HOW TO NAVIGATE YOUR DIVORCE WITH CONFIDENCE: CO-PARENTING INTO THE FUTURE

After a decision is made to divorce your spouse, you suddenly have a lot to do to reduce the impact on your kids and make sure they have a normal childhood and an even better future. It’s not as easy as it sounds, with all the emotions that come with a divorce flying around. The courts in the United States understand this and require that you take a course to help you.  Co-Parenting into the Future is a revolutionary program that helps you learn new skills, tools, and strategies for successful co-parenting. These courses provide valuable insights into how to put the best interests of your child first, communicate effectively with your ex-spouse, and overcome common obstacles to effective co-parenting. Specifically, you can learn directly from Juli and Marks’s own experiences. They teach you the fundamental rules to help you and your co-parent avoid the immense difficulties and frustration that they themselves went through in their own divorce process.  These rules when followed, have been found to greatly reduce the horrific impact that divorce can have on children, so they can overcome these challenges and develop into healthy, well-adjusted adults. 

CO-PARENTING INTO THE FUTURE COVERS THE FOLLOWING CORE PILLARS

• THE IMPORTANCE OF PUTTING YOUR CHILD’S NEEDS FIRST: When co-parenting, you should prioritize your child’s needs in all co-parenting decisions. By putting the child first, divorced parents can create a stable and supportive environment for their children, which is critical for their overall well-being. How to ensure that your child makes it through with the tools they need to move forward with freedom and peace of mind. Most importantly, you will learn how to create a successful future for your children based on possibility rather than what happened in the past.

 

• EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SKILLS: Communication is key to successful co-parenting, and Co-Parenting into the Future provides you with the tools to communicate effectively with your co-parent. You learn different communication techniques like active listening, straightforward communication, and conflict resolution, to help you build a positive co-parenting relationship, and avoid having poisonous conversations with the children and others about your spouse. 

 

• CREATING A CO-PARENTING PLAN: Creating and Abiding by a parenting plan that works for your family, and deals with custody arrangements, visitation schedules, and decision-making authority, would help you avoid conflicts in the future and helps you and your co-parent meet your child’s needs.

 

• CO-OPERATION You and your co-parent need to rise above whatever emotional turmoil that has been a part of the divorce to work together and ensure that your children receive the best possible care and upbringing. With the class, Co-parenting into the Future, you, your children, and your ex can come out the other side with a new and empowering future. You and your Co-Parent can learn to create agreements for interacting with each other such as during holidays, discipline, and social and educational activities.

 

• TOOLS AND STRATEGIES: This class provides you with the tools for co-parenting and addresses issues couples deal with during the divorce process. It also provides you with practical tools and strategies to establish a positive co-parenting relationship with your ex-spouse, manage visitation schedules, and co-parenting disagreements. You will develop creative and effective ways to resolve difficult issues and learn ways to come out of the divorce with a relationship with your spouse that is supportive, and effortless.

 

• FORGIVENESS: Learning how to forgive that which seems unforgivable and taking responsibility for the mess.

WHY CHILDREN’S NEED COME FIRST IN A DIVORCE

The Divorce process can be challenging for you, your co-parent, and your children. It’s almost impossible to keep up with the blame game, the numerous changes happening at once, the mental and emotional stress, and the divorce proceedings itself. Your children might even end up suffering psychological, academic, and social consequences.  There is an average of 876,000 divorces per year in the United States, with 60% involving minors, and roughly one in two children will see their parents’ marriage dissolve. This is a concerning figure, especially when you consider the far-reaching effects of these divorces on each child. 

REASONS FOR EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

Your children might suffer one or more of the numerous effects of divorce for one of these reasons:

• The loss of stability and security: After a divorce, your child might no longer feel secure at home, they could get anxious, and show it by acting out or withdrawing into themselves.

 

• Conflict and tension: The quarrels and tension that come before a divorce create a stressful and unstable environment for your children. They may feel caught in the middle and like they have to choose a side.

 

• Change in family dynamics: A divorce brings about changes in the family dynamic, such as changes in parenting roles, and relationships with extended family members. Your child may struggle to adjust to these changes. Financial stress: You might no longer be able to afford your kids the life they had before the divorce if there is a change in the money flow. This can be disruptive and stressful.

 

• Loss of a parent: it’s always difficult to lose a parent to death, or to a divorce, and sadly some divorces mean that your children will lose regular contact with one parent. 21% of children in the states grow up without their fathers, and children generally find it difficult to come to terms with that.

 

• New Families: It might be difficult for your child to adjust to having a new family after a divorce, especially if there are step-siblings involved. 

 

• Quality of relationships: This along with your children’s age and personalities go a long way to determining how much your divorce might affect your children, and how much support they’re willing to accept.

EFFECTS OF DIVORCE ON CHILDREN

The effects of divorce on a child cannot be overstated. You should put your children first to avoid or reduce these effects on your child, and increase their chance at a successful future. Some of the effects of Divorce are immediate, and go away with time, due to the resilience of children. Others are not so easily handled despite their resilience and require therapy to fix. The child might also not recover from the effects of a divorce. Some of the more conventional effects of divorce on children are: EMOTIONAL DISTRESS

1. ANXIETY, DEPRESSION, MOOD SWINGS, AND IRRITABILITY: Your Children might get overwhelmed and anxious due to the changes that come with divorce. They can consider themselves the reason behind your divorce, and may also become depressed due to the loss of one parent or the disruption of their daily routine and may at times assume the responsibility of mending the relationship. Toddlers and preschoolers in most cases go back to being clingy, bed-wetting, thumb-sucking, and having temper tantrums.
2. VICTIMS OF ABUSE: They might overcompensate in their own relationships when they become grown-ups and endure abuse to not repeat history. Your child may even fail to recognize and respond to abusive behavior.
3. BEHAVIORAL PROBLEMS: Your children might get aggressive due to the stress and emotional turmoil caused by your divorce. If you get information like this, you also want to make sure you’ve been paying attention to them, and that they’re not seeking your attention by acting out.
4. DISILLUSION AND DISTRESS: If your children do not get the emotional support and reassurance they need from you and your co-parent, you should expect that they start feeling disillusioned, and eventually abandoned. 

SOCIAL PROBLEMS

5. DIFFICULT RELATIONSHIPS: It’s not easy to watch whole families from the viewpoint of a broken home, and your child might take it even harder, and start to feel on the outside among peers. They could find it really difficult to make friends and build relationships
6. RISK-TAKING BEHAVIORS: Studies show that Adolescents whose parents divorced when they were 5 years old or younger were at a particularly high risk of becoming sexually active before they turn 16. The anxiety, depression, and weakened parental supervision and support can make your child resort to substance abuse.
7. DELINQUENT BEHAVIORS: The stress and disruption caused by your divorce can lead to feelings of anger, frustration, and insecurity, and might contribute to the development of delinquent behavior.

ACADEMIC DIFFICULTIES

8. If your child struggles in school during the divorce period, It is definitely the stress, the emotional upheaval, or the disruption because they had to change schools. Most have to get used to new environments, teaching patterns, and classmates. There is a record of higher drop-out rates and lower rates of college graduation among Children like yours.

  Co-parenting is not easy; however, it can be a positive and rewarding experience for both the parents and children when it is done right. Co-parenting into the future can help you navigate these challenges with confidence. It is designed to help you provide your child with the best possible upbringing. Recognize the obstacles that may arise, and provide strategies for overcoming them. You have the opportunity to start the process and heal your family, your future, and your children’s future, don’t waste it. Enroll in the Co-parenting class now, and take the first step towards building a positive co-parenting relationship.