Impact of separation & divorce on teenagers / young adults

[Woodandsky]

Please could you tell me your experiences of how young adults living at home (late teens / early 20s) have dealt with their parents splitting up? Thank you :)

From my point of view, very badly
My eldest son took it so badly he doesn't speak to me anymore
My family have become so disjointed I feel the blame
It's all gone titsup

I think it depends on the relationship they have with their father.
My 2 teenagers hate their father for all that he has done to us. I stayed with the narcissistic ex too long. Both of them had to defend me throughout the marriage.
It was my daughter who stopped me going back to him, telling he doesn't treat me well.
Cut along story short, it has affected my son more than my daughter. He doesn't have, and has never had a positive male role model in his life. He became quite angry, aggressive and confused by it all and was unstable for a year or so. He tried meeting my ex narc, but he never spent quality time just with our sin, he was always doing a business deal, or meeting friends, not just spending time with our sin, he is happier now having NC with him .
My daughter had no connection with her narc father, and he has blamed her for our marriage breakup, it wasn't her, it was his madness that shattered our marriage.
If your children had a strong relationship with their father it could be a rocky road and also the manner in which the marriage ended could be a factor, especially if there was adultery.
Good luck.

My three (now aged 23, 21 and 19) seem to have coped OK over the 4.5 years since their dad and I split up. They aren't coping so well with the fact that he's getting remarried next week and feel its too soon but that's nothing to do with me!

They all live with me when not at work/uni and I will maintain a home for them without a new partner until they have their own homes. I do have a boyfriend that I've been seeing for 2.5 years and they seem to like him but as we have NO intention of living together or marrying there isn't an issue.

My eldest struggled most with the split and it was hard for them as there wasn't any specific reason why we split up - we just stopped wanting to spend time with one another. No violence, no abuse, no anything really. They seem to have the same view of their dad as I do (overgrown child with no social filters - he often embarrasses them apparently) but I do pull them up if they get too insulting of him.

If its any help, ex and I were in regular contact and got on well in the first couple of years after our split. So they couldn't play one off against the other!! We were totally honest with our older teens/young adults - they were mature enough to hear the truth

My best friend's parents split up when she was 19. She coped very badly with it in private while putting a brave face on and now in our forties she is having counselling to deal with the issues it created.

I suspect her parents thought she was coping well with it at the time.

Thanks guys
My husband had an affair, it’s coming up to a year since I found out (the sorry story is on here somewhere). He has totally changed since then and become so much better as a husband and father..... but I’m finding it so hard to get beyond what he did sometimes . The DCs don’t know and I feel like I’m backed into a corner where I have to accept what happened regardless so as not to cause pain to everyone else.

Mine are ok, however they have zero respect for their father due to his behaviour.

We co-parent well, socialise together, attend medical apps together (one son has heart disease, even as a young adult, he wants us there) etc.

I think he is a monumental twat but our children love him and have benefitted from lack of arguing and tension.

The only thing I would have differently with hindsight, is that I would have been honest about the reason for the split at the time. I agreed to the old 'just don't love each other anymore' line when of course the truth of his affairs came out after a couple of years.

Its hard, but I would never put them through the crap my parents put my siblings and I through when they split up at a similar age, 25 years later, I still cant believe how selfishly they behaved.

Good luck.