"They don't speak any more... He hates her... She's always criticizing him... He's not allowed near the house... She's burnt all the photographs..."
Young people are always upset when their parents split. But let's be clear: When parents stay in a loveless relationship it's no better for young people than ending that loveless relationship. Living with two parents who clearly hate each other is just as damaging as going between parents who've split up and never want to see each other again. So this isn't about the rights and wrongs of splitting up. Sometimes feelings do change. Sometimes we meet other people. Sometimes it's better to split. But...
The cruellest thing is when parents, angry and hurt, insist to their children that they never loved each other in the first place. In my experience, that's what damages young people the most.
Nine times out of ten, it's not true. However painful it may be for warring parents to remember, there was a time—however fleeting—when they did love or did at least fancy each other. Their child was conceived and born into that. Not into hatred and bitterness and resentment. Once upon a time, two people were together and had fun. They laughed. They talked. Sometimes they had holidays. They told each other things. They thought they were right for each other.
Looking back to the time before the split, it's painful to remember these things. They're hard to acknowledge, even though they're true. When things have changed so much, it's hard for parents to believe that they could ever have had those feelings for each other. "What fools we were! I don't think we were ever really in love..."
But it didn't feel like that at the time and that's what really, really matters. All young people are building a sense of who they are and the story that they tell about their lives will determine the way they see themselves. The terrible fact is that when a young person's autobiographical story begins "When I was born, my parents were fighting and I wasn't wanted..." or "My parents never loved each other in the first place—I don't know why they had me..." the story tends to end unhappily because, for the young person growing up, it feels like an emptiness at the heart of everything. It feels as if all those sweet words of reassurance ("We didn't love each other but we loved you!") are false. False, false, false. For young people, the uncertainty never entirely goes away. Am I loveable? Have I ever been loveable?
I'm not suggesting that we should lie to our children. I'm suggesting that we should tell the truth as it was at the time. It's hard for young people to believe that they could possibly have been loved as babies if their parents didn't love each other. Or if their bitter, resentful parents still won't admit that— once upon a time—they felt differently.
