The Effect of Divorce on Children: an Interview-based Report

Introduction

Divorce, figuratively the fission of one combined heart back into two separate ones and quite literally the termination of a marriage contract between a couple. This is very easily done when there is just a couple involved, however things get more complicated if there are offspring out of that specific wedlock. This phenomenon splits the family members apart, throwing everyone into a disarray, and children specifically do not know how to cope with this sudden change. It is widely known that the offspring of divorced couples tend to lead a harder life than their counterparts from happily married parents. I believe that parents should only divorce if their misunderstandings prevent them all from living a harmonious life. In this report, we investigate how drastically the parental divorce of two participants affects them. We have interviewed two different participants for our research, both males. One is a 17-year-old boy from Denmark who has also lives there, and he studies innovation in college, we shall call him participant A. The other one is 21 years old, Omani by birth but had moved to Tanzania after his parents’ divorce, and he currently studies in HTC in Oman, this one is participant B. I chose these participants to specifically amplify the differences in the effects of parental divorce on different nationalities whilst keeping the genders constant. These specific questions were asked to find out the way that these people lead their lives now and their opinions on the matter so that we would get the basic insight of their thinking process.

 

Body

Children from divorced parents have a different pattern of growing up in comparison to children from married couples, and it is important to investigate these factors as we could be able to tell just how much stress is placed upon a certain student’s shoulders, or how overwhelmed he/she feels, it could also be an indicator of decreasing performance academically and psychologically, as well as their interaction with their peers. Children that undergo this unfortunate stage in their lives have no idea what to do and are often distraught, but some rebound faster than others to their new lives. Opposers of divorce may proclaim that staying together for the sake of the children gives the child exposure to both the parents while growing up. This point may have some merit on the surface. However, many children actually appreciate the fact that their parents are free of the shackle that binds them together as they are able to live in a less contentious environment and thus more able to focus on their lives, this is highlighted by participant A as he says: “The children can also feel the unhappiness off the couple”. There has found to be a certain relief accompanied by children at the event of their parents’ divorce as it denotes less arguments and yelling in the house. From a functionalist perspective, the main function of divorce happens to be the separation of two individuals which are incapable of living together as a couple thus throwing the children into a frenzy and incapable of fending for themselves in the outer world, but from a conflict perspective, we get to note that children from divorced families tend to stand up on their feet earlier than the children from married couples and therefore have more refined leadership and independent skills, they’re also capable of making quicker and wiser decisions, and also mature more quickly. This statement is further concurred by participant B, according to whom, moving to Tanzania made him a better version of himself rather than staying in Oman. Participant A also states that: “I also got more of a sense of responsibility in terms of making plans for the family”. In terms of the effect of divorce on both participants, participant A claims that he is more affected by the divorce than participant B, and says that it caused him to feel more alone, contrarily, participant B says that he’d travelled with his mother to Tanzania with his mother who remarried, and so he didn’t really feel the effects of divorce that harshly. This tells us that children feel more lonely and negligent after the divorce and feel like nobody would care about them If they don’t care about themselves first. In terms of sibling bonding, participant A claims that he developed a more responsible stance towards his younger brother and gave up just looking at him as “a person that lives in the house that I can tease whenever”, as for participant B, his bond with his brother never changed whenever they re-met each other, and they also never argued and just had fun times with each other.

 

Conclusion

All in all, I believe that divorce should be executed if the differences surpass the compromises. Surely divorce has lasting effects on the children but some do rebound and eventually view life as normally as their peers, in addition to a few divorce hurdles like transportation, accommodation and academic performance. Parents can make their divorce much easier on their children by establishing a proper moving schedule, giving them consistent discipline and engaging in their academic life actively. Divorce should not be a means isolation for the family, but rather a split of hand in managing the family in a much more amicable way.

 

 

 References

·       Morin, A. (2021), The Psychological Effects of Divorce on Children, LCSW, Very Well Family, Retrieved from: https://www.verywellfamily.com/psychological-effects-of-divorce-on-kids-4140170

·       What are the effects of divorce on children, Retrieved from: https://www.familymeans.org/effects-of-divorce-on-children.html#:~:text=Children%20who%20have%20experienced%20divorce%20have%20a%20higher%20perceptibility%20to,being%2C%20and%20deteriorating%20health%20signs.

·       Stephens, C. (2020), 10 Effects of Divorce on Children and helping them cope, HealthLine, Retrieved from: https://www.healthline.com/health/parenting/effects-of-divorce-on-children

 Appendix

·       The 17-year-old Danish male is participant (A)

·       The 21-year-old Omani-Tanzanian male is participant (B)

 

1.    How has growing up without parents affected you?

Participant (A): “You learn a lot of different things, like to be on your own more and to travel between your parents, get more of a choice, more decision making, which is inhibited in children with married parents who are being spoon-fed and they don’t get to make their own choice a lot. You’ll get help from your parents and others, but you are forced to grow up quickly.”

Participant (B): “I have my mum and my dad but they divorced and when they divorced I was six months old and my mum took me to Tanzania with her and I wasn’t in contact with my dad for a while so, instead my mother remarried a bit later and during my childhood I just had my mum and she was enough for me and later on I also got a step dad I never felt like something was missing and I never held anything against my real dad. I know that divorce is a very sad occasion and there’s not something happy about it but generally in my perspective I never really had any bad vibes about it.”

2.    Do you think parents should set aside their differences and stay together for the child’s sake?

Participant (A): “Nearly every single couple that thinks about divorce rethinks their decision for the sake of their children, but in the process, they end up getting more problems and hating each other more and more, is experienced by me too, and that my parents wanted to live together until they found their own place but they just kept yelling at each other, so dad had to move out at his mum’s for a year till he could move out. The children can also feel the unhappiness off the couple.”

Participant (B): “I think a very important thing for them to consider before they make any big decisions like staying together or breaking apart because their children’s well-being is one constant and their happiness and their ability to like stay together that’s also another factor.”

3.    How is your relationship with your siblings after the divorce?

Participant (A): “Divorce did affect our relationship. My relationship with my brother changed a lot, before the divorce I just thought of him as a person that lives in the house, a friend that you could tease and annoy, but after the divorce, he became more of a responsibility, and I started to care more for him, especially when I had to travel back and forth to my dad’s place, I had to set him up as well on the train 1.5 hours, and whenever he’s sad about something, I have to talk him out of it instead of my parents.”

Participant (B): “My real brother I never got to talk with him a lot because he stayed away with my dad while I stayed with my mum so I never got in contact with him but when we did, his my brother at the end of the day and I’m his brother so we always get together and we never argue, we always had a good time whenever we are around each other it was a thing before that and it’s the same right now so we are on good condition.”

4.    How has your parents’ divorce affected your friendships?

Participant (A): “It hasn’t had a big change in terms of hangouts and meetups with my friends, because I only had to visit my dad once a week, but there was a little impact of weekend plans, so I would have to time my meetups because of going to my dad’s place, so I couldn’t get to lots of parties and hangouts. Emotionally and in terms of making friends, it made me more aware of myself and secure, and I knew what to do along with being more confident, I also got more of a sense of responsibility in terms of making plans for the family (being the eldest) as my mum also started asking me more questions of whether they should do this/that along with projects, and I developed leadership skills too as a result and so started leading my friends too. I also started getting more caring about my dad and my dad was struggling with depression and he really was appreciative to me being there for him, and it really showed me that I could impact adults even though it seemed very unlikely as a child but you started to realize that too.”

Participant (B): Like I said I was never really connected with my dad for a long, I guess that is one of the things that I might have missed out because of the divorce, but the most information that my friends knew were that my parents were divorced, and that’s also the most information that I need.

 

My observation on gender communication

 

As I observe my parents daily as they go about with their days, I seem to take notice of their little affectionate gestures and conversational patterns with each other. Women and men have different conversational patterns and chronological sequence, as well as different varying topics that both like to talk on.

It’s a wide generalization that men talk lesser than women, from what I’ve seen in my parents, that is true and I can confirm it. As for the topics on which both chat on, my mother usually fixates on topics that center around her childhood, friends, fantasizing about her children’s bright futures, home décor, celebrities, food, music and big headlined news only. My mother’s conversational style is very one-sided and narrative-like instead of discussion-like. My father on the other hand tries to evoke more of discussion-based topics like politics, general news, currency rates, history, policies, etc. To make this observation clearer, I will pick the example of the topic of The deadly Covid-19 virus. Both of them equally cared about the number of deaths worldwide and in Oman, however my mother then diverted her concern to travel and visits, while my father was more worried about the business and marketplace. Another trait that I’ve noticed is that my mother is more responsive to my father’s convos than he is to her narratives. Granted that my father’s topics are more discussion-based, but is it right to only reply when there’s a discussion rather than a narrative? That’s another branch that I’d like to investigate more on.

 As for the interaction between my parents and us children, my mother opts to open up more emotional topics than practical ones, and talks about the same topics as mentioned above along with advising. Our father tends to instill a passion of learning about the world more in us by randomly giving us information about new events, new exchange rates, eye-catching headlines and industrial changes.

The generalization that women like to talk more, and men prefer action than words, is not a claim that I can relate to or shrug off. Mutual communication is important firstly in a couple, and my parents perfectly apply that by communicating with each other before taking actions, for example, missing grocery, buying a new house piece, sealing off business deals. Both believe in talking about it to each other instead of just acting on impulse. The only time that they do take actions on impulse is when the other isn’t available or when they’re mad at each other. Talking helps to clear out so many misunderstandings and is an important asset in any functioning and healthy relationship.

As for the other stereotype of women showing more emotion than men, in this case, it is indeed true. For the emotion of anger, my mother is more hot-headed than my father. In playfulness, my father is the one seen being more jolly on a daily basis, My mother although does have her moments of playfulness and goofiness on certain occasions. In terms of sadness, both of them do equally get sad but my mother is more prone to showing it than my father, which goes hand-in-hand with women showing more emotions, because of the pressure on men to be more indifferent to emotions in order to appear manlier.

All in all, gender communication has been a subject of study for years, and whether it’s formed by nurture or nature is still being debated. Societal pressure acts upon different individuals of the society, though in this era, many have broken free of it and do as they please, this will allow sociologists to have a much more concise and accurate experimentation on gender studies.