Five years after the break-up, Wallerstein's research showed that morethan one third of the children experienced moderate or severedepression. After 10 years a significant number were drifting, troubledand underachieving. After 15 years many were struggling to establishstrong love relationships of their own.
Divorce is deceptive. It is legally a single event but psychologicallyit is a chain of events strung through time that forever changes thelives of the people involved. Other surveys in the US have shown thatgenerally single parent children achieve lower grades, 17 per centcompared to 30 per cent of children of two parent families. However,children in stepfamilies do even worse.
Not all two-parent families are better than one parent or stepfamilies,and there must be measures available including divorce or removal ofchildren from dysfunctional families.
Also the parents must remember that the children may not share yourviews on the absent parent or step-parent. The worst any parent orstep-parent can do is to use the children to hurt the other parent.
John Bell, Both Parents Forever.
