Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

Katy brought up an interesting topic in the Sunrise thread. Along the lines of 'staying together for the kids sake.'

I think there's a tradeoff. I'm not so sure kids in that situation really learn what love is in an older relationship(or how it works) since their first example is flawed. Even though they still get the traditional father/mother roles. What they see everyday(emotion-wise or lack thereof) could condition negatively them for later on.

But then I've also seen kids where both parents divorce and go on to better healthier relationships and they turn out ok. They learn from watching happy parents what happiness is.

Personally, I think the key is if one is able to attain happiness and thereby share it with their kids, that would be more beneficial.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

There is no shortage of messed up kids from intact marriages, and I've seen kids who were raised very well by parents who separated but kept actively involved in the life of their kids and didn't use kids as pawns in games of revenge against each other. So it seems clear it can go either way for the kid.

I also think that although your kid is a huge priority and you owe him a lot, you don't owe him a perfect world. And if you aren't good with your partner anymore, you can't provide one anyway. It will wind up telling on the kid one way or the next -- if only by setting up poor role models for the kid, as you note, bernie. What you owe your kid doesn't include sacrificing your own chances for happiness in an adult relationship in this life. You don't owe him coming back to an unhappy house for the rest of your days, much less 10 or 20 years. You don't owe him never having any respite for your spirit or never fulfilling the normal adult need for the love and companionship of a partner. There are a lot of sacrifices you do owe your children, but when you sacrifice love, you've denied the whole point to life, and that's too much. You will have a lot less love to give your child if nobody loves you and you can't even try to make it better.

If anything, you might come to resent the child himself, and find the atmosphere of the home spiritually poisonous regardless of your love for the child. What kind of home is it if you inwardly recoil from it? What benefit can a happy father provide as compared to a loveless one trapped in his loneliness, seeing his life's energy trickling away wasted every year? I'd guess that the longer a man stays in a loveless marriage, there is a real danger that it's the less likely he is to want to come anywhere near the kid when the marriage finally breaks up, or maybe be a part of his kid's life when he grows up. He has spent too long trying to smother his emotions, and after breathing free at last, he may remember the feeling of years of smothering and at least unconsciously, instinctively dread his family, even if he feels consciously far different toward his child. If the feeling of family comes to be internalized as one we dread, we've stayed around too long and nobody has been done any favor.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

It's a really difficult question, isn't it? I've mentioned several times on the forum that I'm the product of divorce. I used to think parents should never split up if they had kids. It was a mean thing to do to kids. Part of me still feels that way.

When my parents told us that they were going to divorce, I remember us all crying. An hour later my oldest sister talked to us in private and confided that she was, frankly, relieved. She was sick of their fighting and sick of the two of them. It made us laugh and we felt better. My sister has never changed her mind about this. She thinks it was the correct thing for my parents to do.

I'm still not sure what I think about the whole thing. I think my dad was a bit of a jerk to do it, to be honest. Even when I disassociate myself, I can't understand how my dad could walk away from my older sisters. There was so much he could have taught us. What a crappy thing for him to do. Now that I'm older, and after watching Before Sunset, I can sort of understand that everyone has a right to his own happiness...yeah, even at the expense of others.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

I think if the parents are still respectful and actually still like one another, I think it benefits the kids. (The parents are another matter!) But if there is acrimony and disrespect then, no.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

I've had friends talk to me about their marriages, contemplating divorce. I always feel bad for the kids. I take the kids side in it. If there's any way to stick it out and learn to accommodate the mate, learn to be less selfish, then I think people owe it to the kids to try. Too many parents today are just stubborn and selfish.

If, in the end, parents are really horrible and mean to each other then they should go their own ways. But both should remain in the children's lives. Neither should move away, imo.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

It sounds like your issue with your dad hinges substantially on abandonment, not divorce. Divorce doesn't have to be abandonment at all. Why do you feel your dad walked away from your sisters, rather than simply got a divorce?

And of course, it takes two to tango. It's wrong to blame only one party for a break-up unless the other person really was blameless. As to that, whereas sometimes it will be obvious, a great many other times it will be impossible for anybody, much less a kid, to know what goes on between two people. How and why their incompatibilities became manifest, and how seriously, is probably out of a kid's range of knowledge and maybe even emotional depth more times than not.

Dads are probably even harder to understand in this regard, because men are still raised to be pretty much emotional stick figures in our society, and keep whatever they have inside at all costs.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

A little background on myself: my parents were in a "loveless marriage" for several years while I was growing up. Probably from the time I was 8-12 years old. My parents actually still loved one another on some level, never fought physically nor really got into extremely heated arguments. My dad was an alcoholic - he quit cold turkey while my sister and I were small children, but started again as we grew up. My mom slept in a different room and my Dad kept almost exclusively to himself and to my sister and I. Eh, I don't want to give my life story or anything, just a gist, as all family situations are different dynamically.

Anyhow, I frequently describe myself as "avoiding commitment," and while I like to view that as a good thing sometimes, it's also kind of a lonely existence. I'm not quite as much of a recluse as my father was, but I'm not exactly a social butterfly either. My take is that I would have been better off if my parents split, and each tried to fulfill their lives as much as possible. I went through too much of my mom struggling while my dad sat around, lonely and inhibited; blah.

I spend lots of time pondering my life, behavior, and why I am the way I am. It's difficult work trying to "un-condition" yourself or whatever. I don't want to drastically change or anything, but I think I'd be happier without the "loveless marriage." I have friends with truly happy families, and it's always a shock for me to see them function so well.

I could probably have expressed myself better, but Blarg's post pretty much sums it up.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

The main problems don't come from the parents being married or divorced. They come from the parents putting their own desires ahead of their kids. Good parents strive to be selfless, as opposed to selfish, when it comes to their children.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

The primary cause of damage to kids from divorced homes is the economic impact and the common corresponding change in a child's peer group.

Stability is a great commodity in a child's life. Divorce typically adversely affects that stability. Children usually go with the mother and the mother's economic well being is likely to suffer as a result of the divorce.

This thread assumes that the parents are the primary vehicle of influence in the life a a child and while that's a commonly held notion, it just isn't true. A child's peer group is of far greater importance. The extent to which a divorce winds up damaging or changing a child's relationship with his or her peers has the greatest impact on the child.

A loveless marriage of convenience for the purposes of providing kids with a stable household figures to be beneficial to the child(ren). Even if the quality of parenting were to diminish that's a trivial sacrifice compared to the benefits kids get from a stable, economically viable domestic situation.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

I think we could have an interesting debate about whether parents or peers are more influential on a child's life. I'm unconvinced that peers are more important.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

Good posts in this thread, particularly by knowledgeORbust.

To address the OP, it's tricky. My parents divorced right after I graduated high school, but to be fair they separated all the way back when I was in eighth grade and my mother and I moved into an apartment and left my brother and father behind (only as I am typing this do I realize how strange it was that my brother stayed behind and I left, but at the time he was involved in coke dealing and various other nefarious activities and as it turns out he would leave the state by the end of the year anyway to clean himself up, whereas I was never getting into trouble...oy the train wreck it would have been living with those two without my mother to right the ship).

I suppose it was for my benefit, but they officially weren't divorced until I graduated because prior to that he came by the apartment from time to time (he sold the house around a year after we moved out and resumed his nomadic lifestyle) but for all intents and purposes it wasn't a real marriage.

When they divorced, I was like "it's about goddamn time, you guys are oil and water". It was a relief and had they done it ten years sooner I probably would have been happier.

One thing that I definitely think that would suck for a developing child is divorced parents who don't live in close proximity of each other. In fact, the whole concept of visitation sucks to me, the kid gets yanked out of his environment and has to spend time in a totally different one, which I'm sure there's been lots of studies on but which I would guess stunts his/her social life and puts an awkward pressure on spending time with the visiting parent.

My solution: don't get married, then have kids, then divorce. Instead, post on 2+2. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think we could have an interesting debate about whether parents or peers are more influential on a child's life. I'm unconvinced that peers are more important.

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I saw an interesting study on this a few weeks/months ago. It's a tough thing to measure, so they used adopted kids where they could also interview the birth parents. They then compared the adopted kids to kids living with their natural parents and looked for influences on the kids. Surprisingly, the study showed that both groups of kids were equalling influenced by their birth parents and their peer group, even though the adopted kids had no contact with their birth parents. The adoptive parents had very little influence on their adopted kids lives, except for picking their peer group.

Now, I don't know the validity of the study, but it seems to follow other studies that show peer group is equally important to parents, only this seems to reveal that most of the parent effect is due to genetics.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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It sounds like your issue with your dad hinges substantially on abandonment, not divorce. Divorce doesn't have to be abandonment at all. Why do you feel your dad walked away from your sisters, rather than simply got a divorce?



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I feel my dad walked away because he literally "walked away". He left the home and never moved back in. He left his children with endless days and nights and weeks and years of having no father in the home. He basically re-negotiated his contract with us to where he got 11 months out of the year to run around with women and begin a new life while my mom took the burden of raising us.


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Anyway, to answer the OP's question -

Yes, children can benefit from a loveless marriage but as Blarg, Knowledge and Dom point out, the negative effects can outweigh the benefits.

Here's what I see as the benefits to the kids if the parents stick it out though:

- having both parents in the home gives a balance to the kid's life. For me, I would have loved to have had a father in the house. I think all kids deserve to have a father figure in their life. My father would have intervened when my mom got weird and would have provided us a richness to our life that we didn't have without him.

- Financial security is increased. Not having to deal with a stressed out custodial parent who is always worried about monthly bills.

- Not having step parents introduced into the children's lives. This is really tricky and adds so much stress and confusion that it's unreal.

- Having 2 parents around is better than one. They are more effective with discipline and can spell each other when one gets tired or stressed out. The conflicts that I saw with my mom and one of my sisters would have been greatly reduced if my dad had been in the home.

I'm sure I could go on. These are just benefits I thought of off the top of my head.



I've known a couple of friends who have contemplated divorce. In most of these cases I think they are being overly emotional and reactionary. If they would calm down and take some time they would have a change of heart. Women especially seem to think the grass is greener and that they will be better off without the "jerk", when from my perspective they might not be better off at all.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I'm still not sure what I think about the whole thing. I think my dad was a bit of a jerk to do it, to be honest. Even when I disassociate myself, I can't understand how my dad could walk away from my older sisters. There was so much he could have taught us.

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But he could've still stayed involved in your life w/o having to be married, couldn't he? I'm guessing he walked out and didn't take much time with you guys? I'm sure you've seen it the other way around, where they get divorced yet the father is still in his kids lives. To me, it's not crappy he did the divorce, but crappy he didn't carry on afterwards with you guys.(if that's the case and I'm reading this situation right)

Edit: I saw your response to Blarg. You don't need to respond to this post if you don't want to.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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Too many parents today are just stubborn and selfish.

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I think alot of this has to do with people getting married and having kids at too young an age these days. They just aren't ready maturity-wise to be married, much less have kids.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
In fact, the whole concept of visitation sucks to me, the kid gets yanked out of his environment and has to spend time in a totally different one, which I'm sure there's been lots of studies on but which I would guess stunts his/her social life and puts an awkward pressure on spending time with the visiting parent.

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Compounded by the fact that some of these kids are used as pawns by one or both parents.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think alot of this has to do with people getting married and having kids at too young an age these days. They just aren't ready maturity-wise to be married, much less have kids.

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Aren't people on average getting married at historically the oldest age ever? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think we could have an interesting debate about whether parents or peers are more influential on a child's life. I'm unconvinced that peers are more important.

[/ QUOTE ]

I saw an interesting study on this a few weeks/months ago. It's a tough thing to measure, so they used adopted kids where they could also interview the birth parents. They then compared the adopted kids to kids living with their natural parents and looked for influences on the kids. Surprisingly, the study showed that both groups of kids were equalling influenced by their birth parents and their peer group, even though the adopted kids had no contact with their birth parents. The adoptive parents had very little influence on their adopted kids lives, except for picking their peer group.

Now, I don't know the validity of the study, but it seems to follow other studies that show peer group is equally important to parents, only this seems to reveal that most of the parent effect is due to genetics.

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I wonder if this study was done on adopted kids adopted near birth? I think foundation-wise, the parents have great influence over the kids first (about)8 years of their life. I think that has alot more lasting effects than the peers may influence(if adopted that early). I think alot of the peer stuff also comes from some of the relationship with their parents through those early years. Bringing in the rebellion factor. Kids don't tend to rebel against their peers.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think alot of this has to do with people getting married and having kids at too young an age these days. They just aren't ready maturity-wise to be married, much less have kids.

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Aren't people on average getting married at historically the oldest age ever? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

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Not sure. But the divorce rate decreases dramatically after the age of around 28. Along with that, in some places(like here in Wa St.) teen pregnancy is rampant.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think alot of this has to do with people getting married and having kids at too young an age these days. They just aren't ready maturity-wise to be married, much less have kids.

[/ QUOTE ]
Aren't people on average getting married at historically the oldest age ever? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

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i haven't seen any numbers, but i'd imagine that's the case

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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Kids don't tend to rebel against their peers.

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Actually, they do, but they do it by trading them in for new ones. If you look at kids age 10-12, they drop old friends and pick up lots of new ones.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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Kids don't tend to rebel against their peers.

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Actually, they do, but they do it by trading them in for new ones. If you look at kids age 10-12, they drop old friends and pick up lots of new ones.

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Of course that's about the Jr High years isn't it? Which is a big time of change in their lives. I don't think it's as much rebellion at that age against their peers as it is just growing in a different direction. I think alot of that direction is a result from what was manifested in them as kids by their parents.

The root of how they handle situations is still (usually)influenced by what they learned from their parents earlier on. That early development tends to domino through their lives for awhile.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

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it's possible but i think it would be extremely difficult to maintain a normal/strong relationship, especially from the child's perspective.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

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I think this is a key point.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

[/ QUOTE ]

it's possible but i think it would be extremely difficult to maintain a normal/strong relationship, especially from the child's perspective.

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I think that depends on the parents consistency with each other. But too often other factors of the parents sabatoge that.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

[/ QUOTE ]

it's possible but i think it would be extremely difficult to maintain a normal/strong relationship, especially from the child's perspective.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that depends on the parents consistency with each other. But too often other factors of the parents sabatoge that.

b

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i see what you mean, but i'm really talking about the child being able to adjust to the fact that the parent is not in their life on a daily basis. spending every other weekend w/your the parent does not replicate a normal relationship and i could see how a child may find it difficult to remain close the parent.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think alot of this has to do with people getting married and having kids at too young an age these days. They just aren't ready maturity-wise to be married, much less have kids.

[/ QUOTE ]
Aren't people on average getting married at historically the oldest age ever? [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img]

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I think we're maturing alot slower than in the past. It seems common for people to be living with their parents into their mid-20's. That might even things out. Just because people are getting married later in life doesn't mean they're more ready for it.

As for the OP, I think that having divorced parents who are civil and happier alone is much better than having married parents who don't get along. Even if they pretend to get along I think the kids will catch on.

My parents got divorced late in my life (I was 17) and while I missed seeing my dad as often, I think it was better for me. Not that my parents get along at all, but I guess them not interacting with one another is better than them fighting.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

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I think if the parents are still respectful and actually still like one another, I think it benefits the kids. (The parents are another matter!) But if there is acrimony and disrespect then, no.

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This is the nub of it. If the parents are otherwise fine and not bitter/fighting and can conduct themselves as if all was fine - and couples can be happy in this setup, believe me - staying together is fine. IF they fight, then it is perhaps better to separate after attempts to make it work have all failed.

That's what my brain says.

My heart says that parents should do whatever they have to that best benefits their children, and I mean in terms of making their children well-adjusted, confident and independent people. Anything else is immature and selfish. Once you have children, I think you have a responsibility to really try and make it work - stuff which is deep-down 'well if I do stuff that'll make me happy, that'll dripfeed happiness down to my kids' is a childish and self-indulgent view of things.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

Although it's possible for both parents to remain in their children's lives after a divorce, sometimes that's not so great either. My wife and her ex have joint custody of their daughter, with time split between them over a two weeks period of eight days vs. six. He lives close by, so her school is not interrupted, although friends are.

The way things have been going lately, with the daughter being 11 and the dad being a religious fanatic and control freak, wife/daughter wish he would go away, or she could see him less.

Sometimes, having only one parent is better.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
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I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

[/ QUOTE ]

it's possible but i think it would be extremely difficult to maintain a normal/strong relationship, especially from the child's perspective.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that depends on the parents consistency with each other. But too often other factors of the parents sabatoge that.

b

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i see what you mean, but i'm really talking about the child being able to adjust to the fact that the parent is not in their life on a daily basis. spending every other weekend w/your the parent does not replicate a normal relationship and i could see how a child may find it difficult to remain close the parent.

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I agree. I also think that's more the norm than the parent staying involved with the kid.

'course, that can also involve the other parent not letting the other one have time with the kid for whatever reason. So it may not all be on the absent parents shoulders.

b

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think I was only slightly better off when my parents were together. They say they stayed together for the kids.

I think its very possible to get divorced and not abandon your kids.

[/ QUOTE ]

it's possible but i think it would be extremely difficult to maintain a normal/strong relationship, especially from the child's perspective.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think that depends on the parents consistency with each other. But too often other factors of the parents sabatoge that.

b

[/ QUOTE ]

i see what you mean, but i'm really talking about the child being able to adjust to the fact that the parent is not in their life on a daily basis. spending every other weekend w/your the parent does not replicate a normal relationship and i could see how a child may find it difficult to remain close the parent.

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A child finding it difficult to remain close to their parents is pretty common anyway. Lots of kids are more or less ignored, or ignore their parents anyway, or both. At least when you have your kid on visitation you're probably going to be paying attention to the fact that he's alive with more than just the occasional "yo" when you pass each other in the hall at night.

Re: Do kids benefit from a loveless marriage?
 

Yeah but it could just as easily have been the other way around -- the biological parent who either originally was or became the nutball or difficult character.