Any issue hasn't come up about how did how did it how they explained the divorce situation to their friends?

We talked about that last week as as possibly an issue, when a child says, well, you know, is it painful at school to explain that my, my parents are divorced.

Have you ever gotten that kind of feedback them?

My oldest son, who's 16, had a very difficult time at the at the beginning, he did not want his friends to know he was.

He reacted with, I don't want anyone to pity me.

And I really was concerned.

And... - I think basically what we're trying to do is to help parents and their children to deal more effectively with the event of separation and divorce as it occurs in their lives.

And, to help them look at alternative ways of coping with the problems that occur around that, such as visitation problems, problems when their children are acting up, help them learn how to communicate as parents with each other, even though they no longer live together.

Tonight we're going to hear a story about one little boy's divorce, and the story is called Zachary's Divorce.

And here's a picture of Zachary.

Kim's heard this story before, and she thinks it's a pretty good one.

So let's see how it goes.

On this particular Saturday morning, Zachary's toes woke up first.

They wiggled and wiggled and wiggled.

We want to elicit more of the children's feelings around their feelings around separation and divorce.

And so this evening we're reading them a story entitled Zachary's Divorce, which is a short story explaining one child's feeling when he wakes up one morning and, realizes that father is not there, though this separation has been explained prior to him.

What did Zachary mean when he said it was his divorce?

I don't know, He thought it was his fault.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Children have a lot less difficulty than adults do, and they will begin a lot quicker talking about their feelings, as long as they're sure that adults are going to accept them as they are.

And as they get in touch and know that others are accepting of what they are, they're they're free to talk about them and also to learn ways of controlling them.

Well, on Wednesday evenings every two weeks, we have our custodial parents group and they are the parents who have custody of their children and they're in one room talking about the kinds of problems that they have, from week to week, as well as anticipating and looking for solutions and problem solving.

In the other room, then, are their children who are looking at and dealing with their feelings and the kinds of problems that separation and divorce have brought for them.

You know, like my daughter seems to be perfectly happy with the fact that we are still separated and not divorced.

She always brings it up and reminds me you're, still separated.

As is, if, though, you know, the word divorce was still a difficult topic for her.

And my younger daughter doesn't seem to question this whole setup at all.

She likes the idea of having her father some place and me, someplace she gets two parents doing all kinds of things for her.

She loves it, really.

She's perfectly happy.

One of the things we hope is that that we can help parents and children to promote a relationship after the divorce, that the child can maintain his relationship with his parents, with both of them separately, that the parents can maintain a relationship with themselves around the child, to promote a sense of security, a sense of continuity of care.

I'm sad because my daddy was really nice.

He gave us lots of money and stuff like that, and he is really nice.

He gave us anything we wanted.

And now my mom is kind of strict.

My dad isn't.

My dad, is like a little bit to my sister and not not to my sister.

My brother, me.

And I don't know, I think I was sad because I had a whole list of friends and like they compete on this bus I go to now.

They tease me.

You know, another bus they dont.

I think one of the most delightful things after our last children's group is the children evaluated the group and, and told us what they thought they learned.

And one of the things they learned that they felt was the most important, that it was all right to have feelings and it was all right to tell people about them.

And that, even though they were angry with their parents and they were angry about what had happened, that they found that when they told their parents, it did make them feel better.

How did Zachary's mom help him out?

She seemed to help him out a lot By telling him that it isnt his divorce.

Yes.

He doesn't have to worry about it.

We've talked about a number of issues, and that applies specifically to the parent who does not have custody of their children.

Is it ever difficult when you do find out that things are okay without you.

Doesn't that hurt a little bit?

The first time I called her, to ask her how she was doing and everything, she she talked for a minute or so, and she said, daddy, I want to go out and play with my friend now.

And it, I says, okay babe.

So we hung up, and at first I felt a little bad about it because she didn't want to talk to me.

And then I start thinking about it.

And then I thought, well, this is good.

She's getting adjusted to her new environment, and and this will be good for her.

The people who experienced separation and divorce, do not have psychiatric problems.

They have problems that anyone would have in this kind of situation.

So what we're saying is being a resource to them is that we're available to you during this period of time, and maybe we have, educational information.

We have, an idea of the kinds of things your child is experiencing.

And we can help you learn about those things.