I am a child of divorce. Not exactly uncommon in my age group. My family really does have it down to a bit of a science, though. My paternal grandparents divorced in the late 1940s, a time when it was very uncommon. My grandfather wanted to go back overseas after the war, to work with the League of Nations (later the UN). My grandmother did not want to take their very young son to war-torn Europe. My father grew up not knowing anything about his father. He was actually 26 years old before he ever saw him again. As my mother puts it, he didn't know if his father was dead, or in jail, or anything. I believe that he knew his name, and that was it. My grandmother was so hurt by the divorce that she refused to talk about him. In fact it was only in the last few years of her life before dementia took over that I ever heard her speak his name.
My parents were married for nine years before I was born. 10 months later my father decided that he wanted a divorce. It's kind of hard not to take that personally, I have to admit. However, after four kids of my own, I also tell all new parents the same thing: the first year after a baby will likely be the hardest one(s) in your marriage. If you survive that, you will likely be fine. Obviously no one gave them that advice. My father has since married three other times, all ending in divorce.
The one thing that I have to say about my mom (other than how much I love her for raising me completely on her own, since my father moved to the US shortly after they split up, and has been there ever since) is that she never badmouthed my father. In fact, she seemed very hurt if anyone said anything bad about him, including me.
Which, of course, leads me to the Gosselins. A completely overdone topic, but hey, I'm weighing in anyway because I think they're just exhibiting a bigger issue. I have never watched an entire episode of their show. I remember seeing them on Oprah once a few years back. I believe I watched about ½ an episode a year or so ago. That kind of reality show honestly just isn't my thing. I'm more of a “Biggest Loser” or “American Idol” kind of girl.
They are kind of hard to avoid these days, though. I honestly can't get over the amount of attention that these people are getting just because they're splitting up. They certainly never were on the cover of tabloids when they were (playing?) the happy not-so-little family.
Couples get divorced. It happens. It's no longer shocking to see a single mom or dad with their kids. What appalls me about this situation is that these parents (moreso Dad, from what I've seen, but both are guilty) seem to be more interested in bashing each other publicly than in their children's welfare.
Some might say that they've never shown much interest in their children's welfare right from the start, what with putting their kids in a situation reminiscent of the Dionne Quintuplets, but I could see a family who was struggling to provide for their eight kids wanting to make some “easy” money. All they had to do was live their lives, right? So assuming that these two actually had their children's best interests at heart to begin with, why wouldn't they continue to do that?
One of the most important things to remember when a couple with kids split up is that your children share DNA with the person that you can quite possibly no longer stand to be around. If you're badmouthing him/her, you're badmouthing half of who they are. Do they not think that their kids know what's going on? That Mom is accusing Dad of stealing the very food out of their mouths? That Dad is running around with a 22-year-old bimbo and saying that Mom emotionally abused him?
Even if by some miracle they are actually able to shelter the kids from this right now, and are keeping their opinions to themselves in private, do they not realize that these stories won't just disappear when all of this dies down? Ten years from now, a simple internet search will bring it all back to the surface again, and they will know, and they will hurt.
Not all marriages can last forever. Not all of them should. But when you choose to involve children in your relationship it becomes about something bigger than you. You have a responsibility to those kids to protect them from as much of the hurt as you can. How is slamming one of the two people that they love most in the world going to do that?
All I can say is grow up Gosselins, before it's too late. I'm kind of afraid that it already is, though.
On a side note, I don't particularly like Nancy Grace for reasons to numerous to count, but I have to say, this clip would have made me laugh, if it weren't so damned sad.
0 comments:
Post a Comment