Divorce Without Dishonor

I am glad you asked says your host and creator of the Divorce Without Dishonor Blog. About 14 years ago I sat through my first court-ordered divorce education workshop, sometimes referred to as co-parenting classes or other similar benign titles. The purpose of such programs is really to help parents to avoid contested child custody litigation by providing some information, resources and techniques to lessen or avoid parental conflict during these times of family turmoil. They are for individuals and families raising children between two homes.

Those who take this responsibility seriously can improve their parenting skills and make healthy choices regarding their children during times when it is easy to have clouded judgment. I have been to many such programs in the last 14 years that have been offered from many different groups from huge international groups such as Divorce Care to different county programs offered through the Family Services units various courts, to online programs through such organizations as Child Sharing.com.

Overall, you will find that the people who run these programs are extremely knowledgeable, very sincere and dedicated individuals who truly want to help you, and especially your children. However, they are often limited by many rules and guidelines and they have people to answer to. There are often a few layers of bureaucracy to wade through to get things done including financial constraints and budget issues. Of course everyone must always speak with political correctness and they are not permitted to answer any specific questions pertaining to the facts of your pending case. Court run programs will not permit both sides to attend the same classes and they are usually limited to two sessions of about 2-3 hours duration. While they cover a lot of ground, these programs largely are only able to scratch the surface given these limitations and there is little time to go into depth on any given topic. Question and answer sessions are minimal and limited as there is a set timed agenda to follow. Again, I applaud the dedicated people who work so hard and do such great work in helping litigants to think like parents before acting like litigants.

In my case, despite all the efforts of many people who tried to help end the nonsense, my son’s mother and I embarked on an all out full-scale custody battle that lasted for several years. To say it was hell and a life-changing event is a vast understatement.  I called it parental warfare and oh, the stories I could tell you! You see, being an attorney myself and being familiar with judges, lawyers and the court system, I knew how bad I could get screwed and it scared the hell out of me. Unfortunately, most lay people who are not extremely knowledgeable about the family law court system do not know how bad it can be and how much damage can be done until it is too late. Once you go too far down the litigation path, it is hard to retreat to normalcy.

For years I have thought, “What if these programs were taken to the next level?” What could be added to improve these programs and eliminate the roadblocks? At the extreme, I envisioned a cross between Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer replete with in-depth discussions, audience participation, guest presenters, ongoing meetings and online and other support group mechanisms. People need to hear the reality of what a contested custody battle can be like and they need to be able to openly and honestly be able to discuss it with people who will tell it like it is.

What if we didn’t have to deal with all the red tape and political correctness? What if we could break into small cohesive groups and get to the root of the problems and learn from the experiences of each other. Is all for one and one for all to cliché? What if the agenda for the evening could be partly designed by the participants?

What if all of the great books, programs and resources that have been relied on by others were shared and discussed so that participants could know where to turn to address their particular needs before having to obtain their own devastating personal experience first? For years these things have been running rampant in my mind and I am ready to take action. Are you? www.DivorceWihtoutDishonor.com/Boot-Camp

By Rosalind Sedacca

Thanksgiving, Christmas – most any holiday — can bring up painful memories of happier times, especially if you are divorced and have children. But keep in mind that with the pain comes a choice. You can choose to acknowledge the past for what it was. You can value the good times you might have had together. Then you can choose to move on and let go.

If you don’t, you will likely get stuck tormenting yourself with the “shoulds.”  We should still be a family today. He should be ashamed of what he’s doing to us. She shouldn’t be able to have the kids on Christmas Day. I should be over this by now. It should be easier for me to move on – but it isn’t. You get the idea.

Use this holiday season as a marker for starting a new mindset for yourself. You are creating a future that will be as positive for you as you allow it to be. Close the door to what was so you can open the door to brighter tomorrows – for yourself and your children. This holiday season and the ones to come can be weeks of great celebration for you if you start planting the seeds in your mind today.

Here are some useful tips for creating a positive mindset for the holidays.

Be your own best friend:

Divorce and its related stressors can take its toll on your self-esteem. It’s easy to start falling into cycles of despair, fear, anxiety and depression fueled by messages such as “who’s going to want me now?” or “how can I cope with all this pressure in my life?” This can certainly compound over the holidays, which add another layer of stress to family life. Use this time to celebrate you and starting a new chapter in your life. Look ahead to reinventing yourself in ways you’ve always wanted – and acknowledging yourself for assets you have that can be further explored. Take time to laugh and indulge in some holiday spirit. It’s good medicine for you and the children you love.

Focus on lifting the spirits of others:

Gratitude is a mindset that reminds us of our blessings. Do you have a loving relationship with your children? Do you have your health, a roof over your head, the income to purchase a few holiday gifts? Many people are not so fortunate. Be grateful for your blessings, share a smile or kind gesture with others, volunteer for the less fortunate and you will be rewarded in ways you never expected – physically, emotionally and spiritually!

Integrate – don’t isolate:

Take advantage of this social season to circulate and re-connect with family and friends. Plan some small gatherings with those you care about and accept a few invitations to get out and meet other people. Limit your “pity party” time to an hour or two. Then pick yourself up and get back into life. You’ll be surprised by the support systems available to you. You will also find that you are not alone in the post-divorce emotions and challenges you are experiencing. Be receptive to help and it will come to you.

Initiate New Holiday Traditions:

Remembering holiday traditions of the past can set you into a downward cycle and negatively affect your children, as well. This is the time to develop new ways of celebrating the holidays that you and your children can cherish and enjoy together. Perhaps it’s a special trip, celebrating with new friends and neighbors, attending special holiday events in your community or place of worship. Encourage your co-parent to do the same when the kids are with them, so that they have something to look forward to in each home.

Use this time of the year as the emotional starting point for bringing into focus the “you” you’ve always wanted to be. Visualize the future you desire. Make commitments to positive changes in your thoughts, habits and actions. By doing this, every year to come around holiday time you will be re-energized with positive appreciation rather than brought down by sadness and despair. The choice is yours. Embrace this season as the start of wonderful things to come and you’ll have much to celebrate in your future!

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Rosalind Sedacca, CCT, is the author of the ebook, How Do I Tell the Kids … about the Divorce? A Create-a-Storybook™ Guide to Preparing Your Children — with Love!   For more information, free articles on child-centered divorce and her free ezine, go to: http://www.childcentereddivorce.com.

I stumbled upon a quote, while reading some other blogs, that may be of interest if you have children, especially young children, and you are going through a moderate to high-conflict divorce. Nearly 20 years ago a well known Canadian Jurist, The Honorable Justice John Gomery stated “Hatred is not an emotion that comes naturally to a child. It has to be taught. A parent who would teach a child to hate the other parent represents a grave and persistent danger to the mental and emotional health of that child.” The case that led to the above comment involved four children caught up in a heated custody battle between their parents whereby the children became “CATASTROPHICALLY” alienated from their mother. How does that happen?

When you think of young children, their innocence and their sponge-like quest for learning, it is no wonder that they are so affected by their parents’ anger and hostility. It’s one thing to say or do a few things that may not win you the good parenting seal during a contentious divorce, but it is quite another to deliberately poison and pollute a child’s mind. If only we could truly love our children more than we may dislike the other parent.

Most people would agree that children do not belong in adult conflicts. However, it happens all the time. It needs to stop. We as parents need to become aware of the damage that we can do to our children when we allow them to participate in the conflict of divorce. We also need to learn how to protect the children when the other parent just does not “get it.”

It may seem ironic coming from a divorce attorney, but if people spent only a fraction of their time and money otherwise wasted on the fight, in more pro-active and productive ways, their children would be so much better off. Moderate to high-conflict cases may be tempered and tamed if all concerned adopt a collaborative and therapeutic approach. Individual therapy, counseling, psychotherapy, mediation, family counseling and the like are better uses of time and money than litigation fees and practices. Read, learn, and educate yourself on divorce and parenting. Some of the best ways to shield your children from the pain of the divorce and “picking sides” or being “caught in the middle” involve improving yourself and to the extent possible, encouraging the other parent to do the same.

Our children will grow up one day and statistically speaking they have at least a fifty percent chance of divorcing their spouse. What will they remember from all they learned as children of separation and divorce? When it comes to teaching our children about the way people are supposed to get along, like charity and relationships, it begins at home.

Once you have brought your energy into the present moment, you can devote your attention to the new direction your life can now take. Grounded in your new truth, you can create your new future.

Regardless of what life brings us, we have the power of free will to choose which direction to take.  Do we choose the high road, using challenges like divorce to show us that we have the strength to heal ourselves and become more of who we are meant to be?  Or do we choose the low road, and choose to be a victim of life and other people’s choices. Until we decide to embrace the gift that is inherent in any challenge, we are letting it use us, rather than the other way around. 

When we trust our inner guidance, we know that when we find something isn’t right for us, we are being redirected toward something better. Your best self is worth the hard work of the high road, because you will feel empowered to deal with anything and know it can only make you stronger.

Forgiveness is one of the most powerful things you can do to heal from divorce, and it may also be one of the most difficult. But forgiveness is not just a one-way, or even a one-time thing.

It may seem obvious to forgive our exes, and it’s something we may have to do several times a day until our emotions allow us to put our energy entirely into the present. What is less obvious is that we often need to forgive ourselves. We need to remember that we did the best we could with what we knew at the time. Now that we know better, we can do better. And if children are involved, we can teach them what we’ve learned.

It can be just as powerful to ask for forgiveness. In private moments in communion with our spirits, we can ask forgiveness from anyone we feel might have been hurt or disappointed by our divorce—even God, or own bodies that have been put through the wringer with the stress. We are here for giving—forgiving is one of the life lessons we all need to be our best selves.

There is no way we can control the situations that life may bring us, but we can control how we respond to these situations. The power of choice is ours, and it allows us to see old events in a new way. 

Looking back at our old choices, we can make the new choice to interpret them in ways that empower us.  We can see where our choices may have been acting against our highest goals, and can make the choice to learn from them, and then choose to behave differently starting right now.  For example, we can choose to respond rather than react when old wounds or disagreements are brought up, and in making that choice, we take control in a whole new way and become the designers of our own new realities.

When it comes to choices involving child custody, this can be especially challenging, which is why our book about collaborative divorce, “STOP Fighting Over The Kids: Resolving Day-to-Day Custody Conflict in Divorce Situations” was written. To find out more about the book, visit the STOP Fighting Over The Kids book website.

Over the years there have been endless studies on the effects of divorce on parents and children. Some of the results are
controversial. Others seem to be universally accepted as relevant and real. Here are a few of my perceptions from studies on children who experience divorce that I believe all of us, as parents, should take to heart.

• Not surprisingly, the first two years of divorce are the most difficult. In some cases it takes an average of three to five years to really “work through” and resolve many of the issues and emotions that come to the surface. For some, the effects of divorce last many additional years — or even a lifetime — if not dealt with appropriately. Taking steps toward a child-centered divorce can dramatically impact the negative effects of divorce on all members of the family. It will help everyone to move through this time rather than merely letting “time heal all wounds.”

• Preschoolers tend to be more frightened and anxious, but seem to adjust better than older children in the long run. Their biggest fear is of abandonment. Stressing security and a continuation of family routines is very helpful for them. Older children understand more, but do not have adequate coping skills and therefore seem to have more long-term problems. This is often because they remember life before the divorce and so experience a greater change of life patterns and dwell more on comparisons between the past and present. Stressing the love both parents have for the child — and that that love will continue forever is vitally important whenever possible.

• Children who may have witnessed a troubled marriage and family life may greatly benefit from observing their parents now working out a reasonable and respectful post-divorce arrangement. This positive and mature behavior will affect a child’s adjustment more than any other factor.
  
• It is never too late to create a child-centered divorce, even if you started on the wrong track. Every step you take toward focusing on your children’s emotional, psychological and physical needs as they move through the months and years post-divorce, will be a step toward modeling for them how loving, compassionate, and caring parents respond to their children’s needs. I encourage you to make your relationship with your children’s other parent as respectful and considerate as you can — for the sake of your children.
                  
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Rosalind Sedacca’s new ebook How Do I Tell the Kids about the Divorce? can be found at http://www.howdoitellthekids.com. She can be reached at Rosalind@childcentereddivorce.com. Her free articles and ezine are available at www.childcentereddivorce.com.

When going through a divorce, the desire to lay blame is strong, and of course, natural. But in order to learn and grow from the situation, and truly heal, we need to look inside of ourselves.  When we can ask ourselves what our contributions to the situation have been, then we’re ready to take an honest look at exactly how we participated in and co-created our divorce drama.  Then we’re ready to release our anger and move forward without dragging the past behind us.

By taking responsibility for our part in the situation, we can make peace with our past, and use it to improve our future.  Looking at the whole picture, we will hopefully see how we chose the perfect partner to teach us the perfect lessons for our highest growth. And if there are children involved, we will be able to see that when we are the best we can be, we can give them the parents they deserve.

Our book about collaborative divorce, “STOP Fighting Over The Kids: Resolving Day-to-Day Custody Conflict in Divorce Situations” is available now, exclusively at Amazon.com. To find out more about the book and to sign up to receive a free chapter visit the STOP Fighting Over The Kids book website. 

Max Sindell is a young man in his early twenties who has written a book for children titled, The Bright Side: Surviving Your Parents’ Divorce.

Sindell was six when his parents divorced. Over the next many years he experienced a wide array of significant divorce issues that affect so many families. These include coping with his parents’ arguments with and about one another, adjusting to travel between homes, remarriage, step siblings and juggling holidays and other special events. He wrote the book to help children identify their “voice” about all these issues. He also wants to show children ways to find the good that can come through and from divorce.

“The book is really supposed to be a quick handbook for making the most out of divorce and making it so that it’s the least of your problems,” Sindell says.  

Sindell uses his own life lessons to walk children through the “downsides” of divorce, and focuses on ways to best handle them. In his chapter titled, “The Good News and the Bed News,” he says “I’d honestly say that my parents’ divorce is one of the best things to ever happen to me in my entire life: That’s the good news.” “On the other hand, divorce can make you wake up one morning realizing how much everything sucks,” he also adds.

Other topics he discusses include: “You Are Never Going to Have One Home Again” and “Your Parents Are Going to Fight.” But within each discussion he also provides positive observations, such as learning how to travel at a young age and developing more independence.

Within the book Sindell also offers his personal bill of rights for divorced children. These are worth discussing with your children. It reminds them that they are not alone in what they are going through. And is empowers them to learn that they deserve and are entitled to “rights” as they move through and beyond the divorce. Let me share the first five with you, which Sindell says children should actually require to be part of their parents’ divorce agreement.

THE DIVORCED KIDS’ BILL OF RIGHTS
(Excerpt from The Bright Side: Surviving Your Parents’ Divorce)
I. The Right to Be Safe and Feel Safe – A child should feel safe and secure. If there ever is a time you don’t feel safe, tell your parents, and if you can’t tell them, tell a counselor or tell a friend. This is your most important right.

II. The Right to Awareness – Every child has a right to know what is going on. Your parents should not lie to you or hide the truth from you about anything to do with you. While some things should remain private between your parents until you are older, if they’re having a discussion about your schedule, you have the right to know and to make your voice heard.

III. The Right to Counseling – Divorce can make you feel like you don’t have a say and don’t make a difference, and that’s exactly where a counselor comes in. A counselor should be someone whom you can talk to privately, without your parents there, and who can help you with your situation.
School counselors are not the only people you can talk to. Adult friends of the family who are unbiased, or the parents of good friends of yours, are also good people to talk to.

IV. The Right to Be Heard – Sometimes, when your parents are trying to sort out what they think is best for you, they can forget to listen to the most important person: You! If you can’t get them to listen to you by yourself, it’s important to have someone — a counselor or a friend — talk for you.

V. The Right to Be Your Own Person – Before your parents were divorced, there was you, your mom, your dad, and the other people in your family. The same is true now. Your parents have to respect your right to feel the way you feel. In dealing with stepparents, or the people your parents are dating, your rights stand. You must tell both your parents and their friends when any boundaries are crossed. If those boundaries are crossed in a major way, and you don’t feel safe, tell a counselor.

Put yourself in your child’s shoes and give these Rights some serious consideration before making any further decisions affecting your children. Talk to your children about what this means. It might open the door to some very meaningful conversations about topics you’ve never before discussed. Empowered children are happier children — less resentful and less likely to act out to get your attention. Isn’t that what you really want?

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Rosalind Sedacca, CCT is a relationship seminar facilitator and author of the new ebook, How Do I Tell the Kids … about the Divorce? A Create-a-Storybook Guide to Preparing Your Children — with Love! For free articles, her blog, valuable resources on child-centered divorce or to subscribe to her free ezine, go to: www.childcentereddivorce.com.

We may look back on our path to divorce and see a progression of incidents and signs that alerted us that something deeper was happening. Some situations may have seemed random, but ultimately led to a confrontation we weren’t expecting.  The Law of Divine Guidance says that there is a higher power at work—one that pulls the strings of fate to help each of us grow to be our best selves.

When confrontation arises, our sense of pride (our ego) can keep us from seeing the full picture with clear eyes. Our egos will remain in charge until we step outside our righteous belief that we are independent and separate beings. As long as this myth is intact, we keep the door closed to our higher wisdom.

When we can get out of your own way and let go of our defenses, we become humble. Humility is the doorway through which the Divine can walk into our lives, and collaboration can become the new order of the day. 

Our book about collaborative divorce, “STOP Fighting Over The Kids: Resolving Day-to-Day Custody Conflict in Divorce Situations” is available now, exclusively at Amazon.com. To find out more about the book and to sign up to receive a free chapter visit the STOP Fighting Over The Kids book website.