Parents shouldn’t pull children into divorce’s tug of war, expert says
By Rick Ruggles / World-Herald staff writer |
(Posted: Saturday, April 16, 2016 12:30 am)
Robert Emery, director of the University of Virginia Center for Children, Families and the Law, said that asking the children to take sides, trying to show them who’s right and who’s wrong, and venting in front of them can only hurt the children. Emery has written books on children and divorce.
Divorce itself is hard enough on kids, Emery said in an interview. “But what’s really toxic is ongoing fighting, when kids are in the middle, when you have a parent on either arm,” he said.
Emery spoke at a workshop presented by the Nebraska Psychological Association. About 105 mental health practitioners, attorneys, mediators and others attended at the Scott Conference Center in Omaha and about 20 tuned in from Scottsbluff.
State statistics show that the 5,731 divorces in 2014, the most recent year available, was the lowest number in more than 15 years. In Douglas County, the 1,661 divorces in 2014 was the lowest number since 2008.
Nevertheless, divorce and custody fights continue to vex society. And, Emery said, couples who didn’t marry, had children, and then broke up have the same responsibility to their children as those who were married.
Emery, who has a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, recommended that enraged divorcing parents seek psychological help.
Parents sometimes are reluctant to do that because they don’t want judges to consider them mentally unstable, said Lorin Galvin, director of District Court Conciliation and Mediation Services for Douglas County. Galvin said that concern is unfounded.
Emery and Galvin said mediation can be a good way to reduce hostility between divorcing couples because a neutral expert is involved. Litigation, Galvin said, involves lawyers advocating for each side, which can fuel animosity. Lawyers, he said, aren’t trained to solve a person’s emotional problems.
Galvin estimated that about 30 percent of divorcing parents use mediation, either voluntarily or because it’s required under state law when other efforts to settle custody and visitation disputes fail.
Theodore DeLaet, an Omaha psychologist, said he hears children complain that they don’t have anyone to talk with about their own fears and anger when their parents are at war. “I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to make them more upset” is a common sentiment among those children, DeLaet said. That can lead to depression or acting out, he said.
When a parent rips his partner in front of a child, Emery said, “You’re criticizing your child’s DNA. ... There’s only one side. That’s the kid’s side.”
Emery said it takes strength on the part of the parents to protect their children from ill will toward their former partner.
“The goal isn’t to somehow be friends with your ex,” Emery said. “It’s that you have to do your job, and your job is to raise your kids as best you can.”
Contact the writer: 402-444-1123, rick.ruggles@owh.com, twitter.com/rickruggles