Parents Suffer When Children Divorce//Arranged Marriages Evolve - 2/ 25/ 07

[Smartmarriages]

- PARENTS SUFFER WHEN CHILDREN DIVORCE
- ARRANGED MARRIAGES EVOLVE

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- PARENTS SUFFER WHEN CHILDREN DIVORCE

The Baltimore Sun
The Middle Ages
By Linell Smith
Sun Reporter
February 25, 2007

> If roughly a million people get divorced each year in the United States, as
> many as four million parents may also feel pain, anger and bewilderment when
> their cherished family vision explodes. . . .

> A vocational counselor and freelance writer in Westport, Conn., Temlock
> grappled with some of these questions after her own two children got a
> divorce.
> 
> "I felt as if our family had fallen off a cliff," Temlock, 62, says. "My
> husband and I have been married for 42 years. We both come from a long line of
> solid marriages."
> 
> When she couldn't find a book to help, she decided to write one -- but not
> about her own experience. Instead, she interviewed dozens of other parents who
> also felt they were trailblazing new emotional ground.

Parents suffer when children divorce
A son or daughter's marital split can trigger feelings of guilt, anger and
betrayal

Researching the effects of divorce, author Marsha Temlock talked to many
baby boomers about betrayal, financial turmoil and the sting of gossip. She
heard tales of hostility, resentment -- even guilt. Before long, the writer
knew she had the foundation of a self-help book for an overlooked audience:
The parents of divorcing couples.

If roughly a million people get divorced each year in the United States, as
many as four million parents may also feel pain, anger and bewilderment when
their cherished family vision explodes.

"Even those parents who were pleased their child had escaped a bad situation
felt their lives had been changed by their divorce," Temlock says. "Often,
they were suddenly struggling to support two families, or their children
were returning to their home, or they were reassuming the caretaking role.
If they were divorced themselves, they might be thinking, 'If I had stuck it
out, maybe my kids would have been better off.'"

Your Child's Divorce: What to Expect --What You Can Do (Impact Publishers,
$17.95) walks parents through five stages of divorce: Accepting the news;
rescuing your child; responding to change; stabilizing the family, and
finally, refocusing and rebuilding the family, often with a new in-law.

"I know many parents think of their child's divorce in terms of loss. Others
... call it a new beginning," Temlock writes. "I see it as a continuum,
another one of life's challenges with new parental tasks, new obstacles and
new rewards. It's playing different roles at different stages in their
child's divorce journey, knowing when to move to the foreground and when to
step back."

You might consider this book another course in the lifelong curriculum of
parenting.

Should you let your son or daughter move back home? For how long? How do you
construct boundaries to keep from being consumed by your child's problems?
How do you keep in touch with your ex-in-law without being disloyal to your
child? How do you adjust to the role of stepgrandparent when your son or
daughter remarries? How do you change and broaden your view of your family?

A vocational counselor and freelance writer in Westport, Conn., Temlock
grappled with some of these questions after her own two children got a
divorce.

"I felt as if our family had fallen off a cliff," Temlock, 62, says. "My
husband and I have been married for 42 years. We both come from a long line
of solid marriages."

When she couldn't find a book to help, she decided to write one -- but not
about her own experience. Instead, she interviewed dozens of other parents
who also felt they were trailblazing new emotional ground.

"If my book were available for my parents' generation, I don't think they
would have consulted it," she says. "They'd have been too engaged in denial.
If divorce wasn't quite swept under the carpet, it wasn't something that
parents wanted to get involved in. Having gone through the whole marital
revolution of the '50s and '60s, today's parents are more understanding of
the fact their children are more likely to get divorced."

Different expectations
Although national divorce statistics are difficult to come by -- such large
states as California and Georgia have not supplied divorce figures in recent
years -- Maryland had 17,111 divorces in 2005, according to the state's
vital statistics. (There were 37,572 marriages.)

A little more than half of the state's divorces consisted of marriages of
fewer than nine years.

Attorney Sally B. Gold, who practices family law in Baltimore, says some
clients in their 20s and 30s view divorce through the filter of their own
parents' broken marriages.

"Some may be determined to stay married. But others may not have the same
degree of angst," she says. "They may think 'It's OK. We've tried this and
we're moving on.' Letting go may be a little bit easier."

Over the past 40 years, she notes, the women's movement has brought women
closer to equality in the workplace, giving them more courage, and ability,
to end bad marriages.

It has also made parents more tolerant of such decisions.

For the full article:
http://www.baltimoresun.com/features/custom/modernlife/bal-ml.boomer25feb25,
0,5421435.story?coll=bal-modernlife-headlines

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- ARRANGED MARRIAGES EVOLVE

[Perhaps taking a page from 'arranged marriages' that see marriage in an
extended-family context would prevent some of the pain of watching our kids
divorce. Interesting how arranged marriages are borrowing modern technology
to update the methods of locating a mate, but the traditions and values
endure. "Love grows after marriage," Shekhar said. . . .what a concept. -
diane  ] 

Arranged marriages evolve
By Sophia Kazmi
CONTRA COSTA TIMES (San Mateo County, Calif)
February 25, 2007 

> Regardless of how the match is made, religion, culture, social status and
> family values play a bigger role than romantic love. . . .

> "In a traditional society that values the collective and the family ...
> marriage is just larger than two individuals." . . .

> They were engaged in two days and married just eight days later because
> Shekhar needed to get back to his Bay Area tech job.
> 
> Now married nearly 16 years, the San Ramon couple has two boys. Vinita says
> their relationship is still evolving: "We are discovering each other day by
> day."
> 
> "Love grows after marriage," Shekhar said. . . .

> estimates arranged marriages [still] account for about 90 percent of the
> marriages performed each year for couples of Indian descent. . .

> Western and Eastern courtship practices are borrowing practices from each
> other as the world becomes smaller through media and technology.
> 
> Arranged marriage is not foreign to Western civilization, said Batabyal, an
> economics professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
> 
> He compares the practice to the many matchmaking Web sites available today.
> 
> "In a Web profile like eHarmony you are looking at your attributes and they
> are trying to match you with someone else. The arrangement is taking place,
> but taking place through a third party," he said.
> 
> Web sites have become popular tools for arranging marriages. Unlike Web sites
> for singles seeking dates, matrimonial sites are aimed specifically for the
> marriage-minded, and they often are used by parents seeking a match for an
> adult child.
> 

Khalid and Sonita Tarrar's "how we met story" is different from those of
many of their neighbors. The Brentwood couple first met on their wedding day
10 years ago.

Sonita was living in Afghanistan, Khalid in the United States. On a trip to
Afghanistan, Khalid's mother decided to find him a Muslim bride.

She called to announce: "You're engaged!"

It caught the electrical engineer off guard. It was not a call he expected,
but it was a decision he accepted. After all, his mother had his best
interests in mind.

"She knows what I like, and what kind of girl I like," he said.

In India, the Middle East and some parts of Africa, arranged marriages
remain the predominant way to bring together couples who share the same
religious, cultural or tribal background.

Accepting a marriage partner selected by the family may seem odd to some
Americans, but many immigrant families continue the tradition here, though
often it comes with a modern twist.

To read the full article:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/16781201.htm

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