cause-effect essay

CAUSE-EFFECT ESSAY

MERAL BAKIRCI

 

THE EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

Divorce is a difficult process for both children and father-mother. For children, divorcing father and mother stressful, complex, and upsetting situation. No matter how old children are, they may worry about how they continue their life after divorce. At the same time, children may get angry with their family because of divorce. For children, even if their families don’t fulfill their task, divorce means that collapsing a system which children are protected and looked after. The effects of divorce on children differ according to child and family structure. There are a lot of effects of divorce on children such as crying, nervousness, stress, being withdrawn, avoiding having sexual relation, anger, nightmares, restlessness, accusing you, sleeping and eating disorder, and problems with school. There are some terms which these effects are seen on children: babyhood, childhood, and adolescence.

The first term is babyhood. If child is in babyhood when his or her father and mother divorce, the child loses trust feeling which the most important feature is in this period. The basis trust feeling is one of the first things which the baby learns. It provides forming the trust feeling being provided baby’s physical requirements, being feed regularly. But in the divorce situation, the baby becomes anxious and worried about his or her future. Another situation is that the baby can perceive dispute and tension at home but they can’t understand that the cause of this dispute and tension is divorce. This dispute and tension create some problems on babies which are nervousness, sleeping and eating disorder, diarrhea, and constipation.

The second term is childhood. Personality features improves highly n this period. Divorcing father and mother affects child’s personality. Even if children don’t understand the reason of divorce, they are aware of not staying their father and mother at the same house. As a reaction of divorce, children adhere to person who they stay with, wait more interest, behave like a baby. Even if they don’t understand why their father and mother divorce, they are aware of their parent’s anger and unhappiness. As a result of divorce, children may have nightmares; children may have dense sorrow and loss feeling. Also they may think that ‘if they were well-behaved, their father and mother wouldn’t divorce.’ This thought leads to accuse themselves.

The last term is adolescence. Adolescence is both physical and mental maturity process for a child. Even if adolescents understand the situation, they don’t accept separation or divorce mostly. They are extremely angry with their parents and they may even attempt to use violence against their parents. They may lose their trust of relations including their future marriage. Their respect of themselves may reduce and they may think of not being loved. They feel that they are betrayed and refused, and they are disappointed. They may suffer from depression, they may be withdrawn, and they often use suicide as a threat. Some behavior disorder can be seen in adolescents such as stealing something, not going to school, using cigarette-alcohol, and having sexual relations. There are also some adolescents who show more suitable behaviors as they think that behavior differences save marriage.

To sum up, divorce creates different effects on children in different periods. Father and mother may divorce and it is an extremely normal situation nowadays. But parents should protect and support their children like before as far as they make. Parents should follow where their child is, with who their child is, and what their child does. Before parents’ divorce, they should talk their child about divorce and learn their child’s thought. In my opinion, if there is a child, parents should think about divorce twice and if they want to divorce insistently while there is a child, they should try to decrease these effects.