The Long-Term Scars of Divorce

By the time she was 5,
Elizabeth Marquardt was traveling across the country alone, flying
coach as she moved between her divorced parents. She says her parents
split with very little conflict, perhaps owing partly to another kind
of distance geographical between them.

Now 34, Marquardt seems well-adjusted, dividing time between
her job as a resident scholar for a Washington, D.C., think tank and
her own family, husband and two kids in Highland Park, Ill.

But beneath the veneer, Marquardt says, she and other young adults who
grew up in the divorce explosion of the '70s and '80s are still dealing
with wounds that they could never talk about with their parents. It's
that family situation that also serves as the backdrop of the movie
drama "The Squid and the Whale."

Marquardt's own experience, she says, was a catalyst for her research
in what she calls "the first national study of children of divorce,"
conducted with sociologist Norval Glenn of the University of Texas at
Austin. The results of the study and a poignant narrative of her own
experience are contained in her new book, Between Two Worlds:
The Inner Lives of Children of Divorce (Crown, 2005).

The key findings of the study by Marquardt and Glenn are these:

• The grown children of divorce say there is no such thing
  as a good divorce.
• Children of divorce say they spent a lot of time alone
  and, as a result, found some emotional distance between themselves and
  their parents.
• Even in an amicable split, divorce makes children grow up
  between the two distinct worlds of their parents, who often have
  different values and priorities.
• Children internalize the conflict between these two
  worlds. They say they feel they have to grow up too soon, act like
  different people around their parents, and keep secrets to preserve the
  peace.

The long-term scars of divorce

"Too many people have unrealistic ideas about
divorce," Marquardt said. "They think if you do it right, it won't be
so hard on the kids. And that's where this 'good divorce' idea is so
damaging and so seductive, because it basically tells parents a lie.

"Even for those of us who end up quote-unquote
successful," Marquardt said, "divorce shapes the identities of young
people for a lifetime in ways that we haven't noticed or haven't talked
about before mainly because all the research has been done by people
who did not themselves experience divorce as children."

The researchers to whom Marquardt alludes are Judith Wallerstein and E.
Mavis Hetherington. Wallerstein's 2000 book, The Unexpected
Legacy of Divorce (Hyperion, 2001), was criticized by some
for a small survey sample that said children are definitely harmed by
divorce.

Two years later, Hetherington's book For Better or for Worse:
Divorce Reconsidered
(Norton, 2003), which was based on extensive regional research, said
divorce doesn't leave the majority of children with lasting damage.

Though Wallerstein wrote a foreword for Between Two
Worlds, Marquardt hopes her book about divorce's subtler
effects can
avoid the point-counterpoint salvos of the earlier skirmish.

"For a long time," Marquardt said, "people have been
arguing about how many children of divorce end up with serious
delinquency or teen pregnancy or depression. What I do in this book is
go to a whole new level. And it's told from the perspective of the
young adults who are affected by divorce."

Marquardt agrees that, sometimes, a divorce is
necessary, as in cases of domestic violence, drug abuse, alcoholism or
infidelity. But two-thirds of marriages that end in divorce are simply
low-conflict relationships in which people drift apart.

"Divorce needs to happen sometimes, but it's always a
tragedy," she said. "A healthy marriage is an incredible gift to give
to your children, and it's possible for almost all of us."

Marquardt said she hopes adult children of divorce come
away from her book realizing, "It's not just me. I'm not alone." She
also hopes it will persuade couples who have a case of the blahs to try
harder to rekindle their relationship.

Source: The Record.
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