CHANGES IN YOUR ROLE

Staying involved

When a partnership breaks down and you move out of the family residence, then your role in your child’s life automatically changes. Many of the responsibilities and chores of being a parent fall on the adult who has residency. So from now on your role will not involve much of the daily routine. Although, for example, you may agree to pick the kids up from school each day, or see them every day at teatime, you will probably not be sleeping under the same roof as your ex-partner, so change is inevitable.

Most divorced dads miss the daily routine of seeing and interacting with their children, and this becomes a great source of sorrow. They miss the chance to read a bedtime story, or have daily meals with the kids, and are not there when their child falls off the swing in the garden, or to help with homework. If you are a typical divorced dad then you will feel the same way.

Missing out on the daily routine is one of the hardest parts of being a divorced dad. Recognise that you share this feeling with almost every man in your situation and develop strategies to cope with it:

• If you find yourself slipping into a depression because it is ten at night and you have not had contact with your kids, turn your negative emotion into a positive one by planning what you will do with them when you can next see them. Focus on what you will do next: visualise the moment, and look forward to it.
• Talk to a friend. Or even better ...
• Talk to your mum. You may be surprised that your mum is probably the best listener that you can turn to. She will know what you are feeling and will not make judgements about your emotions.

Or you could go down the pub, get drunk with your mates and feel even worse the next day.

The fact of the matter is that this new routine is a part of your new life. Unless you are planning to get back together with your ex this is a part of your future that you will have to come to terms with. It’s a fact in your change of role as a divorced dad.

There are other negative aspects about your new role as a divorced dad. If you want to get depressed about it the list is endless: schooling, hobbies, what they can watch on TV, how much TV they can watch and so on ... your influence in these areas will now be small. But you need to focus on what you can achieve and how you can influence the upbringing of your children, not on what you can’t control. Focusing on the negatives will make you depressed, angry and bitter; this will add to your stress levels and affect your outlook on your current position.

The fact that you are not there for much of it does not mean that you need to remove yourself from whole aspects of your child’s life. In fact it is important for the development of your child that they know that you are taking an interest in all the events in their lives. Make sure that you become aware of what is going on in your child’s environment outside the home.

Just because you are not around all the time, don’t remove yourself from other aspects of your child’s life. Continue to take an active interest in, and be concerned about:

• school
• friends
• homework
• TV
• hobbies
• sport.

Your child will also want to know that you are still interested and want to share their successes and failings with you in these areas. Try to be around and take an interest as they will want to share these things with you. This will be very difficult in the early stages of your separation but as time goes by, and emotions between you and your ex calm down, you will need to create time in your week to get involved in all these things.

Positive changes

It is not all bad news. Because your relationship with your child is for you to determine from now on, you can influence the role that you will play in their future very strongly. You might have some obstacles placed in your way, but as the child gets older these will fall away, and if you have placed a little thought into it your relationship will flourish. It is all about deciding what type of dad you want to be. In fact, you can become a better dad as a result of being separated than you were when you were living at home.

Being a great dad is about creating a positive influence on your children. Many dads still in a relationship fail to achieve this, and completely miss the opportunity to assist their children in their development. They are lazy in encouraging them along, are more interested in coming home and watching the TV, or going down the pub, and spend very little quality time with their offspring.

You can be a lousy dad when you are in a relationship but to be a great dad takes time and effort. Remember the old saying, ‘to be a father is easy ... to be a great dad is the difficult job’.

You don’t have to be a child psychologist to know what is good for your own kids. In fact it is probably best that you aren’t, as great parents just do what comes naturally and focus on providing the simple things in a child’s life. Mostly, these can be summed up as catering for the emotional being and welfare of the child: love, support, encouragement and care.