the host of this CHC podcast, Voices of Compassion. We hope you find a little courage, feel connected and experience compassion every time you listen. Conflict within relationships is natural. So what happens when this conflict occurs within a family and ends up in separation or divorce? Join us as we explore effective communication strategies with children during this challenging time, emphasizing the importance of fostering open dialogue and understanding and offer insights into how to create a supportive environment for children to express their emotions. CHC psychiatrists, Dr. Vidya Krishnan and Dr. Natalie Pon share valuable advice on helping children cope with the changes that come with divorce, offering practical tips for co-parenting and maintaining a sense of stability. So tune in for a thoughtful conversation on fostering healthy family dynamics in the face of divorce and the importance of not only caring for your kids, but also caring for yourself. Dr. Krishnan and Dr. Pon, thank you so much for joining us today, and I’m hoping you might just take a minute to introduce yourselves and maybe why this topic is an important one to discuss.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Hi. I’m Natalie Pon. I’m a child and adolescent psychiatrist at Children’s Health Council, and this is a super important topic that I’m looking forward to talking about today. We know that the current divorce rate is around 40 to 50% and so a lot of families that I see have different family structures that it’s really important for our understanding of children and how to work with them.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Hi, I’m Vidya Krishnan. I’m a child adolescent and adult psychiatrist, and I’m the chief psychiatrist and medical director at Children’s Health Council. It’s very important to talk about this topic because it is a sum and substance and a part of every conversation I have with families, families are at various stages of evolution and of both forming and gathering together. And that is inherently conflictual process, and raising children sometimes only adds to the complication. So it’s very important we talk about this.
Cindy Lopez:
We haven’t done a podcast episode on this topic before divorce. So,I think lots of people will find the topic meaningful and interesting and applicable to their lives. So let’s start by talking about family conflict. So is family conflict typical? I think so at least in my family.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Absolutely. You know, most people tend to not like conflict, and everybody has to deal with it and every relationship has conflict. The ways that we tend to manage conflict as adults often reflects how conflict was handled in our family of origin as children. So, absolutely common, typical, and a really important part of, you know, a relationship’s evolution and what we model for our children.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
And additionally, it’s important to remember that when you think of children as they grow up to be young adults, eventually they are themselves forming their own family of choice or engaged in their development of their intimate relationships. And both how conflict was presented and how it’s handled becomes a very important part of how they structure their relationships in that particular manner, which is incredibly important. I would say it’s almost a normal developmental stage that people have to go through to learn how to understand and deal with conflict.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah. it is important. And I think especially as we think about children and how conflict might impact children in the family. How do you see children coping with family conflict?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
For young children, I often see them acting out with their behaviors in response to conflict. Some kids may tantrum or start having more kind of what we call externalizing behaviors like hitting or kicking or yelling. And some kids may have what we call more internalizing behaviors, which is like crying or becoming more withdrawn, but one of the key things is that we see their responses in terms of their behaviors. And one of the things that, you know, families can do is start to label and really acknowledge what kids see and how their behavior may be connected to what they’re feeling or what emotions they noticed their parents having.
Cindy Lopez:
It brings me back to that, you know, all behavior is communication. So especially with young children, you might see more of what you just said, Dr. Pon and so definitely sounds like there’s probably some unhealthy responses that parents might be paying attention to and maybe some healthy ones too. What does it look like in older kids, adolescents, young adults?
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Just like Dr. Pon was just saying, the emotional responses are common across the age and developmental spectrum where there may be feelings of anger, sadness, anxiety, stress that come up, but outside of that, it’s not uncommon that older teens or older adults have a wider reach into the world, and it’s important to remember. So the effect of these emotional changes or effect of conflict might be more visible in the primary jobs that these older teens have, which is school and which could be in the relationships that they have with their peers and other people. So it could affect school performance, academic performance. It could affect their relationship with their peers, their teachers, their close friends, extended family even. So it could come out in a lot of other ways. One unique aspect of family conflict that comes up in older adults, which may not be nearly as common or obvious in younger children, really is a marked increase in risk taking behavior, particularly in the form of drug use or sexual experimentation, self-harm, suicidal thoughts and behavior, escape into social media or gaming. So those are unique to older teens just because they may have greater access to these kinds of things. And that may be a unique way in which the behavior might come out different from externalizing behavior that Dr. Pon was talking about.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah. To our listeners, we are going to talk about what you can do if you’re seeing some of those behaviors, but before we get there, so say parents, caregivers, primary caregivers are having conflict and whether it’s leading to separation and divorce, which is the topic of this episode, what does that communication with kids look like? So from parents to kids about the conflict or about separation and divorce that could be happening.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah, that’s a super important question that I often get asked on a very regular basis. One of the things that I think is the most important is that separation and divorce is an adult decision because it really is related to the marriage or relationship between the parents and so it is a decision that has to be made between the parents, and so that needs to be made not in discussion with the children because it’s really not up to them. So when the time comes to communicate about separating or divorcing, parents should say that it is an adult choice and that it’s not up to the kids. It’s hard to be really direct and it sounds a little bit tough, but it’s really important that kids know where their domain of control is in this you know marked change in their life. I really recommend too that parents emphasize that there’s nothing that the child or their children did to cause this and there’s nothing that they can do to fix or change this. This is one of the processes that young children especially often go through where they have an egocentric point of view of the world and they often blame themselves because maybe they saw their parents arguing over something that happened related to them.
Cindy Lopez:
Hmm.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
and so really emphasizing this repeatedly is super important. I encourage parents to not leave any ambiguity or doors open if certain doors are definitely shut. I think that families often want to soften this, but it’s really important to be clear with children.
Cindy Lopez:
So I’m wondering, what would that conversation sound like, like, what would parents be saying to their child, especially a young child who may not understand the conflict that is present? What kinds of things could they say?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah, that’s a great question, too. I often recommend that parents kind of come up with a script together, and ideally if the circumstances allow, share the information with the children both parents there together. And it might sound something like, kind of telling the story of the family. Once upon a time, mommy and daddy, daddy and daddy, whoever’s part of the family met and got married and when we got married, we hoped that our marriage would work out and that we would stay married, and sometimes that doesn’t happen and there’s nothing that you did to cause this, and there’s nothing you can do to change this. We’ve decided to get a divorce. What a divorce means is that we will no longer be married, and essentially inserting the changes that the child could expect. This house will be mommy’s house and, you know, daddy will get a second house or you’re going to stay in this house and mommy and daddy are going to be switching back and forth. I’m saying Mommy and Daddy here just because that’s, you know, the most common, but it could be inclusive to whatever kind of family structure the kids are in. And really going into the facts that the kids can expect next. And then acknowledging the feelings and the pain.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah. Yeah. And I’m assuming that with older kids, adolescents, young adults, like, that conversation might sound very different.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Actually, no, kids of all ages need very much the same thing to hear. Obviously, the level of explanation and detail might look different, but kids, even 17, 18 year old kids, not uncommonly will sometimes worry that they are the reason that their parents are separating, especially if they’ve seen conflict between the parents. Because parenting a teenager is challenging, and it’s not uncommon for couples to sometimes argue or conflict with each other over how that is going, and kids may have seen that. So kids at all ends of the developmental spectrum, till they’re truly independent adults. And very much worry about the same things in the content of their relationship, and I think it’s important to emphasize here that even young adults, people who are technically over the age of 18, but might still be dependent on their parents, still have very strong feelings and emotions about the togetherness or not of their parental units. And it’s really important for parents of all age children to really consider. So I would basically do copy paste. Obviously you would change the language in a developmentally appropriate manner to address the person in front of you, but the content of it and all the things you’re talking about, which is the preamble to it, their role in it, what will come next, what they can expect. All of that remains exactly the same. The only other point I would add, which Natalie hinted at, but is important to emphasize is obviously the precursor to this conversation with the children really is that the parents have had a really detailed, deep conversation, which is what she was hinting at as far as the script goes, is because even before the script is written, the idea is that you agree on these common grounds of what you’re seeing and communicating because you want to be as close to the reality of what will come out and will happen. And so it’s important to be on the same page.
The second important thing that is also valuable to emphasize here about this is if there are children at very similar developmental levels you want to give the information to them simultaneously so no child in the situation feels separated out. Of course, if the children are at very different age and / or developmental abilities, you want to really separate them out so the conversation could be super tailored to their needs if you have a child with differing developmental needs, neurodevelopmentally diverse, have learning challenges or other neurodevelopmental issues, you want to take that into consideration in the conversation, but if those issues do not exist in your family unit, and the kids are relatively similar from a developmental age, like all teens or all young kids, you want to talk simultaneously, obviously making space for eventual independent individual conversations with each of them to answer their concerns, questions. Because you are trying to communicate to them a sense of community that they are all in this together, too. And you are, by that, giving them a gift of family by saying that this is happening to all of us. We are all in this journey together. That’s really important.
Cindy Lopez:
Hmm. I wonder to our listeners right now, like who might be parents trying to navigate this process with their kids, but they’re thinking, oh my gosh, I could never have that conversation with my child. I’m afraid, you know, of their response, what should parents do?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah, it can be incredibly tough and the tendency to avoid can be very strong. I’ve actually worked with many young children who basically the divorce and separation was never explained to them. And so it’s a lingering pain, you know, years later. And I would say, even though it could feel better to not talk about it, it’s really going to be the best for your children and your family to be as direct as possible about this because at some point in time, you know, it needs to be talked about and it will be talked about. And you want to be the ones to deliver that information. And I’ll say, you know, in terms of kind of the script, Dr. Krishnan and I were referring to, there’s also other circumstances that can lead to separation and divorce that may be more unilateral and maybe there’s other people that are going to be involved in making decisions, and in those cases, I definitely emphasize, you know, we don’t know what the schedule might be yet. It’s going to be up to a judge or whatever kind of circumstances may be coming next. So, if there’s something that’s not clear yet, it is important to say we don’t know and whose choice it’s going to be, which really inherently lets the children know that it’s not up to them.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Going back to the point you were asking about earlier, Cindy it is also important to emphasize that if there is a lot of avoidance about possibly talking about an impending divorce with the kid or the family there is professional help. There’s a lot of groups out there for divorcing parents to help them in terms of these communication challenges, developing and agreeing on a script, there’s also professional help available in the form of providers like Natalie and me and other people in the community who are experienced in helping families navigate this particular process and can always sit with a family and help them come up with what to say in an age developmentally and circumstance appropriate manner. So that could be another way to deal with that anxiety and things you might be feeling. Separately, there is a lot of lay literature out there that are really good books. There’s a lot of books that are written towards kids at various developmental levels that you can take the support or the aid of in having this conversation. If you don’t feel like you can find the words to say what needs to be said, there’s a lot of help in literature out there that can also come to your aid. And most local libraries have a fully stacked shelf, public libraries of books that address this particular topic that you can borrow, research and kind of pursue before you figure out what you want to do or say. So you’re definitely not alone and it’s important to remember.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yes.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah, that’s a good reminder. CHC’s Voices of Compassion podcast is made possible by the generosity of people like you. To learn more about supporting CHC, go to chconline.org/donate. Also make sure to follow us on social media for more inspiring and educational content from CHC.
Let’s talk about co-parenting for a minute. Clearly the co-parenting starts before the divorce ever kind of is actualized. You both noted, you know, let’s figure out what the communication is going to be with our children. So that co-parenting piece starts right away. What additional advice do you have for co-parenting?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
There are so many different resources and supports out there and one of the things is figuring out what kind of style and strategy is going to work well for the parents, first of all. Of course, we you know, in ideal circumstances, often recommend that children do well with having a lot of consistency across households or families, especially with, you know, structure, limits and boundaries, rules, and often this kind of helps them feel more cohesive as they go back and forth, or as they change environments and sometimes it’s not possible, and in those cases, I recommend that parents be pretty explicit about having different roles at, you know, one parent’s house versus the other parent’s house.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Yeah, I would agree with all of those things, that consistency, clear limits, necessary consequences are important and the way I usually will have families, especially when you’re dealing with older kids, say is that while we as parents are deciding to not be together, we are going to continue to be your parents. And that’s really important to emphasize because all the parenting rules automatically then apply. So we’re not going to take our eye off the ball is what you’re basically telling them, which for teenagers is really important because that is the safe container in which they lead their lives. Risk taking is a very innate and natural part of teenage existence, but it’s also the part of our life where we learn to live by the values that our families espouse or make safe, healthy life choices for ourselves in the moment and in the future. So it’s really important to emphasize that the parenting role will continue moving forward.
Another important thing to really emphasize as far as teenagers goes, particularly with regards to co-parenting, is it’s very, very easy for parents who are struggling through a relationship challenge to see this teenager who, for all intents and purposes, looks like a grown person, and start to think of them as another adult in this situation. I have a lot of situations where parents will share about what’s going on with the divorce proceedings, with the child in question, actually. Sometimes put them in the middle of the parenting situation, having them make choices that they really shouldn’t have to make, take on sometimes the burden or the responsibility of parenting a younger child who’s already struggling in the context of a divorce and having them become the parent which is very challenging for them. And also the other thing is really airing out a lot of the arguments between the parents in front of the child, which they really should be behind closed doors because they don’t have all the context of the relationship to truly understand that conversation for what it is about. And last, but nevertheless, not the least, no matter what your level of frustration with the other party in the situation is they are still the child’s other parent, and you really don’t want to be in a situation where you’re badmouthing the other person, no matter what your personal belief system might be in front of your teenager or young adult. It really becomes emotionally very challenging for them to deal with this, especially if their relationship with that other parent is very different.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah. Yeah. I know. And I’m sure you hear these stories all the time where, you’re talking with kids and they’re saying, well, my dad doesn’t make me do that, my mom makes me do that. You know, why can’t I do what I do at my dad’s house or at my mom’s house or my other dad’s house? And I think you noted that too, Dr. Krishnan, when you said, you know, you don’t want to get in a situation where you’re bad mouthing each other as parents to your child because you don’t want to put them in the middle, and I think that’s a tough situation for a parent to be in when the relationship between the parents is antagonistic. Do you have any specific advice or thoughts about that?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Dr. Krishnan had referenced this, really keeping in mind that no matter what happens, this other person is your child’s other parent and there is a love and bond there that’s going to exist.And, remembring that and keeping that, holding that in mind, even when, you know, things are very laden with conflict, or there’s a lot of things that the other parent may be doing that you’re really not in agreement of. And that anytime you speak ill of the other parent, you’re really making the child choose emotionally, even if there’s not a physical choice to be made. And that’s something that is extremely painful for children.
Cindy Lopez:
So as you mentioned both early on in our conversation, you might see some behaviors with kids, with young children, you might see some tantrums and acting out in some ways you haven’t seen before, or they’re kind of, you know, reverting to older behavior, younger behavior, and I’m just wondering what strategies you might have for our listeners about how to support their children, during this, you know, particularly tough time.
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah, it can be really hard and like you mentioned we often see kids regress and have angry acting out or meltdowns. I think really reflecting and connecting the fact that, you know, it’s really hard that we’re getting a divorce or it’s really hard to have two homes. In these moments that don’t seem linked to it, but this is an emotional undertone of, you know, everything that’s going to be happening for the child in the years to come. And keeping that in mind and connecting it and labeling it for the child because you know, children are going to have a hard time being like, I’m feeling really badly, or I’m really angry because of what you guys are doing, especially young children, because it’s very hard to hold that ambivalence towards your parents, for that’s one thing that I would say in terms of supporting them. I’d also say sticking to routines and as much as possible continuing to take care of yourself during the process, whether that is getting a therapist or professional help or going to support groups because the more you’re able to take care of yourself, the more emotionally available you’ll be to support your child.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Yeah, no, I agree with all of those things. I would definitely want to second that taking care of yourself idea. This is a long road. It’s not a one and done conversation, one and done emotion. And it’s really important to kind of be in there for the long haul, not just for yourself. And I think that taking care of yourself, but in terms of taking care of the child because there will be multiple other follow up conversations to that emotional first conversation that will happen. So making both the time and the space to have those conversations, making yourself both physically and emotionally available to have that conversation becomes really, really important. And being very honest about the changes in the family and processing that. If time permits, which I know this is an extremely busy time for a family because there are so many changes going on, especially as far as caregiving responsibilities and other things go. But time permitting, I really encourage parents to take a deep dive into taking a greater amount of interest in the kids’ academic and extracurricular activities, trying to attend things if you can to show them you are a part of your life. Also, despite the intensity of emotions if they can partly focus on keeping a communication bridge with your partner so that all of these things can work about as smoothly as one can hope for.
I sometimes encourage families to keep the larger context in mind is that it’s entirely possible that you will be sitting next to that person, irrespective of whether you’re divorced or not at this kid’s wedding or graduation or other future events in their life, you might have grandchildren together that you might eventually want to think about. And these things are all coming, and they’re all there in that line. There’s a lot of emotion in the moment and if you can keep your eye on the ball, that could really be helpful in terms of helping sort through the current challenges.
Cindy Lopez:
So we’ve talked about like behavior we might see in kids like, as you noted, earlier, Dr. Pon, externalizing behaviors, the internalizing stuff like how should parents respond if their child is not really reacting? If their child is perhaps withdrawing or like all of a sudden, you know, they love soccer and they’ve just determined they’re not going to play soccer anymore. Like how can parents respond in those kinds of situations?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah. And it’s very common for kids to go through phases of responding. A lot of kids, especially younger kids will kind of ignore it and be like, “I’m fine” or “I don’t care,” and we know that that’s not true, but you know, kids are ready to talk and explore about things verbally when they are. And so I would say continuing to spend one on one time with them, playing. Young children only have a very limited tolerance for exploring negative affects and talking about these very serious things, and then they need to be in other states and play is their language and the way that they communicate. And you may see that with one on one play, they’re playing out some things that are happening, like transitions or things that happen at each house, and that’s the way that they’re able to communicate and share with you. So I’d say consistent playtime can be great if a child’s feeling really withdrawn. And, you know, just remembering that things ebb and flow and so there’s going to be different stages of understanding what’s happening and wanting to talk about it and then wanting to revisit at different points in development.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
From a teenage perspective, I would just add two other things. The rest of it, obviously, teenagers are not always up for playing, that is not the main, primary mode through which they process their life events. And if they’re not up for talking, there are two things you can do. One thing that you are able to do, is you can always model the behavior that you’re hoping to see in terms of communication, emotional communication, openness, or while you don’t want to talk about the laundry list of challenges you’re having with a partner in the middle of a divorce, you are always welcome to talk about the challenges you’re having with change.
Change is universally challenging and it provokes emotional responses in all of us. And it’s hard and difficult. So you’re modeling managing change through your talking about change and how you are coping with it and what you’re doing. And the last part of it, is teenagers and young adults by nature are very peer oriented. And so it’s very important for them either to have the permission to talk to other people about it because while they may not talk to you, they might talk to a friend or a classmate or another kid going through a similar set of circumstances or separately, they may have other trusted adults they may feel more comfortable talking, whether it’s uncle or grandparents or close family friends who may be better because they may feel more comfortable with them not being in the middle of the situation, might feel like better people for them to process their emotional struggles, and feel like they can get the support they need.
Cindy Lopez:
Yeah, I’m wondering too about parents who have kids with special needs. For example, they have learning challenges, kids have learning challenges and school is already difficult for them, or they have mental health conditions. Does that change those conversations at all? What would that look like?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Well you always want to communicate in a way that, your child will best understand. So I’d say if there’s certain ways of communicating, that can be really effective for your child based off their learning, or mental health conditions, or neurodevelopmental status, that’s always useful. I would say, stress can always cause exacerbation of, you know, underlying mental health conditions or, make it harder for children who already have challenges and just being aware of that. And, you know, sometimes if a child has had a history of separation anxiety or you know, depression, it may be good preemptively to reconnect with a professional, who might know your child, if that’s available, or somebody to support, them through this process.
Cindy Lopez:
So, as parents are working through this process, they’re talking with their kids, hopefully they’re talking to each other. What should parents share with other people or with their kids, like the teacher, their best friend’s parents, the child’s coach, like, should they be talking with those people about this?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah, there’s many stakeholders in a child’s life, and I would say everybody important, especially for young children. It is super effective to inform them that way, the teacher or the coach knows the fabric of what’s happening behind the scenes and why this child may be having a harder time staying still, or, you know, maybe more withdrawn and can you know, connect or give little bit more special attention to this child.
I also think it’s really important to remember to not put these other people in the middle of any parenting conflict, especially, you know, teachers can be very easily put in the middle, well, at this house, at the other house, you know, they don’t have to do their homework or that’s this parent’s problem. And just remembering that, this person is there to support your child, but not to take sides between things or be part of a blame game. And if there are certain circumstances that you feel are absolutely necessary you know, in relation to the divorce for these other people to know, providing succinct information may be helpful, but you also want to use discretion, because, sometimes relatives or other people can inadvertently mention, certain content and you want to always be thinking about what could get back to your child or what the children can overhear.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
And I would agree, generally speaking, even as far as older teens go, and there the purpose is a little bit beyond what we’re talking about. Also in terms of the risky behavior and the monitoring, having other people know is helpful so that they can keep an eye out, their extra eyes and ears who are making sure your child is safe in the community and in the spaces that they inhabit. And so that’s really critical. And then circling back to children with learning differences or mental health challenges as a part of that situation, that would be an additional space where having other stakeholders like coaches or teachers be in the know can be important if there needs to be time provided for a child to adjust to these new circumstances, because that could be sometimes a little bit of a rocky road, whether it’s in terms of academically getting used to getting homework and submitting things and doing things from two different households or being in a situation where the family is a little bit of a flux in terms of daily routines. They take time to settle and having a school know about this or having a coach know about whether it’s consistency of attending practice is going to affect whether the kid gets to play in the game on the weekend or not. Those can be really important because if you’re trying to keep the kid’s life super stable, these people can really be great partners in helping you with that as well.
Cindy Lopez:
Would there ever be a case, I’m thinking about teenagers, older adolescents, young adults, where you would encourage the teenager themselves to go talk to one of their teachers or school counselor or their coach? Or should that always kind of be a conversation with the parent and that other adult?
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
My take usually is that we want it to be a parent first conversation, like Dr. Pon said at the beginning, this is a parent decision and it comes from the parents. There can always be options for follow up conversations the kid can have. The teacher can check in with the kid after the information has been transmitted, but I do feel like the level setting in all of these situations has to come from the adult.
Cindy Lopez:
Both of you have talked about this, at different times in our conversation, but just kind of one more time, when should parents seek help?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
I’d say if they feel like they need help in any sort of way, absolutely seek help. It’s a really stressful time of a lot of change. And then I would say absolutely seek help if there have been circumstances leading up to the divorce or separation that have been traumatic in nature or developmentally inappropriate because it’s important that, you know, this is explored and talked about with somebody safe. So those would be two, you know circumstances that I would say definitely seek help.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
I would echo all of that and Dr. Pon put it really wonderfully there. And I think, for me, looking at it again from a teenage lens, uh, it would be three. If there’s any disruption in sleeping or eating, I think help is important to get immediately if a kid is not sleeping or not eating or engaging in emotional eating as a part of their coping strategy that can lead to a lot of unhealthy health consequences, which I do think need immediate attention, If you’re seeing risk taking behavior in the form of self-harm, suicidality, substance use, excessive engagement in screen gaming, online pornography, which sometimes can happen in these circumstances, that definitely calls for pretty immediate attention. And anything that disrupts the functioning of a child, if they’re not able to function in school or keep up with friends or other extracurricular activities, those things are concrete benchmarks outside of when you feel like you need help that I would definitely encourage people to seek assistance.
Cindy Lopez:
Really helpful. Thank you. So, as we wrap up our conversation I’m just wondering, if there’s anything specific you’d like to leave with our listeners today?
Dr. Natalie Pon:
Yeah. I think it’s a tough decision no matter what. And parents often ask me, you know, will my child make it through this? Should I get divorced or not because of you know, how my child’s gonna handle it and I would say, you know doing what’s best for you as the parents because it is an adult decision as we keep going back to, and knowing that children are resilient and that there’s a lot of support out there to help your family get through this time of change and transition. I always want parents to know that and that doing what’s best for the parents will lead to positive circumstances for the children, even though there may be a lot of sadness, and other negative emotions that go along with the process.
Dr. Vidya Krishnan:
Last words I might say is for parents to deal with their own feelings of guilt, shame, or failure that come from the perception of their marriage disintegrating is really important and central to a lot of the work you might need to do eventually to help your children through this process. So I think going back to taking care of yourself is really important and coming to terms with what, uh, you’re going through and what you need to do is what is going to be most helpful in this journey.
Cindy Lopez:
So important. To our listeners, as Dr. Krishnan and Dr. Pon have both mentioned, please reach out if you need help. There are lots of free resources available. We have free parent support groups at CHC. We have this podcast, all kinds of free resources for you. If you need some professional help please reach out to us. You can find us at chconline.org. You can reach out to our care team, careteam at chconline.org. You can email them and you can also phone at 650-688-3625. So Dr. Krishnan and Dr. Pon, thank you so much. And to our listeners, thank you for joining us today. Visit us online at podcasts.chconline.org. Make sure to subscribe to Voices of Compassion so you never miss an episode, and we’d love it if you’d leave us a rating and review. Have a question? Send us an email or a voice memo at podcasts@chconline.org. We’re here for you when you need us.
