ok, follow up on my advice to children of divorce ... heres my advice to the birth parents. Read or ignore, lol. If you have children, you have an obligation to love their other parent. You should marry them; I know, how old-fashioned. Trust me, youre never going to get away from them, not as long as the children or grandchildren have any part of your life. So, just get married asap. And STAY married. If you dont have children, maybe you can escape a bad marriage. But if you do have children, you have an obligation to them. It doesnt matter if youre not happy, boo-hoo, get over it. Go to the doctor and get meds. Once you have kids with someone, you just have to deal with them. So your commitment is be the one who never leaves. Now, marriage is a contract, and our legal system has made it pretty easy to get out of a contract. Half the marriages end in divorce. Its an easy thing to do. Legally. But if you have kids, its hard ON THEM. You cannot make your spouse stay. You can only make yourself stay. At no point do you ever beg people to love you. But for the parent of your children, they dont have to love you. They have to love your kids. Sometimes married people just tolerate each other. Its not the end of the world. Give it time; it will get easier. If your spouse has issues, you have a right and a responsibility to protect yourself and your children. So if they hit you or your kids, or if they cheat ... to me, those are walking papers. As in, they should walk out and keep walking. But dont make up issues where there are none, and dont close the door to them if they make a true effort to change, rehab, counseling, etc. Live in separate rooms of the house with deadbolts if you have to until they have proved it to you, but dont shut them out without a lot of time, effort and patience. And if they dont come back, counseling doesnt work, divorce happens. What then? Ok, dont hate me. Stay single. FOR A LONG TIME. You flunked being married. Whatever reason, doesnt matter. Its like bankruptcy; you shouldnt be able to run out and just get credit again. Nor should you be able to run out and get married again without A LOT of growing on YOUR part. Second marriages have a higher failure rate than first! Your chances of success go down, not up. Your kids do not need a revolving door of step-parents. Period. They have two parents with a broken relationship. Tossing more people into that will NOT make it better. But you deserve to be happy. And, since when did being married make you happy? Find happiness in your kids. Find happiness in yourself. Stand on your own two feet for a few years. If you are the non-custodial parent, expect to pay about half of your wages to your ex in one way or another until the last child is grown. Its a lot. And it hurts. Tough. Its the price you pay for getting off the hook of parenthood. Show up when you say you will. EVERY EVENT. Dont bribe or buy your children. It will only hurt them. Be the parent you promised to be on the day they were born. OR walk away. If you cant be there and be there 100%, find a job that takes you far, far away. Better to be an absent parent than a sorry one. If you ARE the custodial parent, get ready for some hard times. You are a one-man show. You need day care, you need a circle of people, you need help. Find a church asap, one that will love your kids. After that, find a better job. Yes, that parent OWES child support, but having worked IN child support enforcement many years ago ... I wrote a lot of warrants for people that didnt pay child support. As THE parent responsible for the light bill, the food on the table, etc., you CANNOT depend on the child support check. IT CANNOT BE IN YOUR BUDGET. It is the rare absent parent that doesnt fall behind in their obligations. Put that money in a coffee can. Put it in savings. Its your emergency fund. When you have six months expenses in there, then start looking for investments for your kids sake. If you depend on that money, the first time it is late, you will stress. The second time it is late, youll struggle to pay the bills. If the absent parent STOPS paying, you wont be able to make it ... so just dont be dependent on it. Maybe the best thing for BOTH parents is to think about it all BEFORE they pull the plug on being married. Read Love Dare. Watch Fireproof. Watch War of the Roses Read the Bible. Job. If you think your life is hard, just read JOB. As my dad always said, you made your bed, now lie in it. Disclaimer ... I love yall, no judging on the re-marrieds. Just wishing for more first marrieds to hang in there and work it out. And wishing for more divorced ppl to wait awhile before jumping in again. When you watch kids go through three, four, five more marriages with the other parent, youll understand ... staying married protects your kids from the future bad marriages of your potential ex-spouse. You are your kids best insurance against a revolving door of stepdaddies.
Posted on: Sun, 16 Nov 2014 06:41:22 +0000
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