By Rebecca for Divorce Magazine
Adults experiencing the divorce of their parents may find it frustrating to deal with during the holidays. Follow these three tips for surviving this trying time.
Few things are more frustrating than trying to survive the holidays when your parents divorce. It's bad enough that you're an adult and therefore seen as the confidant of one parent or the other, but it's also crazy the way that a parent can decide to put you in the middle of their issues with the other parent.
There are a small number of things though that can bring out inappropriate behavior towards adult children the way the holidays can. Sometimes it seems like this season is one giant full moon, and it can be daunting. So, whether you are at the beginning of your adult parent divorce experience, or somewhere in the middle of the process, here are three tips that I give people like us to make it through.
- Create your own tradition: Sometimes the only way out of these situations is to have something else to do. If you're married with children, you might consider inviting both parents to your house (with ground rules of course that are strictly enforced), or issuing an open invitation to any family members that want to come (like I did during the first year). This can be a beautiful way to create a new memory for your family, and can take the stress out of having to visit multiple parents.
Don't allow yourself to get sucked into the vortex around you. The conflict can come in like a tornado and leave nothing but destruction in its path. While your family of origin has changed in structure, it's not necessary to completely blow it apart. There are many techniques you can use to get through your parents divorce and the holidays, but these three should provide you enough to think about. If you take nothing else from this blog post, at least remember to be gentle with yourself.
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