Once you have finished gathering all your divorce information, sought all the divorce advice that was out there, found divorce help by hiring an attorney and financial planner after you have learned everything there is to know about how to get a divorce there is one decision that has no fast, cut-and-dried answers: how to raise your children in two households.

Custody of the children can be a major talking point when negotiating a divorce settlement. Depending on how near or far from one another the parents choose to live, it is possible for children to spend equal time with both of them. Once the marital home is sold (if this is what you decide to do) you may work it out so that both spouses can live in smaller, separate homes within your children’s school district. Furthermore, alimony payments can help out with the mortgage.

What ever you and your spouse may do or argue about, don’t sucked into the trap of neglecting your children. As a parent, the kindest thing you can do is to arrange a quick and easy divorce lasting from a few weeks to a month.

If the circumstances of your situation allow it, joint physical custody of your children may be the healthiest option. A child may struggle to understand the mere concept of divorce; all the more so when coping with divorce. When both parents are available to their children, life after divorce can be a time of healing.

Nathan Dawson writes for http://www.lifeaftermarriage.com a great online source for finance information.

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Hi, I am your child. I just lost my family. My dad doesn’t live with us anymore. Nobody even asked me about it. You just told me and thought that hugging me and telling me that you love me was enough. It wasn’t.

This is the lament of our children. We tell ourselves we are doing what is in their best interest but rarely do we respect how they feel. We try to tell them everything will be okay, yet they feel the stress and tension we are under. We tell them that our love is unchanged but they watch helplessly as they lose one thing after another.

As divorcing parents, we are admonished by child advocates, mediators and the courts to put the child’s interest first. But many times, our actions send a different message to our children. Post-divorce, I was challenged with two decisions. One was subtle and the other was more blatant, but both required that I put my child’s BEST interest before my own.

Should I change my name back to my maiden name? This was one of those decisions I had to make. To me, my husband’s last name represented pain. It tied me to a life that I preferred to disconnect from in every possible way. But, to my son, this last name connected all of us. This last name signified his belonging.

A child may perceive a name change as your decision to detach from him. He might wonder if his mother’s love has changed somehow. Someone once said, “there is no right or wrong, but only perception.” Post-divorce, our children need to feel connected; otherwise, they feel vulnerable and unsafe. Likewise, I considered that my changing to my maiden name might make my child feel a heightened sense of abandonment.

Then there was the issue of custody. How much time should the child spend with each parent? This is a very sensitive and scary issue that is often decided by the courts as we parents clamor not to lose importance and visibility in our child’s life.

Initially, my ex and I tried a split custody arrangement where our son lived with his father for one week, then our son lived with me for one week. This was his ongoing schedule. Almost immediately, this took its toll on our son. It was too unstable. His father and I had different lifestyles. Our values, our priorities, our expectations and other inconsistencies created chaos as our child had to constantly recalibrate and switch on a weekly basis.

Our son spent most of his time preparing to leave one residence and preparing to go to another. He was constantly doing laundry and constantly cleaning up his room. Sure, these are great skills for our child to have but, due to the schedule, he never got a break.

Then there was homework. If he had a project due in a week or two, he’d have to split its preparation between two households. Then while getting ready for school, our son would often discover that he didn’t have a textbook or some other important school item. He’d stress over trying to remember where he last had it. And many times, this would involve going back to his dad’s and searching for it.

Despite our efforts to have clothes, toiletries and other comforts of home at both residences and coordinating schedules, something as simple as clothing became hugh. For instance, our child had a favored outfit at one house and wanted to wear it at the other. To tell him he couldn’t, because it was at his dad’s house, sent the message that he couldn’t wear his own clothes. But on the other hand, if he did wear the favored outfit or removed clothes from one residence, he’d have to transport his desired outfits between houses. And inadvertently, one house would end up with more clothes than the other. Hence, a simple decision became stressful and cumbersome.

I encourage divorcing parents, and every parent for that matter, to value your child’s feelings. Please strive to make decisions that honor his importance and nourish his spirit.

Suzette R. Hinton, SAC-I, Certified Life and Mentor Coach, Counselor and Mother. Graduate of CANA, Inc. (http://www.CoachingInstituteofNorthAmerica.com) and Founder of Purposeful Connections (http://www.purposefulconnections.com). Suzette believes that purpose is not only a destination but it is the energy that pushes us toward its fulfillment.

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I wrote this article several years ago after an eight year old girl piloting an airplane crashed and was killed. While the story is old, the lessons we can lift from the story still ring true today, and always.

Play, not pilot

Should Jessica have been up there or not?

That’s the question I have been asked dozens of times since 8-year-old Jessica Dubroff died when her plane crashed during her attempt to become the youngest pilot to fly across America.

In general, I’m very reluctant to comment on a situation involving parents and their children when I don’t have all the facts. But this case is fairly cut and dried, and we have all the information we need.

Let’s put aside, for a moment, the following:

In most states, you have to be 21 to drink legally, 18 to vote, 16 to drive a car and 15 just to be behind the wheel of a car with a parent present. You even have to be a certain size to get on the more intense rides at Disney World.

Let’s instead talk about something I have not heard asked during all the reactions to this tragic loss of life: What’s the No. 1 job of children?

If it’s to be little adults, then we can continue to push children to achieve beyond their years.

However, children are not little adults.

They are children.

The No. 1 job and task of children is simply to play.

Child therapist and registered play-therapist supervisor Art Cleveland has this to say about the importance and power of play in the life of a child:

“We as adults often say that children are ‘just playing.’ Children are never just playing. They are constantly dealing with their hopes, dreams, fears and anxieties through play. Without play, children cannot master their world. When this process is rushed, even by well-meaning adults, children lose not only their childhood but the opportunity for a happy adulthood as well. Jessica’s childhood was on a crash course before she ever climbed into the cockpit.”

Said another way, raising healthy children comes down to what is developmentally appropriate for a child.

What is developmentally appropriate is not necessarily what a child says he or she wants to do. Children can talk a good game, but they are not necessarily ready and/or able to follow that up with appropriate behavior.

When I was 8, I wanted to grow up to be a grizzly bear. While my wife might say that at times I have made it, this was a child’s wish, not connected to reality in any way.

If something can be done, then should it be?

In my work with teen-agers, I have found they are great at wanting to be older than they are.

But what I encourage them to do is, if they are 16, simply be 16. Be a child, then be a teen-ager, then be an adult.

There’s going to be plenty of time to be an adult.

The goal is to make it that far, learn and have fun on the way.

In conclusion, perhaps we can look at one more issue that could provide some insight in the case of this little girl.

In the movie “Jurassic Park,” the character played by Jeff Goldblum has this to say about the scientists who created the dinosaurs:

“They were so busy figuring out if they could, they never slowed down long enough to ask if they should.”

Let’s hope that more parents will now be encouraged to ask this question about their children.

Visit http://www.ParentingYourTeenager.com for tips and tools for thriving during the teen years. For regular weekly tips you can subscribe to our f-ree Parenting Your Teenager Newsletter. You can also subscribe to our f*r*e*e 5 day e-program on The Top 5 Things to Never Say to Your Teenager from parenting coach and expert Jeff Herring.

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