Introduction Putting Children First When a Marriage Comes Apart The telephone call was typical of many that I receive as a marriage therapist and mediator. After fourteen years of marriage, Danielle and Frank were separating. Normally, only one partner calls to make the first appointment. It's usually the one who wants out of the marriage. I know to listen carefully to the caller's version of events while bearing in mind that in marriage there are at least two, and sometimes even more, sides to the story. What was different here was the timing'just a week before Christmas, an understandably unpopular time for separations'and the timetable Danielle had set for the split: now.As a psychologist and a dad myself, I found this especially distressing since the couple had a six-year-old child, Sam. Danielle and Frank had each met with lawyers, but Danielle told me that she'and, she hoped, Frank'didn't want to go that route.
They both made the same amount of money, so they weren't going to be fighting over finances. Even though Frank wanted to work things out, Danielle said, there was little chance of saving the marriage now. ?Could you please meet with us before Christmas? she asked urgently. After we agreed on a date, Danielle offered some additional, crucial background: She had only recently confessed to Frank that she was having an affair. She was worried about what Frank might do. Whenever she tried to talk seriously about separation, he made it very clear that he wanted to have Sam with him all the time. Danielle said this was a ridiculous suggestion. After all, she had spent more time raising Sam, and she loved him so much.
She couldn't stand being apart from him. But Danielle also felt guilty and uncertain about what was right and what might happen legally. After all, she was having an affair. As I penciled in the appointment, I wondered how much Christmas spirit any of us would be feeling by the time they left. Later, as I read through my notes from the conversation, I saw that Danielle and Frank had all the ingredients for a volatile and ugly divorce: a one-sided separation, the surprise and betrayal that comes with a partner's affair, a rush to accomplish in a matter of days the tasks of separation that typically take months or even years, potentially adversarial lawyers, and terrible timing. What could be worse for young Sam than his parents? separating over Christmas break? There was no question that as former partners and future exes, Danielle and Frank were in for a rough time. Despite all this, though, I hoped that one thing Danielle had told me on the telephone would hold true: that she and Frank shared an abiding love and concern for Sam. Really Putting Kids First Sometimes I wonder why I put myself in the middle of the agony'and the anger'of couples like Danielle and Frank.
As a psychologist, mediator, researcher, and college professor known for my twenty-five years of scientific studies and work on families and divorce, I could choose to remain in the academic realm rather than jump into the fray and fury of divorcing couples. But children like Sam don't have a choice. In the United States today over one million children every year find themselves in Sam's shoes. So I put myself in the middle in the hope of getting children like Sam out of the middle. For I know with absolute certainty how important it is to get kids out of conflict and put them first in a divorce. All of my research and all of my work with couples and families demonstrates that what parents do after divorce'how they parent, how they handle their emotions, how they relate to each other and work together'is the key to children's resilience in coping with divorce. Believe me. I know just how real (and just how unreal) the world gets in divorce.
I know the helpless, sinking feeling you get facing the end of your marriage and grappling with what.