Avoiding the holiday stress as co-parents in California
The emotional toll of a divorce is something that can be healed over time. However, when holidays approach, the negative feelings may come back, as other families spend time together and celebrate. The holiday season may be especially painful for a child with divorced parents, even if all legal issues surrounding the child custody, visitation and parenting plans have been resolved.
Parents in Orange County who are going through this can take steps to alleviate this kind of family holiday stress. According to sources, an expert noted that through careful planning and good communication, children who experience his or her parent’s divorce can still enjoy the holidays.
The holiday season is a great opportunity for divorced parents to show their children that they can still celebrate and have some fun time even though mom and dad are not married anymore. To achieve this, good communication between parents and children is the essential.
Both parents can set aside their feelings and concentrate more on how the children spend the holidays with each parent without the stress. How they will communicate with the children is important as well because the child may misinterpret a parent’s tone of voice when they are about to spend holidays with the other parent.
Also, planning in advance may benefit both parents and children. Doing so may allow parents to deal with certain time conflicts and changes, preventing any problems that may affect the child during the actual holiday. Once the holiday plan is created, both parents should make every effort to stick to it.
All children are usually excited about the holidays and parents should not waste that opportunity to strengthen the parent’s relationship with their children. It is also the chance for divorced parents to show their love and care for their child, regardless of the relationship between the parents.
Source: Herald-Standard, “Holiday stress take a toll on children from divorced families,” Susy Kelly, Dec. 10, 2013
