How to live with divorce

By: Grace S

By the time students graduate high school, there is a 50% chance they will have experienced the divorce of their parents. This can have lasting effects on the child, both emotionally and mentally. Many students within our own school go through the hardships of divorce; these are the stories from three of them.

Justice Holcomb

Senior Justice Holcomb was fourteen when her parents got divorced. They had been fighting for a while and it really started to take a toll on the whole household. Holcomb and her siblings “definitely grew a lot closer then cause [they] would always go into each other’s room when [her parents] were fighting.”

While some negatives did come out of the divorce, like her family losing their house and Holcomb becoming estranged with her father, she ultimately recognizes that it was for the best because the arguing finally ceased. “I was sad that I wouldn’t be living with my dad and my mom together, but at the same time, I was happy because then they would stop fighting.”

With that, Holcomb also spoke of her improved relationship with her mother. Through this process, Holcomb said, “I guess I kind of just realized how strong my mom is...my mom and I are best friends.”

Holcomb told of an uncomfortable story when she had to be in the same room as both of her parents after their divorce. “We went to go get my senior pictures and go pick them out and I had to sit in between them. It was so awkward!”

Alex Ruble

Sophomore Alex Ruble was in kindergarten when his parents separated. He acknowledged the fact that it has been a major event in his life saying, “if the divorce didn’t happen, I’d be in a totally different position right now.”

One recurring negative experience filled with uneasiness is having to interact with both of his parents together in the same room. Trying to decide who to sit with at church engenders “a horrible feeling” for him. He employs the strategy of reading both of their faces to determine where to sit, “like, ‘does this one seem mad?’, ‘does this one seem mad?’ But usually I sit with the parent I’m with at the moment. So if it’s my mom’s time, I’m gonna sit with her. But I’m gonna say hi to my dad and his family.”

Ruble and his sister follow a schedule to determine when they get to live with which parent. “One weekend I’d be with my mom, then my dad alternating weekends. But with my dad, on Wednesdays after five, I’m with him. And I stay with him till Thursday at seven.” If that seems a bit meticulous, that’s because it is. Divorce courts work with all parties involved and try to figure out a way for everyone to be accomodated. Ruble himself said he never wanted to testify in court and he never had to.

Ruble recalled feeling sad when the divorce happened eleven years ago. “My mom was in a horrible place back then. My dad was in a horrible place. It was hard watching them in that place.” While initially the divorce made him feel sad, his dad has a daughter with his fiancée now, and they are planning to get married in the spring. Ruble said “[She] makes [my dad] happy and it makes me happy seeing him happy and all that.”

Daisy Green

For freshman Daisy Green, her parents got divorced when she was a baby so she doesn’t remember when it happened, but she is still feeling the lasting effects of it to this day.

Her parent’s divorce makes her worry for her own future with marriage. She sometimes thinks, “maybe it’s going to happen to me. I’ve seen a lot of people get divorced and I wouldn’t want it to happen in my life, for me...I’m scared that something is going to happen and then I won’t know about it-like what happened to my mom.”

She spends Thursdays and every other weekend at her dad’s house; all the other days she lives with her mom. This brings about challenges for Green because she has to pack clothes from her mom’s to go to her dad’s for only a day. “I’m never there, so I don’t keep them [clothes] there. I always have to pack my stuff up every Wednesday night, bring it there, then have to come back, [and] bring it to school.”

While having to move between two houses can sometimes get tough, Green recognized some good that has come from the divorce. “It’s also a good thing to spend some time with just one of my parents. And whenever I get the chance to hang out with just my dad, that’s when I mostly take it.” She admitted that her dad is sometimes closed off and “I still don’t really know all that much about him.”

While her relationship with her father is a bit rocky, Green has become extremely close with her mom. She spoke of the nights she and her mom stay up late just talking to each other. “We just talked about stuff that was going on recently...we talk all the time-just about everything. I know I can tell her everything,” she said. She followed up by saying, “It makes it less hard when you have her to just always be there...I don’t even know what I would do without my mom.”

Advice

It is very easy to become closed off when something difficult, like divorce, happens. It is very easy to not talk about the difficult things and to pretend that they don’t exist. But that, in turn, makes it very easy to feel alone during difficult times. Divorce is most often times not ideal, but more people go through it than one would think.

When asked about the advice they would give to their peers in a similar situation, personal insight was given:

Holcomb: “Probably just looking more on the positive side. They’re not fighting anymore... obviously they did it for a reason, they didn’t just do it to do it. If they wanted to be together, they still would be. And so just remember that there’s always something positive coming out of it and that everything happens for a reason.”

Ruble: “Just stand up for your own opinion, don’t hide in the corner and watch them bicker and fight...stand up for your own beliefs.”

Green: “Sooner or later you will kind of accept that it happened and it will be easier just to kind of move forward.”