In 2012, statistics showed that 50 percent of marriages ended in divorce. Divorce is any formal separation of husband and wife according to established custom. Two years ago I was affected by this when my parents got a divorce. It was an extremely difficult age to experience such a tragic change in my life. My life before the divorce was like any other normal, happy family. We did almost everything together, from sporting events to church on Sunday mornings. Then all of a sudden all of this was nonexistent. Instead of family car rides to these sporting events we were driving ourselves, if even going at all. It turned my world upside down, forcing me to mature as I watched my family fall apart, which is something no kid should ever have to go through. Having to move away, having to go back and forth between parents, and having to act like everything is okay when you know it’s not are just a few of the many challenges that come with divorce.
Before the divorce I had only moved once and that itself was difficult enough for me. By the time made all new friends and finally settled in, we were forced to move again. But this time it was for a different reason. After moving the first time I never thought I would have to move again. When I was in 4th grade we moved into what was said to be our “dream house”, but what’s the point to a dream house if a broken family lives inside… There isn’t. It was just a waste of money to put on a show trying to convince us that we actually were a happy family, when in fact, we weren’t. We lived there for 6 years before the word “divorce” was even mentioned. It’s as if they wanted to save their marriage without either end putting in the effort, which is pretty much setting the marriage up for a failure and that is exactly what happened. Although it was clear to my parents that there was nothing more they could do to save their marriage, there was a part of me, deep down inside, that thought it could actually be saved. But as soon as my mom spoke the words, “Pack your stuff, we’re leaving”, I knew nothing else could be done. My dad had claimed that the house was “his”, so my mom and I were left to pack our stuff and find somewhere else to live until we could come up with some money to buy a place of our own. So in the meantime, my mom’s parents kindly opened up their home for us to reside in until we were financially stable. But do you know what’s more embarrassing than being kicked out of your own house by your own dad, having to live with your grandparents, or having to share a room with your mom because there wasn’t enough room in your grandparents house? It’s not having enough money to even put a down payment on the cheapest apartments we could find. Now that’s what I call embarrassing. Then, finally, we got enough money to move into an apartment. “The resident parent now busier and more preoccupied, the absent parent simply less available because of being less around,” is research I found online that I can fully relate to. As my mom was working as much as she could to get the money we needed to pay our bills, my dad was nowhere to be found. This made it hard for my mom because I had to solely rely on her for all my needs since there was no one else I could turn to. But even the rare occasions when I did see my dad, he couldn’t fulfill my needs. It’s as if he had forgotten how to treat his own daughter and right now, all I needed was to feel loved.
But since I wasn’t getting the love and affection that I needed, it caused me to lash out and become very aggressive towards the people that loved me the most. “Where the child may have tried to get parents back, the adolescent may try to get back at parents,” and that’s exactly what I did. I wasn’t the sweet and innocent girl that I used to be. Before the divorce I was afraid to cuss, go to parties, be later than my curfew, and even talk back to my parents and drinking and doing drugs were way out of the question. I was raised in a strict Christian