According to the American Psychological Association roughly 40-50% of marraiges in the United States end in divorce. My parents fell victim to this in the Spring of 2012. I was only sixteen at the time with a six-year-old sister in tow, I cannot say that the divorce did not have an effect on me. Here are five things I learned from my own personal expirience with my parent’s divorce and how I came to understand that in the end: everything will be alright.
1. It’s okay to be distraught…and it’s okay not to be.
This was something very hard for me to wrap my head around as a sixteen-year-old and even now as I approach my twenty-first birthday. I suppose my age played a large part in this. Unlike my six-year-old sister, I knew why my parents were separating. I understood that they were just not meant to be and honestly, I wasn’t as broken up as people expected me to be. I remember people comforting me and later wondering why I wasn’t an absolute mess. For my sister, it was traumatic and I worked endlessly to help her in any way I could, but for me it was almost as if a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. It is completely alright to be an absolute mess (on the inside and out), and it is okay to not show any emotion at all. It doesn’t mean you’re insensitive or numb, just that everyone processes things differently.
2. Two people can be amazing individuals but be toxic together.
I didn’t fully understand this until years after the divorce. All I had ever seen were my parents together and arguing constantly. I never really got to know them for who they really were until they separated. I learned that my mother is independent and hard-working. I learned that my father is kind-hearted and loves to joke all the time. At first, I felt a little betrayed as their separated-selves unfolded. I wondered if perhaps they had changed or been hiding all along. It was only after that I realized how much people can change when they are around someone that isn’t good for them and how much I really do love both my parents no matter what.
3. You can have time to make both parties happy.
This is especially important to me. At the beginning, I was always fighting to ensure that both parents felt equally loved and knew that they had my full support in whatever decision they made. Now, though there are bumps and a few setbacks, I have learned that I can be a daughter to both, even though we are no longer a fully-functioning family. I can stay with my mother all week and visit with my father on weekends and I hope they both know how much I do love them, and how happy I am that they are healthier now. Now, I have two Christmases where I don’t have to fear that I am giving too much attention to one side of the family while ignoring another, and the feeling is absolutely liberating.
4. It is never your fault…EVER.
Every child of divorce, no matter their age, gender, or birth lineup has thought at one time or another that their parents’ divorce was their fault. Allow me to affirm right now for anyone who still has this feeling (I myself sometimes wonder what I could’ve done differently): that this is definitely not the case. Just because two people could not be together, does not mean that their children are the fault. Those issues (whatever they may have been) are entirely their own, and if anything, their children are the best thing that came of their marriage. As Mrs. Pott’s from Beauty and the Beast says: “You can’t judge a person based on who their father is.” Nor can a child judge their parent’s troubles as their own doing.
5. Everything will be okay.
Sometimes there are setbacks in divorced relationships. Sometimes there are arguments about child support or ‘who will pay what and when’. In the end, everything is going to be okay. When I was going through that dark time, it was hard for me to believe that one day there would be a day where the thought of my parent’s not being together would not make me sad. I also didn’t think that I would be relieved my parents divorced. I am grateful that they separated and spared themselves and their children from the stress of a marriage that just wouldn’t work. I am grateful that they did put in eighteen years and never let me forget how loved I was. Most of all, I am grateful that there are two things my parents can always agree on: that they absolutely approve of my fiancé and cannot be more proud of me.