My favorite thing about being a parent, is my child, I think that is true for most, if not all parents. There are so many challenges when you are single, but the rewards are worth it.
Often we wonder if we are doing the right thing, if our children are going to resent us later because of the divorce. Maybe they will, or maybe they won’t, either way, we have to do what we think is best. It seems like a divorce would never be in the best interest of your child, but sometimes it is.
It is important to remember that we, as parents, are our children’s first role models. When they are toddlers they want to be just like us, this includes the relationships we have. If your daughter sees that her mother is abused or has no say in her own life, this is what she will think is normal and when the time comes for her to find a husband, she will seek the same type of relationship she has witnessed her whole life.
The same is true of our sons. If a boy sees his father be mean, hyper critical or abusive to his mother he will think that is the way a man behaves and will, in turn, treat his wife the same way. I don’t know a single woman in the world who would want her son to be abusive in any way to his wife, or want her daughter to be mistreated. It is important that we don’t model behaviors we don’t want our children to imitate, otherwise we are failing them and setting them up for the same future we had.
Sometimes the best thing we can do is to get our children out of that situation. Even if you never get married again while your children are little, you can still model safe, healthy relationships. When your children see how you treat the people around you and how they treat you, they are learning an important lesson. When your children see you stand up for yourself or for them, in a healthy, non abusive way, they are learning an important lesson.
Almost as important as food and shelter, the ability to relate to the people around you in a healthy way is a necessity. It is very important that we show our children how to treat other people, it’s important for us, as parents, when they become teenagers, but more importantly, it is vital to their future happiness.