Divorced/single parents, relationship and supporting your children

I have been divorced and a single father for nearly 5 years and I realize on a daily basis the importance of my relationship with my son’s mother and the impact that our relationship has on our son.

My son’s mother and I have a working relationship that is only based on the care and welfare of our son. Our son lives with me and his mother gets him every other weekend. At times, it seems like it’s only me working on our relationship, to keep it cordial and civil. At other times, we work seamlessly together and without a hitch. If I allowed my pride to interfere when an unreasonable demand is being made of me or when something doesn't go my way. It would be easy to dismiss her, with disregard and/or disrespect like I see so many men and women do on television and in the streets. But before I react I ask myself, "What signal would I be sending to my son with a negative reaction?" Would I be saying that it's okay to treat women this way. Would I remind him when he doesn't act the way that I expect him too that he reminds me of his mother. Therefore, his worthy of the same treatment.

The majority of divorced/single parents need to wake up and get off their personal soapbox when it comes to their children and stop using their children to exercise their own personal hurt and pain. With every negative reaction that divorced/single parents displays towards one another the children get exposed to the harsh venom of life, separation and non-acceptance. Then we wonder why so many children in divorced/single parent households suffer from low-self esteem, depression and display guarded behavior. I believe that in a lot of cases the strain of the divorced/single parents relationship has ingrained those characteristic into the children.

When I tell my son "I love you" I say it from a selfless and unconditional vantage point, just as my father did for me, when I came to live with him at 10 years old. Regardless, of the relationship that my mother and father had, he always supported my relationship with my mother and encouraged me to have a relationship with her. For example, I cannot tell my son I love everything about him except for those characteristics that remind me of your mother or that I love you but I don't support your relationship with your mother because I have a personal differences with your mother. If I showed my son love like this, it will surely backfire on me because it will turn from me saying "I love you" into him saying "you don't I love me, because you deny who I am!"

In the book The Audacity of Hope by President-Elect Barack Obama he asserted that when he was first elected to the United States Senate in 2004 that many of his colleagues and constituencies viewed him as a blank screen in which to project their ideology and bureaucracy on because he was so new to the Senate. In many ways our children serve as that blank screen. Good or bad, parents project their ideology and bureaucracy onto that children. Because of that children are limited to the parents understanding or misunderstanding they tend to repeat the same behaviors. I encourage those divorced/single parents that have custody of the children to support their children's relationship with the non-custodial parent (barring any abuse) because this will help to easy the personal pain that your children endure in due to the divorce or separation.