My First Thanksgiving Without the Kids

The kids just left with my ex and his girlfriend.  They are driving to the DC area to see his sister and his mother, who is flying up from Puerto Rico.  This is the first time that Jonah and Layla will see their grandmother and their cousins in about six years.  They were very excited, and I was happy to see that.

However, it must be said that this is going to be my first Thanksgiving without the kids, and I am also feeling sad.  In past years, my ex has come to my house, and we have celebrated as a family.  I love to cook, and the kids’ godparents usually join us.  This year is a departure from that tradition.  Considering how much our lives have changed since my move to Boston, I guess it is a change that makes sense.

As I stood outside the kids’ school waiting to pick them up today, I felt an aching in my heart and a lump in my throat.  Yet, the longer I stood there, the more I realized that I was lucky to be able to pick them up from school like I do because my ex doesn’t do that anymore.  I know that he feels sad to be missing out on that mundane yet also meaningful ritual.  Certainly, there are many parents, married or divorced, that miss key events in their kids’ lives because of their jobs or other responsibilities.  It is hard to make it to everything, and it is literally impossible to be with them for every important moment because some of them have to be experienced without parental involvement.  This thought made me feel better.

I may not get to experience this Thanksgiving dinner with them, but I get to have my own fun.  I am going on a road trip with my new boyfriend Jon.  We are heading to Philadelphia tomorrow night to eat a deep-fried turkey with one of his brothers.  His sister-in-law is going to take me to a yoga class with her (clearly my kind of woman).  On Friday we are heading to New York City to pick up Jon’s son, and then we go North to Vermont to eat yet another meal with a different brother.  On Sunday we are swinging back to Northampton to pick up the kids at my ex’s place.  Jonah wants to show Jon and his son his favorite Noho spots, namely Sam’s Pizzeria and GoBerry.  Finally, we return to Newton, hopefully with enough time for Jon to make a fort with the boys, as per Jonah’s request.

I am really excited about these plans.  It’s fun not having to plan and cook a big meal.  It’s fun getting to be someone’s guest and meet new people.  It’s fun to explore new places, even at a whirlwind pace.  And it will be great to be with Jon for one of his favorite pastimes: driving.

As I got a little choked up as the kids left, Layla promised to call me everyday, and Jonah looked me in the eye and said “I know that you will miss us, but you have Jon.”  I think that made him feel better, knowing that I won’t be alone and will be having my fun too.

In divorce, sometimes you just have to admit that you can be both sad and happy.  Sad that you may not be with your kids all the time, sad that you lost a meaningful love relationship, sad at how things have changed.  Yet at the same time, there is much to rejoice in.  In my case, I am happy to be living in a fun new city, happy that I have a great new job that is challenging me in exciting ways, and thrilled that I have started a relationship with a kind, funny, generous, and loving man.  At this holiday of gratitude, I can’t help but acknowledge the momentary sting of my children leaving.  Yet more than anything, I choose to focus on, and give thanks for, the abundant, sweet goodness of my life.

How Can We Help the Sons of Divorce?

My thriving son of divorce

The most recent divorce gloom and doom comes from Tara Parker-Pope’s Well blog from the New York Times where she reported yesterday a study that sons of divorce are three times more likely to consider suicide than males whose parents weren’t divorced.  As confident as I am about my parenting skills, news like that always makes me cringe a bit.  First, because I hate to think of that being true.  Second, because so much of the news on divorce is so grim.  I guess that’s why I write my blog, now isn’t it?

Of course I feel compelled to find a positive spin on this report or come up with a possible solution.  When these kinds of alarming statistics come our way, it is a good opportunity for us to be more mindful about how we are raising our children.  Perhaps we need to pay special attention to how our boys are responding to their parents’ divorces.  Instead of lamenting how divorce is destroying future generations, let’s come up with some ideas to help kids cope with their (and our) setbacks.

Here are a few of my suggestions.

1) It is important for boys to have a constant relationship with their fathers. I am a big advocate for both parents having as much contact with their kids as possible.  This is why my ex and I both see the kids almost every day.  Our custody arrangement is unique that way because our kids spend four nights a week with me and three nights a week with him.  Luckily we live 5 minutes away from each other and can come and go with ease.  I have noticed that my son is particularly attached to my ex and sometimes calls him and asks him to come over to tuck him in at night.  My ex usually says yes. Read the rest of this entry »

Sustainable Marriage, Sustainable Divorce

In yesterday’s New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope published a sustainable marriage quiz that posited some very thought-provoking questions about how much your partner expands your knowledge and makes you feel like a better person.  I was particularly interested in this quiz because I recently speculated that my own parents’ marriage has lasted 49 years because they have continually helped each other learn and grow.  Since my divorce, I feel like I am a student of marriage, as I continue to ask myself why my own union didn’t last in the hopes of making better relationship decisions in the future. Read the rest of this entry »

First Day of School 2010

This is my first attempt at a photodiary post.  Here are Jonah and Layla on their first day of school.  They were very excited.

Here is the peacefully divorced family getting ready to go to school together (with the stunning background of our garage).  Of course I am not in the photo because I am behind the camera.

We tried something new this year.  Jonah spent the night with my ex and Layla spent the night with me, and then we all met at my house to leave for school.  I think that worked really well because each of the kids got some quiet, undivided attention the night before their big day.

As you can see, Layla was feeling a bit nervous when she arrived at her first grade classroom.  None of her best friends are in her class so she was sad.  My ex, being sensitive and shy like her, was very worried about her, but I knew that she’d find the strength to spread her wings and feel comfortable.

This is what she looked like as we said good-bye.  I knew that she would perk up!

When we arrived at the third grade classroom, Jonah was already having a good time with his deskmate Kenneth.  He is my social butterfly and barely noticed when we left.

Doesn’t Jonah look mature in his new reading glasses?  He is so proud of them because he looks even more like his dad now.

So the update is that they both enjoyed their first day.  Jonah said he loved it even when his friend Zach gave it a thumbs down.  Layla said it was the best day ever.  I am sure that they will have more to say about this (and perhaps contradictory stories) but I am glad that we had an easy transition.  And as usual, I am appreciative that my ex and I were able to share it with each other.  Peace rocks!

Field Notes on a Child of Divorce: My Son Gets It

Jonah, deep in thought, with his Egyptian headdress

Jonah and I have started a summer ritual of reading the Harry Potter novels together.  It’s become our thing, and we’ve never really had a thing before.  One of the most endearing (and also exasperating) parts of this ritual is Jonah’s non-stop analysis of the book.  I know my friends right now are simply laughing at me.  What did I expect when his two parents have doctorates in literature?

Yesterday we were reading the fourth volume The Goblet of Fire.  Harry and his best friend Ron are mad at each other over issues of trust and are not speaking to each other, although they clearly miss one another.  Ron is really the first person in Harry’s life that he has been able to count on.  So as we are reading yet another scene where they have a chance to make up but simply get more pissed off, Jonah says to me, I think Ron and Harry still really have love in their hearts for each other even though they are fighting.  I was stopped dead in my tracks because I realized in that moment, He gets it.  He understands that conflict doesn’t have to destroy love.

Jonah has always been a psychologically savvy boy.  He has told me a few times that he doesn’t understand why some people have a hard time getting along with others because he learned that in pre-school (with the presumption, Didn’t everyone learn that too?).  He always asks me about people’s motivations and wants to hear stories about everyone in my life.  When his dad was moving out of our house, he asked him why.  My ex took a deep breath to contemplate his response.  Before he could even reply, Jonah said, It’s so that you don’t get mad at Mama anymore, isn’t it?  That pretty much summed it up.  And that was all the explanation he needed.  He got it.

When I wrote the article about my ex losing his license and being grumpy and tense for a day, my friend Sarah, who has a beautiful parenting blog, asked me a poignant question.  Do I feel like I am leaving my kids vulnerable to my ex’s bad moods?  That was certainly something that I asked myself.

We have talked about my ex’s temper and what they do when it flares up.  They know that it is never their fault because that is just part of his personality.  They have learned to ignore him and find other activities to do until he calms down.  In a nutshell, they have learned to love someone even when that person seems unlovable.  They have learned not to take another person’s actions personally.  And they have learned that with enough patience, their adored father will return to his loving tender self.

The interesting answer, then to Sarah’s question, is that having to deal with their father’s moods (or by extension their parents’ breakup) has left them anything but vulnerable.  Instead it has empowered them to deal at an early age with some of life’s inevitable realities.  We all have our complexities and idiosyncrasies, but if we learn to accept others as they are, we can appreciate their wonderful characteristics as well.  People aren’t always easy to get along with, but we can love them anyway.

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Has there ever been a time when your children learned something important from a difficult situation?

Do you have any childhood memories of someone who was challenging yet instructive at the same time?

If you are a child of divorce, did you learn anything positive from your parents’ breakup or marital conflict?