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Divorce Does Have VictimsAwake!—1991 | April 22
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What About Older Children?
Older children handle divorce little better than younger ones. When adolescents witness their parents’ divorce, they may suffer a deep disillusionment that sours their view of marriage and other institutions, such as school. Some conclude that all relationships are unreliable, doomed to unravel someday in betrayal and infidelity.
Thrown off balance in this way, some teenagers careen to wild extremes when their parents divorce. Some turn to drugs, some descend to sexual promiscuity, some run away from home. Others seem at first to take the divorce in stride, only to go through a delayed reaction. Perhaps it is no coincidence that, as the magazine The Washingtonian noted, the rise in divorces has seen a parallel rise in teenage eating disorders and even suicides.
So parents who are biding their time, waiting until their children are ‘the right age’ before initiating a divorce, may be in for a long wait. It does not appear that there is a magical ‘right age’ at which children glide through divorce unscathed.a Sociologist Norval D. Glenn even suggested in the magazine Psychology Today that children may suffer from negative effects of divorce that “persist undiminished throughout the lifespan.” He concluded: “One must seriously entertain the disturbing hypothesis that the increased numbers of children of divorce will lead to a slow but steady erosion of the population’s overall level of well-being.”
But these findings, studies, and statistics, grim though they are, do not mean that every child of divorce is destined to lead a troubled life. They do, however, demonstrate that divorce presents a very real danger to children. The question is: How can children be protected from the effects of divorce?
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Divorce Does Have VictimsAwake!—1991 | April 22
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a In fact, recent studies have shown that even young adults in their early 20’s suffer considerably when their parents divorce. The apparent reversal of their parents’ morals leaves them staggered, reports The New York Times Magazine. Many plunge into hedonism and promiscuity, while others withdraw from all romantic connections, some swearing they will never marry.
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