Participants: Alanzo & June Smith
Series Code: FFH
Program Code: FFH00002B
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00:01 Welcome back to Families 4 Heaven.
00:03 We are talking about divorce and the devastating effect 00:09 it has on families in general. 00:13 Janet is our guest and Janet has had an experience that 00:17 she is sharing with us. 00:18 Janet, so here you are, you found out that the person 00:23 you married is not really the ideal person that you 00:27 thought he was. 00:28 What was happening? 00:30 Well the communication between the both of us started 00:33 lacking, we started speaking less and less to each other. 00:37 We would deal with everyday issues such as bills, 00:43 mortgages, and different things, but we were not dealing 00:47 on a personal level, feelings, emotions, and sharing 00:51 each other's thoughts. 00:54 It came to be as if we were roommates living under the 00:59 same roof and things just started falling apart. 01:02 You notice that she said the first thing that went was 01:06 communication, communication. 01:09 When people are hurting, they tend to shut down. 01:13 Instead of identifying the problem, they withdraw. 01:18 That usually leads to dysfunction, now they hurt 01:23 separately without clarifying exactly what the issue is. 01:27 If you haven't identified the problem your 01:30 are unable to solve it. 01:32 The communication, lack of communication leads to the 01:37 next thing, you both become roommates, no longer lovers. 01:41 No longer friends, hugging and all of what you thought 01:45 you would be doing during courtship, 01:47 you are now just roommates. 01:49 Okay Janet, tell us what happened. 01:52 Well I started noticing at family outings he wanted to 01:57 spend less and less time with me and the children. 02:02 At one point I went to a family event, a family member 02:08 approached me and asked me where was my husband? 02:12 At every single family meeting I was going alone with 02:16 my children and I didn't realize now other people were 02:20 becoming aware of the fact that our marriage 02:23 was falling apart. 02:26 So when my family member approached me and asked me that 02:30 question, it was a reflection and it hurt very much. 02:35 I realized at that moment that the subject could no 02:40 longer be set aside, it had to be addressed. 02:43 I went home and spoke to him about it, 02:46 I spoke to my husband about it at that time. 02:50 What happened was he just started revealing to me that 02:55 he was frustrated over the fact that he had made such a 02:59 long lasting decision at such a young age. 03:03 He realized at that moment he had made a great mistake. 03:07 But we were already married with our home and our two 03:11 children and it was very difficult to hear those words. 03:15 But I was still in the back of my mind, was very hopeful that 03:19 we could work this out. 03:21 I continued trying to push the marriage, my mistake was 03:27 I disregarded, even when he told me that, I just ignored 03:32 it and continued going. 03:34 In denial? Janet: in denial I just did not want to 03:37 believe. Alonzo: you just didn't want to hear that. 03:39 Isn't that consistent when someone is trying to hold onto 03:42 something they treasure, but at the same time it's... 03:44 Obviously what appeared to happen was they both had two 03:49 different goals, she wanted to preserve her marriage and 03:53 try to work it out to protect her nest, but he wanted out 03:56 because he had thought he lost his youth by taking on 04:00 all these responsibilities and woke up later and found 04:03 out that much of his fun time was now gone. 04:06 Now he has to be a father and a husband and 04:09 he got overwhelmed. 04:11 There is a lesson in that for you young people. 04:15 It is one thing to say you are in love, and some of you 04:20 elope and go get married, and some won't listen to 04:23 counsel and they get married. 04:25 It is one thing to do that, it is another thing when the 04:29 reality of married life hits you. 04:32 Marriage is not just about romance, there is much 04:35 more than that. 04:37 Marriage is about paying the bills. 04:39 When children come into play, it's being a father, being 04:43 there, a mother being there and taking care of 04:47 responsibilities and when that starts occurring on a 04:52 daily basis, then it somehow changes how you feel about 04:58 the person that you once say you are in love with. 05:01 So there are some cautions there and we are asking 05:03 you to take note. 05:05 So Janet, eventually what happened? 05:10 Eventually he started, he used to work a lot of overtime. 05:15 I trusted him 100% and believed that he was working at 05:21 night during night shifts. 05:24 So one day he was working a night shift and I just 05:31 got this overwhelming feeling that he wasn't 05:40 working at that time. 05:42 I don't know how to explain it, I just felt these 05:47 emotions go through and at that moment I opened my eyes 05:52 and finally woke up and realized that he wasn't working. 05:57 He was seeing someone else and I knew by just instinct. 06:02 It was without any physical proof at that moment. 06:08 Well later on that night he came home and I actually, 06:13 when I got that feeling, started calling his cell phone. 06:18 Usually he would pick up right away, and an hour had gone 06:23 by and he wouldn't pick up his phone. 06:25 At that moment I was almost 100% sure that 06:31 he was with someone else. 06:32 When he finally called back, I didn't let him speak 06:37 once he said hello, I just told him on the phone I know 06:42 exactly what he was doing. 06:43 I told him to please come home, just drop whatever you're 06:49 doing at that moment and please come home because he 06:53 has basically been caught because I knew where he was 06:57 and what he was doing. Alonzo: did he come home? 06:58 He came home almost 2 hours later. 07:01 I was waiting for him in the living room in the dark, 07:04 so when he walked in he did not see me sitting 07:07 in the living room. 07:08 I called him into the living room and as we sat there I 07:13 started speaking to him and he didn't want to talk. 07:16 He just had his head down the whole time, like he was 07:20 feeling ashamed because he had been caught. 07:26 So I told him at that time that I understood. 07:32 This is how in love I was, I understood that he had made 07:36 a mistake, that if he was willing to let this person go, 07:40 I was willing to forget and continue our marriage. 07:44 At that moment he revealed that he was no longer in 07:47 love with me, he just didn't want to be a part of the 07:50 marriage anymore. 07:53 Wow, okay. 07:54 Dr. Smith: that must've been awful hurtful. 07:55 Janet: it was, it was horrible. 07:58 It's amazingly, even though life has moved on and things 08:02 have gotten better, how the memory links to that heartache. 08:10 Dr. Smith: I'm sorry I just want to piggyback on that 08:13 because it is not inconsistent that women, especially 08:17 women, this happens with men too, but when you are a 08:21 mother, and you have your children to protect, even when 08:26 you see blaring abuse, you know this is wrong and should 08:31 be happening, you still try to keep your nest. 08:34 Because that is what mothers do, 08:37 you watch over your chicks. 08:39 Alonzo: it is so sad, no matter how hard one person 08:46 tries, if the other person is not willing, 08:50 eventually it will go. 08:53 Maybe somebody is watching this program and you are 08:57 going through the same situation. 08:59 Not so much the person that wants to hold on to the 09:03 marriage, but the person who is breaking away, 09:06 who is saying I want to be out of this marriage. 09:10 Is it possible that you could just pause and take a 09:13 deep breath, and introspective look into yourself? 09:17 Maybe you have children, family and could you just maybe 09:22 get some help, professional help, because that is the 09:28 right thing to do. 09:30 It is the manly thing to do, it is the womanly thing to 09:33 do, it is the best thing to do. 09:36 You know something, most of all is the godly thing to do. 09:40 Now we are moving to talk about the effect of divorce 09:44 on children. 09:46 Before we do that, Janet how did it end? 09:51 Eventually we ended up getting divorced, the divorce was 09:56 finalized, it was a process but. 10:00 Alonzo: a painful experience I'm sure. 10:02 Janet: a very painful experience for the whole family. 10:05 Alonzo: for the children as well. 10:06 Janet: for the children as well, 10:08 they have suffered a lot. 10:10 Alonzo: when we talk about the devastating effect of 10:14 divorce on children, we are not insensitive to the 10:18 whole family, as a matter of fact when there is a 10:21 divorce no one wins. 10:24 No matter how, no one. 10:27 For children, however there is this delayed reaction. 10:34 By this I mean, a parent might get divorced when the 10:40 child is at age 5, 6, at that time the child might not 10:46 react in any significant way. 10:48 They may or they may not. 10:50 But when the child reaches 14 or 15 or 16, there is a 10:55 possibility that the divorce could have traumatizing 11:00 affect on the child. 11:02 That is what we call delayed response. 11:06 Another impact is that children are as damaged or harmed 11:12 as older children, meaning younger children have a 11:17 devastating results as much as the adolescent 11:20 or older child. 11:22 Sometimes because the child is young and they can't 11:25 articulate their pain, they are not able to make sense 11:29 of all the details of what's going on, they seem like 11:32 they don't understand, but it doesn't mean that they 11:35 are not being negatively impacted. 11:38 So parents, or the caregivers, shouldn't dismiss a child 11:43 and think they don't know what is going on. 11:46 Our recommendation is that you really need to follow the 11:49 child closely, secure them with a lot of emotional 11:52 support, give them a stable of an afterlife as you can, 11:57 so the child can keep their normalcy. 12:01 As quickly as you are able to you get 12:04 them professional help. 12:07 Regressive behavior is almost the opposite 12:11 of delayed response. 12:13 In this case, rather than the problem coming years later, 12:17 we find the child going back. 12:20 For example a child that was no longer wetting the bed, 12:24 could resort to bed wetting. 12:26 These are some of things that can happen to children. 12:30 Divorce has it's traumatizing effect on children. 12:34 Sometimes children become confused about relationships. 12:38 Your mom and dad are two people who love you most. 12:44 When you see this love broken as it were, or separated, 12:49 you are not sure what love really means. 12:52 So as you grow up it sometimes creates confusion in your 12:57 emotions, and when you say you love you are not sure you 13:01 are loving like mommy and daddy loved, or you are loving 13:04 like somebody else should. 13:07 You find the children that go through a divorce, or many 13:11 children, not all of them, but many children who go 13:13 through a divorce become confused about their emotions. 13:16 Divorce is a very stressful life event. 13:19 What would you say to someone who say to you say to 13:26 how do I get over the pain of losing someone that I truly 13:32 love, how do I get over that pain? 13:34 Much like you get over the crisis in your life, or other 13:41 crises, you have to accept that this has happened. 13:46 Except that you still have life. 13:50 You have a family and you have yourself, you have other 13:53 people that love and support you, and you must move on. 13:58 There are concerns, for example, there is social concern, 14:03 the fate of the divorce is not just the family and home 14:08 environment, it spills out into society. 14:11 Many children, the children in the school and society, 14:16 when you trace it, it is from a divorced broken home. 14:20 It has economic concerns, there's spiritual concerns. 14:24 It affects their spiritual health of the family and it 14:27 also affects the economy of the family. 14:30 Children who come out of a family that experiences a 14:35 divorce sometimes end up with emotions of anger. 14:41 They get really frustrated in understanding the pain 14:46 that they feel and they are not likely, or not usually 14:51 able to make sense of that anger. 14:54 Because they still love their parents, they are not 14:56 divorced from their parents, the parents are divorced 14:59 from each other. 15:00 But daddy is still my dad and mommy is still my mom 15:04 and I love them both. 15:06 So they don't know what to do with those emotions often. 15:09 You know there is a big difference between 15:11 a divorce and a death. 15:13 As matter of fact sometimes the divorce is far more 15:17 painful then death. 15:18 Because when there is a death you have flowers and cards 15:22 and there's a funeral and burial and things like that. 15:26 When there is a divorce there is sometimes no friends, 15:30 no cards, no flowers and you are left alone. 15:34 That makes it even more painful. 15:37 Sometimes you feel guilty and that leads to self-reproach 15:42 or self-hate. 15:44 In fact, sometimes people hurt themselves because they 15:48 think they are responsible for what happened. 15:50 Or they begin to reflect deeply on how they may have contributed 15:54 to the breakdown in that family. 15:56 And instead of getting help and relocating their pain, 15:59 they hurt themselves even more. 16:02 Janet, did you stay in your pain for ever or have you 16:09 moved on with your life? 16:10 Where are you now, share with us. 16:12 Will we serve a wonderful God who blessed me and my children 16:18 with a wonderful man. 16:19 I got remarried, and have been married 16:23 for four years now. 16:24 He is a God fearing man and our home is now 16:29 a happy home again. 16:31 Alonzo: beautiful, that is beautiful. 16:33 In other words you have picked up the broken pieces, 16:36 brushed things off and move on. 16:40 We recommend that whatever your situation is, 16:45 trust in God. 16:47 If you are listening to us and your family is going 16:49 through a difficult time, you are contemplating a 16:52 divorce, again I appeal to you get some professional help 16:58 and turn matters over to your Creator and your Maker, 17:04 because He has the power to change things. 17:07 He has the power to change you, and He has the power 17:10 to change your situation. 17:12 We hope that by you watching this program, if you are 17:16 going through this problem you will find some help. 17:21 Thank you for watching and have a great day. |
Revised 2014-12-17