To help your child cope with your pending divorce consider their point of view. It’s in everyone’s best interest if as an adult, you put aside your own feelings of bitterness and anger towards your ex-spouse, and focus solely on what your child is going through. Divorce can be a very sad, stressful, uncertain and confusing time. Parents can help their kids by providing comfort, stability and a positive outlook.
Consider what your child is thinking:
1) Why are they always fighting? Is it my fault? It makes me feel guilty.
2) I don’t want to take sides. I wish they would stop saying bad things about each other.
3) Please don’t fight in front of me. Be grown-ups and speak nicely to each other. Work out your problems when I’m not within earshot.
4) I don’t want to be the go between. Speak directly with each other, not through me.
5) Please tell me the truth so I know what’s going on. When I’m not in the loop, I feel like I have no say and that you don’t care about me. It makes me feel insecure.
6) Tell me what the new schedule will be so I’m not caught off guard. Lay out the entire month for me so I can understand whom I will be with and when.
7) Listen to what I have to say! Let me talk and be honest without getting mad at me.
8) Reassure me that you both love me and will both be in my life. I’m worried I will lose the parent I’m not living with.
9) I need to hear that this new living arrangement will work out and that I’ll still have both parents in my life.
10) If I’m old enough, provide me with technology so I can contact either parent when I want to.
When parents are going through a divorce, most court systems across the country now require that parents take co-parenting classes to help them work through the emotions and logistics of this restructuring. Co-parenting classes teach parents how to deal with their own stress as well as understand the pressure their child is feeling. They help parents to effectively communicate with each other in a civil manner and how to work on setting up a new co-parenting plan and lifestyle.
Online co-parenting classes can often be taken to fulfill these court obligations as well as to gain strong new skills in parenting. Taking a 6 hour online co-parenting course rather than in a classroom is highly beneficial for most busy caregivers. Online courses enable the parent to stay at home and learn from any Internet based computer device. This alleviates the need to miss work, school or family time to go to a classroom. With all the turmoil of change, parents find that their kids are often more needy during this time and it’s hard for them to get away. Online co-parenting classes become available on your computer screen as soon as you enroll. Then the classes can be taken at any time of the day or night, and at any pace you would like to go. This means they can be taken while the kids are napping, doing homework, or at night after they’ve gone to bed. There’s no need to pay for a babysitter or spend time away from them to fulfill this requirement. At the end of the class a Certificate of Completion is sent to you. This documentation proves to the judge that you successfully completed the class.
Take an online co-parenting class to get a better understanding of what your child is going through during divorce and what you can do to help.