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Etienne Waroquet

Amy Flick

ENGCOMP 0200-1425

30 October 2019

Repercussions of Marital Disruption

Growing up In Cleveland Heights had its many perks and benefits. It was my first home.

It was the first place I remembered growing up in and the first place where I had my best friends.

It was home and going to school was enjoyable and I really remember a striving family with a

mother and a father who loved each other. After their divorce, many things changed, but the

effects on my mentality was the most concerning.

Being a short ten-minute walk, I would walk home from school every day. Sometimes as

I would come home, I’d hear my parents yelling at each other. It didn’t faze me at first but then it

grew increasingly concerning. A few months passed, and fighting didn’t stop. Sometimes my

mom would leave for the weekend or even longer and not tell my brother or I where she was

going. One day, the screaming and fighting were so severe that I remember my mom storming

out of the house with no conscious thought to look back. I was scared, concerned, and more so

worried for her. I did not know where she was going at the time, and I didn’t understand the

concept of parents fighting and arguing. That was the last time she stayed home.

I felt abandoned by my mother. She would call to tell us everything was okay, but my

father was always there for me. There are a lot of underlying issues from this exact moment that

are portrayed throughout my life every day. I have many trust issues with people and issues

opening up with others and being friends because my mind doesn’t want the same situation to

happen again. Its a conscious thought unable to control.

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I had so much anxiety to go to school because I was scared of what was happening in my

home life. Some days I would have panic attacks so intense I’d cry endlessly in my classroom.

The school would call home and the only way I could function was if my dad was at school with

me. I was scared of being abandoned again. I was too young to understand that school was a

requirement and my parents couldn’t always be next to me. Over time, I had to cope with the fact

that my dad couldn’t go to school with me. He would leave small notes for me in my lunch box

and in my folders saying things like, “I love you, Etienne!” or “You’re the coolest 6-year-old I

know.” These comforted me and helped pushed me through the school day. By this time, I was in

the first grade and still learning basic skills, but I was able to recognize my dad’s unconditional

love for me.

One day at home, I heard knocking on the door. When my father opened the door, a

sheriff’s deputy stood. He had implied that we were being evicted from the household. A large

part of being evicted was that there was a massive housing crash in 2008 in Cleveland.

Essentially, houses were being sold to people who couldn’t afford them. So, a large group of

residents in the Cleveland area were being evicted. During this time, I moved away to

Pennsylvania to live with my mom while my father was searching for a new house and living

with some of his friends. My mother and I for the most part were very close, but after the divorce

my relationship with her changed. I became unnecessarily hostile to her and I didn’t trust her

because I put the blame on her which I shouldn’t have. Going to Pennsylvania was a difficult

time because I switched schools for a short while and had to make all new friends. I was already

prone to difficulties with socializing and moving made it all the more difficult. After a few

months passed, I moved back with my dad to a new town in Ohio. Things had slowly gotten back
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to normal and I was slowly becoming accustomed to living with my father while I visited my

mother every other weekend.

Even to this day, I still do not know why my parents had gotten a divorce. I have a strong

idea as to why they did, but it is nothing I want to inquire about because those are memories that

pain me to look back on. Not a day goes by where I don’t think how my life would be if I never

had to endure those instances.

Mental health is something that affects me to this day. I’ve seen many therapists and

talked to many people to hopefully better understand why I deal with difficult thoughts and how

to cope with them. For the most part, I don’t have many underlying issues anymore, but I have

been acutely shaped from my parent’s divorce. The positive experience I take from the entire

situation is that I am excited for my future. I have no issues with either my mother or father. I

understand that even during those times of fighting they endured while I was a kid, they still

wanted the best for me. Parents are not perfect people and they make mistakes. Despite all of

this, it makes me excited to have a relationship in the future and having a family. I’ve seen how a

family should and shouldn’t be and I couldn’t be more excited to meet someone I dearly care

about and to have a family with that person.

The experiences I found myself subjected to taught me a lot about how and how a family

should be. This brings me to my central concern which is understanding how the scenarios I

experienced are similar to those of many other children worldwide. Having more support

opportunities may have helped me understand the scenario better at the time, but these are only

issues I can look back on and move forward from. The concerns of marital disruption are not

deeply studied and it’s important to understand the severity in which these issues affect people

and children around the world daily.

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In 2012, Fagan and Churchill described the repercussions divorce creates on a child’s

ability to create mannered social skills and dedicated family relationships. This paper seeks to

provide a wide array of knowledge on this matter providing science findings related to the

marital disruption on children. Divorce is becoming an increasingly common phenomenon, with

each year over a million American children suffering from divorce of their parents, which

represents over 20% of children (Fagan & Rector, 2000). Contradictory to the 1950’s where a

study was conducted showing approximately 368,000 divorces happened and 11% of children

were at the hands of marital disruption (Olito, 2019). The effects of divorce are continually

growing, suggesting that divorce among families is rapidly increasing. Divorces lead to an onset

of many social implications on children possibly inducing troubling futures for them. Studies

have shown that such instances may develop possible adolescent violence. A study by the

National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health indicated that families with one biological

cohabitating parent saw 42.6 percent of children getting into fights where-as families with two

married parents saw only 28.8 percent of kids getting into fights. Instances of violence early in

adolescence lead to the likelihood of violent relationships in adulthood underlying just a few

themes marital disruption may bring on children.

Through the review of the literature, the paper attempts to provide direct findings with

the use of statistical data presented in the form of charts and graphs regarding the concepts

affecting children suffering from marital disruption. The majority of the sources provided in the

literature text are conducted with smaller scale groups but remain consistent among other similar

studies. The goal being to direct the concern among children suffering through the divorce of

their parents.
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The first few sections of the paper recognize the limitations of family life created from

marital disruption. The later sections recognize common issues children retain from divorce in

their later teen life and adult life including apprehending social skills and an increase in violent

and criminal behavior stemming from anger and an inability to recognize their emotions. Upon

the divorce of parents, children have been known to express a wide range of emotions including

sadness, loneliness, anxiety, low self-esteem, and a sense of fault for the parents’ problems.

To examine the effects of marital disruption on children, the contradictions in age need to

be recognized in order to differentiate the effects these issues tend to have on children. Clinical

assessments are used as a standard to examine children’s mood and stability after a divorce. They

are referred to counselors and clinical programs for an in-depth analysis on the lasting issue.

Clinical assessments provided had a higher focus on extreme cases and results could not be

generalized for the majority of children who experience their parents’ divorce. Comparative

studies proved to be more concise and consistent as they examine quantifiable outcomes such as

academic achievement, emotional adjustment, and self-esteem through a series of questionnaires

and tests.

Cross sectional studying examines individuals at a given point in time in their life. This is

instrumental in understanding the effects of marital disruption on children because it’s shown

that the age a child may be has a drastic change on the outcome of their future. A Norwegian

research study found that children who experience divorce early in life are more likely to have

lower educational standards (Fagan & Churchill, 2012). It also states that boys whose parents

divorced while they were in elementary school had a higher tendency to develop problems in the

years that follow. Some of these problems included truancy, vandalism of others property, and a
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prevalence in dishonesty and lying (National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1996). However,

scores from tests still showed that children who experienced divorce at any age had a higher

tendency to affect their whole lives showing higher despondency scores.

In reading Fagan’s and Churchills piece there was a direct correlation to family

detachment from marital disruption. The primary effect shown immediately was a decline in the

relationship of the parent and the child. Divorce at any age for children under the age of four

showed they had a decrease in trust of their mothers later on throughout their child years.

However, for boys, they were likely to improve their relationship and trust with their mother two

years after a divorce. The National Survey of Families Households found that nearly one in five

divorced fathers hadn’t seen their children in the past year after a divorce. After divorce children

were more likely to have less contact with their father than with their mother showing 38% of

daughters would not have contact with their fathers and 20% of sons of divorced parents would

not have contact with their father. Boys had responded with much more hostility in a parental

divorce than girls. Fathers also reported a more distant relationship with their children showing

they created a more negative change in relationships than custodial mothers (Fagan & Churchill

2012).

Often the first conflict coming from a marital disruption for children is parental

relationships being diminished. An understudied area concerns psychological behaviors

becoming a vulnerability along with a lack in social skills following a marital disruption.

Kathleen O’Connell Corcoran is a nationally recognized mediator studying the effects of marital

disruption on children and providing conflict resolution. A study written by Kathleen O’Connell

Corcoran found the common signs of concerns in psychological behaviors in children ranging

from infants up to 12 years old. Infants and toddlers tended to show signs of regression, irregular
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sleep patterns, and disturbances. They persisted with crankiness but a stronger difficulty in

leaving their parents. From the ages of three to five kids were resorting to blaming themselves

for their parents’ divorce and continuing to show a greater fear of being abandoned; clinginess.

In early adolescence children six to eight years old, pervasive sadness was a typical onset.

Children tended to be mentally torn apart and struggled to feel accepted. Older children, usually

ages nine to twelve, were able better comprehend the situation. Children around this age would

show signs of intense anger and usually blame a parent for causing the divorce. However, they

exhibited signs of introversion in school and felt different from other children. In addition,

O’Connel Corcoran found children among all ages had an increase in anger after a marital

disruption.

Among the studies read, marital disruption appears to create effects and concerns on

children worldwide. The studies used similar methods of obtaining results through recognizing

psychologic and emotional dependency by conducting mediated interviews and advanced

consultation techniques. Advances in mediation techniques improves the understanding of the

effects created by marital divorce. Years have passed showing current generations, like

millennials, have a lower divorce rate then the generation of baby boomers due in part from the

tendency to focus on their career path before considering marriage (Joe Pinsker). When looking

at current effects on children, some of the strongest concerns affect kids in their early developing

years and create lasting effects that have to be recognized early on. The studies recognize the

issues and affects created. Consequently, a lack of remediation techniques has been provided

within the studies which prevents understanding into techniques best for helping solve the

consequences of marital disruption on children. Marital disruption creates lasting negative

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effects on children worldwide that affect their capability of fitting in with the rest of society and

with their families.

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Works Cited

Corcoran, Kathleen O'Connell. “Psychological and Emotional Aspects of Divorce.” Mediate.com

- Find Mediators - World's Leading Mediation Information Site, June 1997,

https://www.mediate.com/articles/psych.cfm#stress.

Davis, Matthew. “The Changing Nature of Marriage and Divorce.” The Changing Nature of

Marriage and Divorce, https://www.nber.org/digest/nov07/w12944.html.

Effects of Divorce on Children. Department of Justice Canada, Oct. 1997,

https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/fl-lf/divorce/wd98_2-dt98_2/wd98_2.pdf.

“Effects of Divorce on Children's Behavior.” Effects of Divorce on Children's Behavior

[Marripedia], http://marripedia.org/effects.of.divorce.on.children.s.behavior.

Fagan, Patrick. “The Effects of Divorce on America.” The Heritage Foundation, 5 June 2000,

https://www.heritage.org/marriage-and-family/report/the-effects-divorce-america.

Fagan, Patrick F, and Aaron Churchill. The Effects of Divorce on Children. Marriage and

Religion Research Institute, 11 Jan. 2012, https://www.frc.org/EF/EF12A22.pdf.

Olito, Frank. “How the Divorce Rate Has Changed over the Last 150 Years.” Insider, Insider, 30

Jan. 2019, https://www.insider.com/divorce-rate-changes-over-time-2019-1.

Pinsker, Joe. “The Not-So-Great Reason Divorce Rates Are Declining.” The Atlantic, Atlantic

Media Company, 26 Sept. 2018,

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/09/millennials-divorce-baby-

boomers/571282/.

Wilcox, W. Bradford, et al. “The Evolution of Divorce.” National Affairs, 2009,

https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-evolution-of-divorce.
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