Kara Bishop at the
Huffington Post recently wrote an excellent
post on that site that is a must read for any parent going through a divorce. Kara works with
Divorce Recovery, Inc. in Tucson, Arizona, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping people (adults and children) cope with the challenges of divorce. One of the things they do is an exercise with the 10-12 year old children in the program where they invite the children to create a set of rules they wish their parents would follow to ease their divorce and post-divorce issues. They then compiled the various rules from the children and made a list of the top rules that are often repeated by the children in the program. I would encourage you to click on the link and read the post in full, but below are the basics:
1. Don't say bad about my other parent
2. Keep us out of adult stuff
3. Don't make me feel bad about loving the other parent
4. Learn to get along for big events (ballgames, plays, graduation, etc.)
5. Don't make me choose sides
6. No fighting in front of us
7. Don't make me a messenger or put me in the middle
8. Don't share or take your anger out on me
9. Don't ask me to be a spy on my other parent
10. Give me one-on-one time with both parents
Kara Bishop is also the creator/curator of
Postcards from Splitsville where she posts artwork by children expressing their thoughts on divorce. It's a touching and eye-opening view of things from a child's perspective.