PARENTING FOR DIVORCING PARENTS

SKILLS FOR HEROIC PARENTING FOR DIVORCING PARENTS                                                    Judge Michele Lowrance

 

INFORMING YOUR CHILD ABOUT YOUR DIVORCE

The first step and maybe the most difficult is telling your children about your divorce. Following are suggestions to use when scripting what you are going to tell your children about your breakup. Ideally, both parents together will have this talk with their children. It will make the child feel safer if it appears the parents are going to work together on the reinvention of their lives. This may be the most important discussion  you will ever give your children, so there is no such thing as too much preparation. These suggestions may be appropriate for children of any age:

“MOM AND DAD HAVE PROBLEMS WITH EACH OTHER AND CANNOT LIVE TOGETHER. We have tried very hard to work out the problems and decided that living separately would be better. It has nothing to do with you; it is strictly between Mom and Dad. We are sorry that this is causing you pain, but we  are going to work …

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December 20th, 2011 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments are closed

VIDEO GAMES A PROBLEM?

Video games have been with us for well over a generation now.  Many parents have been around long enough to have played through their own parents’s concerns for gaming while growing up themselves.  Still, parents may wonder how to think through today’s games. On one end is, “I did fine with them,” and not give much of a thought to their own kids’ playing. Alternatively, the realism and depth of interaction available in today’s games may warrant a different concern.

 

When thinking about whether video games may be a problem, a better means of measurement than time is responsibility. While many say that today’s games are different from before, our responsibilities and tasks of development are largely the same. If responsibilities are met, if friendships are being developed, and interests are being pursued, then playing games may even enhance these same life activities.

 

Looking at game play this way gives families and individuals a better understanding and more fluid control over gaming, than by a time related approach, for example. If grades are falling or if social activities are lost, one may even use these as conditions for future game play.  It may be easier to enforce a …

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December 14th, 2011 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments are closed