• Front page
• Receive letters on your RSS reader

Rocky Mountain News wine columnist Jennifer Rosen made a comment in her Aug. 8 Spotlight column, “Go with the flow: Enjoy that wine,” that should be read by every divorce attorney, every divorce judge, every child advocate, and every couple going through divorce.
Jennifer said, “A child of divorce, I spent 12 years shuttling between two households, two sets of values, two realities. When pressured to take sides, I was paralyzed. How could I choose when I loved them both?”
Having run divorce recovery workshops for 13 years, I am always saddened to see how many couples further victimize their children by polarizing their thoughts and structuring unhealthy custody arrangements. Quite often those issues are compounded by court-appointed child advocates who pit husband against wife instead of seeking healthy solutions.
Having helped nearly 1,000 people process their divorces, I can tell you the legal system in Colorado for divorce is a mess. More often than not, it is a lose-lose situation for both parties and the children suffer the most.

Larry Sears, Centennial

READER COMMENTS

Please put the blame squarely on the parents. If they cooperate for the good of the child, the legal system does them no harm.

Having two sets of values may be why a couple break up, children should not be used as a weapon by one parent or the other, but that is their choice, not the requirement of the law.

for once I will agree with sharon and its the parents who cause the problems with the custody issue and turn the issue into its all their fault [meaning the other parent]. I will add that having a court appointed social worker doesnt help either as they usually side with one or the other. in real life some divorces are nice and then the others are just mean and nasty all because of one parent.
Its not the laws its the parents who cause the emotional problems for the kids.

How about ending state licenses for marriages and state involvement in marriage. Marriages, or unions or partnerships or whatever, are religious only deals and the state does NOT get involved. Children are legally the SOLE responsibility of the birth mother. Fathers, dads or sperm donors are allowed as much involvement as the mother wishes. Rich moms call all the shots, poor moms get welfare and chafe under the watchful eye of social workers. If a dad wants to be involved in the child life, he has to keep the mom satisfied with his contribution and participation.

There is a little girl across the street that is friends with my daughters.She is a my house everyday and spends the night very often.Her mother is very nice to me on the phone but hates the fact that her daughter rather be here than home. Why?

The mother all of a sudden decided she wasn't happy anymore and needed something else in her life. The father moved out suddenly and the little girl came to my house crying and very upset. She was told they were getting a divorce 5 mins. before the father stated moving his clothing out.

I asked the mother why the divorce and she said she just wasn't happy anymore. I was thinking to myself ,how about some Prozac,but I said nothing.Within 3 days there was a strange man spending the night at their house. Strange I say because the girl and her younger sister did not know this man and were still upset about losing their father.

It was a easy divorce the father and mother didn't have to fight over anything,evidently they had worked out everything before they sprung it on the kids.

Soon after the 1st guy was no longer in the picture ,about a month, another guy became a fixture in the home. Within a month he moved in,within 3 months she told him she wanted to be friends and took off on a 5 day vacation by herself,and told him to be gone when she got back,though she left the kids with him.The girl could not come over and play with my kids because her mother's now ex-boyfriend was upset and needed her support.She is 9 years old and her sister is 6.

Meanwhile the father has moved on and found someone new. She is mexican with 5 children .her youngest is 18 and has a 3 year old and another on the way. When the kids go over to the fathers every other weekend,they go nowhere,because him and his girlfriend sit around drinking beer all weekend.The mother picks them up because she doesn't want her children driven home by their father who has been drinking.

This is the chaos this girls parents have created in the wake of their easy divorce.

Meanwhile I and my children are stuck in the middle because their friend hates being home with her mother because she is so jealous that she wants to be here and takes it out on her when she is home.

She doesn't want to go to the fathers because they drink all weekend. They live near a pool and she asked him if he could take them to the pool and he said he didn't have the money,in turn she said if you stop buying beer we could go and was punished for her comments.

Divorce civil or uncivil is bad for the children. Their emotional needs are often overlooked because the parents have convinced themselves that since the divorce went well the children didn;t suffer. Wrong.

Dave,

I hate it that some moms do that to the dads. I know that does happen.

I have wished a few times that there were a law that non-custodial parents remain involved. When the mom and kids still live in the same home, dad should have no problem knowing where to send mail, make calls, and even visit once in a while. But when a parent leaves the kids after 6, 8 or 10 years in their early life, and does not return or ask for them for a decade or more, that sudden and lasting absence can cause some serious lasting pain on children.

AMEN, although I don't normally advocate government involvement, why don't you call Social Services about that little girl? The mother you describe doesn't want to, or is unable to care for her children properly. The father sounds just as bad if he's driving around drunk. Maybe those girls would be better off without either parent.

I've seen many nasty divorces where the parents use the children as pawns. One divorced couple has the kids one week at her place, one week at his. The mother spends her week with them trying to undo the damage the father has done, and uses any extra money taking them to therapy.

Wish I had a solution . . . . . . .

A bit of a tempest in a teapot,considering that marriage and parenthood have almost nothing to do with one another,and by law haven't for several decades. However,if the Marriage Tooth Fairy decides to pay us a visit and Set Things Right,she might try the following,as behavioral incentives.First,amend the tax code so that deductions for dependent children can be claimed only on a married-filing-jointly return.Second,amend the Social Security Act (which controls public welfare benefits) so that welfare benefits for children can only be claimed by married couples who are jointly the biological parents of all the kids at issue.Third,abolish either Roe v.Wade OR the network of paternity laws-they cannot both be simultaneously constitutional.
It's been clearly established that single parenthood is is great for single parents and the bureaucracy for whom incompetently parented children is a multibillion dollar meal ticket,but it's not so great for the children so badly served by the current paradigm.It might help THEM a little were we to show just a tiny bit of respect for the societal institution that gives kids their best chance....parents married to each other.

CWW, I wouldn't call Social Services.I am trying to give the girl what she needs when she is in my home. Love,understanding,and a shoulder to cry on.Her mother is very self centered and lets the 6 year old run the household which has made her into a problem child. If the youngest does anything wrong ,her sister is punished for it.

I have been watching both girls and will be untill school starts. Her mother works for the Adams 50 school district. I had to take my two kids and hers to a Dr.'s appt. I had to go to after having breast surgery. The littlest one was told numerous times she had to be very quiet and use her manners. I provided her and the other kids with books and magazines to read and to help them keep quiet. As soon as I was called into the back room ,this little spoiled child started acting up and disrupting other patients that were there.
I told her I was disappointed in her behavior and when we got home I gave her a 15 min. time out.
I told her mother what had happened and she was all sweet on the phone about it. When her oldest got home she was punished because the little spoiled angel got a 15 min. time out from me. The mother also went on a rant and said if I was mean to her again she was not going to let me watch them anymore.Fine by me. I refuse to let a 6 year old brat run my household.

Calling social services would make things worse.the older child wouldn't have my family to rely on.

Amen, I think that woman should be put on this mailing list:

www.vhemt.org

Amen, I think that woman should be put on this mailing list:

www.vhemt.org

what is www.vhemt.org?

Obviously most people going through divorce get to that point because they no longer see eye to eye on anything. That also includes the welfare of their children.

How can parents allow their hate for each other blind them to the needs of their children?

Mike,it's real easy when the Left has "Deadbeat" as the adjective most often applied to the word "Dad". Also real easy for a guy to walk away from kids and a woman who hate and disrespect him.

Enough wishing is wasn't the way it is.
Solutions: Yes, end all paternity laws. Guys get to sire as many off-spring as they can convince women to left them sire. Wilt Chamberlin did 20,000 women. Some jazz musicians claimed dozens of illegitimate children. A guy from kKss had an insurance policy to cover his off-spring. That IS the way it is. reality.

Women get full, total, and SOLE control of children. Men get only as much control as the mom allows.

I do not think this would mean much change. Most families would continue as we do today, because most families are decent, responsible people. The ones that fail would avoid the vicious legal battles that now ensue. Women have SOLE control, men do not have to pay ANYTHING. Us taxpayers would have a few more abandoned kids to support, but not that many more.

Dave, Isn't your posting the norm already?

Not quite,Amen.The norm is a garbage heap of bad law and government-sponsored Jim Crow propaganda against the half the population that pays the bills.When the feminist left and its castrati proxies aren't trashing the bill-payers,they're making a great living abusing children.

I feel bad for the children. They go through so much and the parents are so into the ME ME ME ,it's all about ME mode the kids suffer.

Another thing I think that should be a law is before any child support is awarded paternity tests must be done.

It's not right that a woman who has a child can say who's it is and automatically that man has to pay child support only to find out years later it is not his child. By then the court most of the time will make the man continue to pay,citing the child only knows him as his father.

What should happen is the woman be forced to repay every penny of child support.

Some words of advice for the men out there if don't wear a raincoat and she claims she's protected,don't cry a river when the flood comes.

And maybe if the cesspool that is domestic law wre cleaned up and made fair,there might be fewer children thrown in.

POST A COMMENT

• 'Kid Nation' reality show a new low
• Rivers a shameful hire
• Too little news
• ‘Diesel’ fumes
• Unlocalized story a disservice to readers
• Riled up by Christian music
• Darling of the left
• Solutions too costly