Divorce Experts Agree: The Kids Should Always Come First

While the storm continues to rage over whether divorced parents can raise sound children, people close to the issue--including mental health professionals, and children and parents of divorce--offer the following suggestions to ease the transition and soften the blow:

“It’s more about things parents shouldn’t do than what they should do,” observes Greenwich, Conn., child and family psychologist Jerome Brodlie. For one, they shouldn’t get into a contest regarding custody, visitation schedules and legal matters, he says. If possible, they should live near one another, allowing for flexibility in the arrangement. “Obviously, if parents can communicate with each other after they are divorced and not get into a contest for attention or affection of the children, they should go on to have their own lives so that they don’t become overly dependent on their kids.”

Add to that observations by Philadelphia-based family law attorney Lynne Gold-Bikin, a former chair of the American Bar Assn.’s Family Law Section and a divorcee who raised three children, now successful, happily married adults.

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“The first thing you do is you don’t pull them back and forth like pieces of Turkish taffy,” says Gold-Bikin. Equally important, she adds, is respecting and cooperating with your former spouse. To maintain a cohesive family unit despite the divorce, Gold-Bikin says her family keeps a computerized bulletin board. When one of the children had a problem while living abroad, the attorney says her ex was the first person she called. “There was never a time when our kids saw us as separate when it came to them,” she says. “To this day, when [my ex-husband] comes to town . . . and I pick him up [at the airport], the kids see us hugging. I frankly don’t understand when people have slept together how they can hate each other.”

Manhattan resident Mike Molnar, a child of divorce, says parents should remember to stay involved in their kids’ lives. “If one of those parents ceases to show up and the phone calls stop, the end result is that they become acquaintances rather than parental figures later in life,” he says. As Molnar was raised solely by his mother after the divorce, he says his dad missed out on his important high school years. “I don’t know my father as well as most people know their fathers,” he says. “We have gone years in seeing each other only a few times a year.” And now that his dad has remarried and Molnar has a little sister whom he “absolutely adores,” he visits his dad’s home more frequently. Still, he feels that his conversations with his dad remain “shallow. If one of your parents isn’t around, ultimately both of you miss out because you can’t recapture that relationship.”

Parents should never bring up their disagreements and arguments with the child, says Paloma Nazario, another child of divorce. “It has nothing to do with [the child] and never ever should,” adds the New York City resident. She says the only thing that a parent should be concerned about is his or her relationship with that child, not with his or her ex. And in turn, she says, “all [a child] needs to know is that Mommy loves me and Daddy loves me.”