Every marriage with children that ends in divorce will produce some level of “was I not good enough” in the children involved. What happens as a result depends upon the maturity of the child, as well as the maturity of the parents.
It takes a lot of work for a marriage to be successful. If we were all perfect human beings, that wouldn’t be difficult. But we’re all far from perfect, and we bring to marriage our particular needs, flaws and faults. Sometimes they mesh with our partner’s needs. It’s more likely they’ll mesh for a few years and then conflict will begin.
No one would say they intentionally sought out an abusive mate. Counseling may show the reason a woman was attracted to and married a abusive man was her earlier childhood conditioning. She may have grown up in an abusive household and her “comfort zone,” the relationships she understands best, will be abusive. Once she is able to change her need, if her mate is unable to change, she will have outgrown the relationship and divorce would be the likely result.
How could the children possibly understand? Growing up in a troubled marriage, the children may act out the violence they see. Or they may believe that they can do something to change what is happening between the two people who control their world. They become star athletes, they become straight ‘A’ students, they become the best they can be. And when their best can’t keep divorce out of their lives, they believe they’re failures.
Some children may decide the only way to keep such pain from happening to them is to never commit completely to another person. For some of these children, no matter how old they get, they will always be striving to be better and better. They’ll reach for the top in their career, they’ll be workaholics, they’ll sacrifice themselves and their personal relationships to prove they, indeed, are good enough.
Other children may run from the pain. They may hide behind a clownish exterior, hoping that no one sees how much they’re crying inside. They may build a wall beyond which no one can reach. They may become runaways.
Other children respond to household strife by stealing cars, breaking and entering, or mugging strangers. They make take a gun to school and terrorize students and teachers.
Whether or not your children show signs that they have been affected by divorce or a dysfunctional home, they may be better at hiding their feelings than other children.