December 30, 2005

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Palo Alto Online

Easing the pain of divorce

by Alexandria Rocha

In a new program at the Children's Health Council, Anne Bergman asks parents facing separation or divorce to put aside their anger, frustration, and sadness for the benefit of their children. In more ways than one, it's like asking them to do the impossible, she said.

"I see women who can barely get out of bed, and we're asking them to put on a smile for their kids," said Bergman, a social worker at the Palo Alto nonprofit mental-health organization. "We're asking parents to be totally put together for their children when they're totally devastated by their marriage."

Aptly called Kids First, the four-hour workshop is designed for parents in any stage of separation or divorce. It's intended to reduce the negative effects on children by teaching parents skills to deal with the sadness, rejection, loneliness, and anger -- among many other emotions -- that most youth of divorced families experience.

Though parents may find it difficult to attend to their children's emotional needs when their own are in distress, Bergman said it is absolutely necessary.

"How parents handle (divorce) makes a huge difference in children's lives," Bergman said. "Your kids are a victim in this."

About 40 percent of all marriages in the United States ended in divorce in 2003, the most recent year data is available, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. The divorce rate peaked in the 1970s and has been slowly declining since.

In recent years, the effects of divorce have been highlighted in mental health and parental circles. Some experts say it's because many children of the divorce explosion are now adults taking an active interest in how it affected them. Others say health organizations and schools are starting to recognize a lack of services for children of divorce.

Elizabeth Marquardt -- an affiliate scholar at a New York City-based think tank, and Norval Glenn, a sociologist at the University of Texas, Austin -- this fall released a major national study that surveyed 1,500 young adults aged 18 to 35 from divorced families. Overall, the study shed light on just how painful divorce is for kids and adult children.

The research found that many children of divorce endure a silent conflict between their parents' two worlds and it shapes their adult identities. Marquardt has said such children often feel like "divided selves," and when they're grown, "some wonder whether they can be their whole, true self around anyone."

Studies routinely show that children of divorce are two to three times more likely than their peers whose parents stay married to suffer serious long-term social and emotional problems, Marquardt said. Those can include school failure, delinquency, teen pregnancy, addictions, anxiety and depression, suicide attempts, and suicide.

Children also face substantially greater risks of physical and sexual abuse after divorce, when new, unrelated adults come into the home, Marguardt added.

Both Bergman and Marquardt said that although programs like Kids First can help, the trauma of divorce is still severe, making the programs even more crucial.

"If parents already are divorced, or must divorce, the communication and conflict resolution tools they learn in parenting classes are useful and important," said Marquardt, whose book, "Between Two Worlds: The Inner Lives of Children of Divorce" was released in September.

Although the stigma of divorce has almost completely disappeared, Bergman said divorce itself is still just as difficult as it was a few decades ago. If anything, it has gotten more challenging.

"Divorce is more socially acceptable than it was in the '50s, but the complications of two working parents and the complicated schedule of the many activities of children in places like Palo Alto make custody plans harder," Bergman said.

Bergman, who co-teaches the local Kids First program with William Russell, a family lawyer specializing in the legalities of divorce, said participating parents are given examples of various custody plans during the session.

Bergman and Russell also offer solutions to various situations parents may encounter. For example, parents learn that anger is way to connect with other people, as defined by the "misery loves company" phrase. Parents are encouraged to avoid making new friends based on how much they each hate their ex-spouse.

Bergman launched the course for parents going through separation or divorce at the direction of her bosses at the council, who felt county-sponsored services were too limited. Bergman was planning to create a curriculum from scratch, but then she came across Kids First. It was just what she had in mind.

Kids First was developed in Maine in 1989 by a group of mental health and legal professionals known as Resources for Divorced Families. It was offered for several years in churches and community halls, and in 1996, two other agencies stepped forward with grant money to start a nonprofit organization. The Kids First Center opened in 1998 in Portland, Maine and serves about 3,500 families a year.

The program is only offered in two places outside of Maine -- San Diego and now Palo Alto.

"One of the reasons I did this was because when I would see people from Fresno, they had no place to go but what the county offered. I thought people needed more," Bergman said.

For more information, call 326-5530 or visit www.chconline.org. Staff writer Alexandria Rocha can be reached at arocha@paweekly.com.

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