YOUTH AND BROKEN HOMES

By Mark Tittley

INTRODUCTION
During a quiet time at a camp I encouraged the young people to obey their parents. A young guy asked, "Which parents do I obey? My two sets of parents always says different things. I'm confused!" Another said, "I don't have that problem, I only have one parent to obey, I haven't seen dad since he left last year." This is the stark reality facing youth work in the 1990's. People get married today with the vow, "Til divorce us do part." One of the crisis that many teens must deal with is that of coping with their parents divorce.

Local figures released indicate that there were about 27 000 divorces in 1986 and 33 246 in 1987. About two-third of these divorces involved minor children, and in 1985 more than 25 000 children came from divorced homes.

The Talk magazine, May 1990, said, "There were 32 524 South African Children who were caught up in the pain of divorce in 1989." With statistics being quoted that one out of every three marriages end in divorce, and an article in the Daily news, Thursday, 20 September 1990 that said, "73 percent of children in South Africa come from broken homes; and that 150 000 children have been affected by divorce in the last four years" we must sense a grave concern for the children involved. Nobody comes through a divorce unaffected. While the effects will differ greatly in extent and severity, all are affected.

The problem with divorce is that it it is not just the parents who separate - it is the children who get separated from one or both of the parents. This added to the effects of divorce on children leaves little doubt as to why God has such a strong view toward divorce! We read in Malachi, "So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. I hate divorce" [Mal 2:15,16]. Paul reiterated this view, "a husband must not divorce his wife" [1 Cor 7:11]. We will deal with the effects on youth, responses from youth and how to minister to youth affected by broken home situations such as Divorce (separated-parent); Re-Marriage (Step-Parent) and Single-Parenthood.

1. TEENS AND SEPARATED-PARENTS

(1) Financial
When one parent leaves home the other partner has to carry the financial burden all alone. Mom will need to go out to work, if she was not out in the work place already, and money won't be readily available anymore. Youth will find that their responsibilities around the home will increase as a result. Real effort must be made to make the burden as light as possible.

(2) Custody
Youth will need to adapt to seeing one of their parents on an irregular basis, or perhaps even moving to another town and school. In South Africa at the moment when parents decide to divorce, children almost inevitable end up with their mother, as our courts favour giving the mother custody.

(3) Criticism
At times mom may confides in the young person, making dad out to be a baddie, or vice versa. Parents do this to make themselves look good or to gain an ally for support. Youth may respond by playing parents off against each other or take sides and reject either one of the parents.

(4) Boy/girlfriends
Parents will sooner or later begin to start seeing other people. Youth need to realise that parents still need love and people around them, so there is a strong possibility that they will begin dating again - which could lead to marriage and perhaps even to step brothers or sisters.

B. RESPONSES TO SEPARATION FROM YOUTH

(1) Sorrow at the Loss
A grief process is begun within the teen. They speak sorrowfully of the loss of an intact family and the lack of opportunity for a close relationship with their father. Youth feel caught in the web with nowhere to vent their feelings and often clam up, hoping that the pain will go away.

(2) Negative Feelings
They express feelings of sadness, neediness and vulnerability. Their emotional reactions are more difficult to resolve because the parent left voluntarily, whereas in death, the loss was not preventable. As a result their anger is stronger and will last longer.

(3) Loss of Security and Confidence
When parents divorce or separate, the adolescent loses a sense of security and confidence in the future because of the radical changes that occur within the home and family. The parent's choice to leave says to the teen that they are secondary, and assurances of the parents love for them is unreconciliable with their feeling of abandonment. When a secure home structure crumbles youth feel they have no one to turn to because the two most important people in their life no longer love each other.

(4) Self-Blame for the Divorce
They generally blame themselves for causing too much stress in the home, or in some way, ng caused the breakup of their parents marriage. Youth will ask themselves, "What is wrong with me?" or "What did I do to be punished like this?" They will tell themselves that if they had shown more love or being more obedient they could have prevented the separation.

(5) Withdrawal from Social Groups
Youth feel ashamed and embarrassed about their parents divorce and are often too embarrassed to tell their friends. This may lead to withdrawal from their social groups or they take out frustrations on their friends.

(6) Caution with Relationships
They are anxious about relationships with the opposite sex, marriage and personal commitment. They fear hurt or abandonment in relationships.

(7) Fluctuating Feelings to Parents
Throughout the period, feelings of youth for their parents go through changes. They vary between feelings of resentment and anger and being torn between them and wanting to protect one or both of their parents feelings.

C. MINISTRY TO YOUTH WITH SEPARATED PARENTS
Youth who are confronted with the "half-loss" of a parent through divorce need special care and counselling.

(1) Deal with the False Guilt Youth Experience
Help youth realise that they were not to blame for the marriage breakup. Lead youth away from accepting responsibility for the breakup.

(2) Ask Parents to Reassure Youth of their Love for them
The breakup of the marriage does not mean that the child-parent relationship will also break. Effort from parents can reassure youth of love and care.

(3) Encourage Youth to Share Feelings Openly
Often youth feel that one parent was more at fault than the other for the divorce. If these type of feelings can be expressed instead of harboured, healing can begin. Help youth to accept (without approval, necessarily) their parent's actions, to forgive the parent and to accept the new relationship.

(4) Encourage Youth to Interact with Both Parents as Normally as possible
This is hard to do if parents move away, but youth should work at continuing a normal relationship, as far as possible, with each parent.

(5) Find ways to Provide Parental Role Models
Parents make a mistake when they try to be both parents. This will give youth a confused role model. Help youth by linking them to opportunities for role identification with adults in different settings. Adults in the church can be identified, and asked to provide these youth with healthy, supportive and caring relationships.

A list of self-help tasks to assist youth cope with a divorce in their home:
* Turn to the object of your faith. Jesus is the anchor and help you need.
* Acknowledge the reality of the divorce. Don't live in false hope.
* Expect major changes in your home and life.
* Dissociate yourself from their parents problems.
* Get on with enjoying your own life as soon as possible.
* Express your grief. Do not bottle up negative emotions.
* Resolve anger toward your parents. Forgive parents for getting divorced.
* Avoid self blame you may burden yourself with. It's not your fault.
* Maintain positive and realistic hope for your own relationships.
* Find someone you can trust and confide in. Someone sufficiently detached.

A vital aspect of helping youth come to terms with divorce is getting youth to try and see the experience from their parents point of view. Encourage youth to see mom and dad as individuals who have feelings, who have their own likes and dislikes and who do make mistakes because they are not perfect. Parents also experience feelings of failure, guilt and inadequacy because of divorce. They need to talk to both parents, explaining their feelings to them.

Give youth time to mourn but don't let them go on thinking, "Dad will come home and he and mom will love each other again". Although it does happen, it is not often. So it is best to encourage youth to let go of the past.

2. TEENS AND STEP-PARENTS

A. EFFECTS OF STEP-PARENTHOOD ON YOUTH
In the early stages of remarriage the boys and girls are hostile, negative and angry, not only at their stepfathers but with their mothers as well. They are angry with their mother because she remarried. But these problems are usually temporarily.

Youth who experience the trauma of remarriage, the difficulty of divided loyalties and the change to new routines show signs of stress, anger, defiance and frustration.

B. RESPONSES TO STEP-PARENTHOOD FROM YOUTH
The responses from guys and girls to step-parents differ.

(1) Responses from Guys to Step-Parents
When the father leaves boys will be angry with their mom's because they have lost their dad, and they will fight about it a lot. But when a remarriage takes place they have nothing further to loose and view their stepfather as an advantage. If the stepfather does not try to be too assertive during the first year or two, boys adapt well. The best result comes when the stepfather offers emotional support and friendship and does not try to enforce discipline. Step-fathers should adopt a disciplinary role only after they have established good relationships with their stepchildren. In general, guys adapt relatively easily to their new roles in a step-family.

(2) Responses from Girls to Step-Parents
Girls cope more negatively with step-parent relationships than do guys, often turning the new home into an emotional battlefield. They have a particularly poor relationship with their stepfathers, remaining aloof and contrary. Girls tend to be very emotionally close to their mothers and view the stepfather as an intruder. They are against receiving expressions of love, especially if it involves touch, because they are unsure of how to love a parent who is not their own flesh and blood. The lesson for stepfathers to learn is: talk more and touch less.

Girls in families with stepmothers have great difficulty in adjusting. Relationships between stepmothers and daughters reaches its lowest ebb when the new marriage is at it's happiest. The reason for this is that when the father does get custody of the daughter the father daughter relationships develops and a close bond is formed. The daughter enjoys a privileged position. When the father re-marries the daughter views the stepmother as a competitor because the father devotes more time to his new wife. She displays intense jealousy. The situation is worsened when the stepmother tries too soon to adopt a parental role. This creates a conflict as the child is pulled between her biological mother and her stepmother.

A Young girl between 9 and 15 is trying to establish her own independence, so she views her stepfather as an outsider interfering in her life. Because she is experiencing conflict over her own emerging sexuality, and does not want to think of her mother as a sexual being, she will view normal signs of affection as lust. So when father arrives home and pecks mom on the cheek, she will say, "Disgusting! They're always kissing and cuddling."

C. MINISTRY TO YOUTH WITH STEP-PARENTS

(1) Listen to Youth
Provide an open channel of communication between you and the youth through programmes and messages that show your concern and desire to minister to youth who are experiencing difficulty relating to "new parents" in the home.

(2) Show Genuine Concern
Even if the young person is unreasonably by rejecting their step-parent, show that you are genuinely concerned and willing to understand life from their perspective. Probe their situation with "information-gathering" questions to gain a deeper understanding of their life situation.

(3) Expel False Myths
The age old myth that step-mothers are dragons must be banished forever. Pliny the Elder reflected this myth way back in about 50 AD when he asked whether nature has proved to be "a kind parent to man or a merciless step-mother." By encouraging youth to view the new parent from a Christian perspective of love and acceptance they will make healthy adjustments to them.

Some statistics say that 60% of children being born today can expect to live in a single-parent family sooner or later. These children will be affected!

A. EFFECTS OF SINGLE-PARENTHOOD ON YOUTH

(1) Altered Developmental Patterns
As youth raised by a single parent begin to assert themselves, express ideas different from their parent, want more control of their lives and become more demanding, their parent reacts. Some parents feel their children are out of control. They can't wait for the child to turn 18 and leave home. They begin to subtly or openly push them out, while other parents have drawn so close to their child that they need to let go of them.

(2) Possible Delinquent Behaviour
While it is wrong to say that children brought up in a single-parent home will become delinquent - a distorted family is usually in the background of the delinquent. The lack of home discipline will result in an undisciplined youth.

Discipline in a single parent home is usually extremely harsh or extremely permissive. Permissiveness communicates a lack of concern and love.

(3) Lower educational achievements
Youth from one-parent families are three times more likely to be suspended from school and twice as likely to drop out, according to the book, A Cry for Help, by Dr. Mary Griffin and Carol Felsenthal.

(4) Loss of Comfort and Protection
Advice to the single-parent that emphasises how "resilient" children are, may reassure the mother or father's conscience, but it cannot give the child the comfort or psychological protection of two parents. The youth leader can play a vital role in helping to provide these young people with a solid friendship- relationship that will bring comfort and protection to the youth.

B. RESPONSES TO SINGLE-PARENTHOOD FROM YOUTH
Responses are varied depending on the individual. Some common responses are:
* Taking advantage of the weakened parent.
* Taking hold of the situation to enhance their own feelings of competence by helping to parent the younger children.
* Finding a way to feel appreciated because they feel more needed to help the family survive.

C. MINISTRY TO YOUTH WITH SINGLE-PARENTS
Single-parenting is probably one of the most demanding tasks that people in our society ever confront. If marriage and family structure are best for a fulfilling and meaningful life, then the single-parent is having to operate without a major source of potential support. Because there is only one responsible adult present he or she has to work much harder and longer hours, doing a wider variety of tasks. This combination of an increased workload and a decreased support system creates stress for the parent.

A Ministry to youth with single-parents will be effective if we give youth:

(1) A Substitute Role Model
For the young guy without a father figure in the home, the male youth leader can play a vital role as a role model. This will help him develop a balanced personality. A leadership couple can provide youth with a "surrogate" parental support system and environment where healthy development can exist. A good marriage modeled will help youth adjust to their own life partner later.

(2) Love and Acceptance
Youth from broken homes need love and acceptance like a fish needs water! Provide an accepting environment where youth feel wanted, a sense of belonging and know the joy of being involved in a stable and secure peer group. Loving youth involves letting them talk openly about their home life without judging them. Be a sounding board for youth.

(3) Comfort and Protection
The youth leader can play a vital role in helping to provide these young people with a solid friendship-relationship that will bring them the comfort and protection they so desperately need.

(4) Discipline in Love
Youth from such homes lack discipline. By discipline is not meant punishment! Discipline is the act of stretching the mind and body of a person so that when the performance comes, it can be a pleasure because of the pain a person faced in practise. Giving youth positive direction, teaching youth how to act in the life-situations they will encounter, and moulding youth into young adults for God is vital for youth from single-parent homes to develop healthy characters.

(5) A Challenge to Support The Parent
This includes helping to share the extra workload at home in whatever way possible as well as taking a more active and loving role in relation to their parent. This will give youth a sense of value and importance as they assist in the home and minister to the needs of their parent.

A. GOD DOES NOT WANT DIVORCE, BUT HE REMAINS IN CONTROL WHEN IT HAPPENS
"Some Pharisees came and tested him by asking, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?...Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce and send her away..."

"It was because your hearts were hard that Moses wrote you this law," Jesus replied. "But at the beginning of creation God "made them male and female"...Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate." [Mark 10:2, 4-6, 9]

B. GOD WILL ACT IN THE PLACE OF YOUR PARENTS TO TAKE CARE OF YOU
"My father and mother may abandon me, but the Lord will take care of me." [Psalm 27:10]

What does God promise to do when we feel forsaken by our parents?

Complete the sentence, "If God is my loving heavenly "Dad", I can...

C. GOD WILL ALWAYS BE THERE TO HELP YOU
"God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea..." [Psalm 46:1,2]
"...and be content with what you have, because God has said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you." [Hebrews 13:5]

D. DO NOT TAKE SIDES, RATHER BE THE PEACEMAKER
"The first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him." [Proverbs 18:17]
"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God." [Matthew 5:9]

What do these verses tell us to do when we are caught in the middle?
If your parents want you to take sides, how should you react?
If your parents accuse you of being the problem, how should you react?

E. TRUST GOD'S WISDOM AND NOT YOUR OWN
"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight." [Proverbs 3:5-6]

F. TRY TO FORGIVE YOUR PARENTS IF THEY HAVE HURT YOU
"Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you." [Col 3:13]

How could you help someone who is living through a divorce situation?

Divorce is a difficult issue to deal with, but commit yourself to be his special kind of peacemaker when you are called on. As Jesus said, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." [John 14:27]