Directory Options/ Divorce as Child Abuse/ADHD/ Futures/ Oldest city - 11/9/08

[Smartmarriages]

- DIRECTORY LISTING OPTIONS
- DIVORCE AS CHILD ABUSE
- ADHD CHILDREN AND DIVORCE
- URL FOR THE NEW OBAMA WEBSITE
- AS THE WORLD TURNS
- THE OLDEST CITY

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- DIRECTORY LISTING OPTIONS

> What is the difference between the $75 fee and the $225 fee on the Directory
> of Programs?  If I want to start now, can I get an adjusted rate or pay for
> next year only since the year is almost over?
> JP

If you sign up now and pay for 2009, you get the remaining months of 2008
for free - which is why we say now is the ideal time to list.

For $75 you get a 100 word listing plus header, contact info and live links
to your email and website.

For $225 you can also list your schedule of training dates and update that 4
times a year.  See here:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Directory.BrowsePrograms

- diane 

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- DIVORCE AS CHILD ABUSE

November 8, 2008
Divorcing couple face prosecution for psychological abuse
Richard Owen, Rome 

In a case believed to be the first of its kind in Europe an Italian couple
face prosecution for causing their 12-year-old child "psychological
suffering" by going through an acromonious divorce in which they allegedly
argued in front of him and fought for his affection.

Milan prosecutors have asked a judge to charge the couple - who have not
been named under Italian privacy laws - with "ill treatment of a minor"
because of "the psychological suffering inflicted". The charge carries a
prison sentence of up to five years. Legal experts said they could recall no
such previous prosecution in Britain or Europe.

The case was authorised by Marco Ghezzi, the Milan prosecutor for cases
involving minors, after a health visitor reported that the child was
"disturbed". 

Antonio Sangermano, the magistrate who is conducting the prosecution case,
said the mother and father had blamed each other for their break up in
arguments carried out in front of the child.

The prosecution report states that: "Each blamed the other for shortcomings
and educational errors in bringing up the child", with each parent trying to
"discredit, devalue and undermine the other" in front of him and "project
their emotions onto him, above all anger".

The couple had not physically mistreated the child. But this "parental
hyper-conflict" had induced "a syndrome of anxiety and depression" over his
"conflicting loyalties and emotions", which in turn had led to "problems of
concentration", with the child falling behind in his school work, the
prosecutors said. 

The result had been to "confuse" the child and instil in him "the conviction
that his parents hated each other". The prosecutors alleged that both
parents had persisted in arguing in front of the child even though he told
them it was "making him feel ill".

They had "manipulated" the child in an attempt to "make him decide between
them", using him as a tool in their divorce battle, the prosecutors said.

Cesare Tacconi, a Milan judge, will decide early next month whether to go
ahead with a trial. To protect the identity of the child, judges have
refused to divulge the name of the town near Milan where the family lives.

Piero Caprera, a lawyer for the wife in the case, said it was "undeniable"
there there had been "arguments within the family". But he said the
prosecutors would be unable to prove the parents had intended to harm the
child, as the charge of "maltreatment" requires, and predicted that the
judge would dismiss the charges.

Corriere della Sera, the Milan newspaper, said if the case went ahead it
could have implications for "untold numbers of other cases" in which
divorcing or separating couples had rows in front of their children.

Cesare Rimini, an Italian divorce and family lawyer, said the Milan case was
"a sign of growing social alarm over the effects of divorce on children". Mr
Rimini said that all too often children were "the indirect victims of a
fight between their parents". The law was designed to "protect minors
against abuse within the family and physical or moral harm." but had not
previously been used in this way.

Frances Hughes, Senior Partner of Hughes Fowler Carruthers and a leading
family lawyer, said: "I am certain that no such prosecution has ever been
brought in the United Kingdom."

But she said that in parts of Europe it was "now widely accepted that
conflict between parents jeopardises children's mental health and stability.
For example, in the Netherlands it is now standard practice for interim
orders to be made to ensure that the parents do not live in the same
property while the divorce is going on if there is a child living with them.

"In England we would only make such an order if one of the parties had
behaved violently or threatened violence. It may well be that this area of
law is rather more highly developed throughout the European Union that it is
in England." 

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- ADHD CHILDREN AND DIVORCE


Reading this article, it looks like they don't make any distinction about
which came first, the ADHD diagnosis or the divorce. Especially since they
included, and highlighted, divorces before the children were 8 years old.

So, from this article, you could just as easily say that 'Children whose
parents divorce before they are 8 have a higher rate of ADHD".

Of course, both the legal divorce and the diagnosis are only rough
chronological markers. The divorce becomes final after anywhere from months
to years of litigation, separation, and/or marital problems.

John Crouch

---------
http://www.virtualmedicalcentre.com/news.asp?artid=12786

Couples with children with ADHD at risk of higher divorce rates, shorter
marriages

6 Nov 2008

Parents of a child with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are
nearly twice as likely to divorce by the time the child is 8 years old than
parents of children without ADHD, the first study to look at this issue in
depth has shown.

Moreover, among couples in the study who were divorced, marriages involving
children with ADHD ended sooner than marriages with no ADHD-diagnosed
children.

Additional findings from a subset of divorced couples with children with
ADHD showed that several characteristics within the family contribute
individually to the risk of divorce: age of the child when diagnosed; race
and ethnicity of the parents; severity of coexisting disorders in children
with ADHD, such as oppositional-defiant disorder (ODD) and conduct disorder
(CD); education levels of the parents; and a father's antisocial behavior
(trouble with the law.)

"We believe this is the first study to find that both parent and child
factors individually predict the rate and time of divorce," said Professor
William Pelham, Professor of Psychology and Pediatrics at the University at
Buffalo and director of UB's Center for Children and Families.

"Moreover, this is the only study to demonstrate that the severity of the
child's disruptive behavior, specifically those with ODD or CD, increases
the risk of divorce.

"Certainly we are not suggesting that having a child with ADHD is the only
reason these marriages end in divorce," noted Pelham.

"Disruptive child behavior likely interacts over time with other existing
stress in the family to spark conflict in a marriage and, ultimately,
divorce." Wymbs' research documents that when parents interact with an ADHD
child, they are more distressed, argue with one another more and view one
another as less supportive, compared to when they interact with a child
without ADHD.

Data for the study was gathered from a subset of participants in a larger
investigation called the Pittsburgh ADHD Longitudinal Study (PALS), which is
funded by grants from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism
(NIAAA) and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to Pelham and Brooke
Molina, Ph.D., from the University of Pittsburgh.

Some 282 adolescents and young adults who had been diagnosed with the
disorder in childhood and their parents completed a series of questionnaires
and diagnostic instruments, along with individual interviews. The child's
birth date was used as the starting point of the time to divorce.

These results were compared with those from 206 demographically similar PALS
participants without ADHD and their parents.

Results showed that 22.7 percent of parents of children with ADHD had
divorced by the time the child was 8 years old, compared to 12.6 percent of
parents in the control group. Divorce rates of parents with and without
children with ADHD were not significantly different after children passed
the 8-year mark.

"Families that 'survive' through that age, perhaps because they are low on
all of the risk factors, apparently will make it through the rest of the
child's childhood," Pelham said.

Of the characteristics that may contribute to risk of divorce, a father's
antisocial behavior proved to be the largest factor. The rate of divorce
also increased when mothers had substantially less education than fathers;
children were diagnosed with ADHD at a younger age; families had racial or
ethnic minority children and children had serious ODD or CD behavior
problems.

"With these findings in mind," Pelham said, "those who treat children with
ADHD and disruptive behavior problems should take note if parents are having
marriage problems and try to intervene to prevent the children from going
through the trauma of divorce."

However, they also pointed out that for some couples who may have serious
and frequent marital conflict and are raising difficult-to-manage children,
divorce may be the best option for the children.

Results of the study appear in the October issue of the Journal of
Consulting and Clinical Psychology.

(Source: University at Buffalo: Journal of Consulting and Clinical
Psychology: October 2008.)

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- URL FOR THE NEW OBAMA WEBSITE

I forgot to give the url for the Obama website that invites you to share
your suggestions for change.  Here it is:
http://www.change.gov
I went in and shared my vision. Figure it can't hurt.  - diane

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- AS THE WORLD TURNS

A friend just forwarded this from her dad.  He was thinking about what the
future might be like for his newborn grandson, Rex:
 
> It occurred to me that when Rex is 8 years old, Obama will be the only
> President he will have known. If he is curious about such things, he might
> well ask the question, "Mommy, do you have to be black to be President?"
> Love, Dad 

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- THE OLDEST CITY

Here's an article from Sunday's 11/9/08 Washington Post about St Augustine,
America's oldest city,  - a nice side-trip from Orlando. - diane

> "There's historic St. Augustine with the Castillo and the Lightner," he said.
> "The artistic St. Augustine: There are art galleries all over town. There's
> the beach town. And if you're looking for beautiful Victorian architecture,
> this is the place to study it. Flagler College has Tiffany stained-glass
> windows in the lunchroom. Memorial Church is a replica of St. Mark's in Venice
> . . . ." He paused. "This is old Florida, and the most European city this side
> of Quebec.
> 

> . . . the historic Castillo de San Marcos, was the place I should have gone
> first to get my bearings.
> 
> Completed in 1695, the oldest fort in the United States was big enough to hold
> the entire town -- and the town's animals -- when under siege, which it was,
> frequently enough.
> ad_icon
> 
> Inside the fort, park ranger Jeffrey Edel, muffled in full Spanish military
> regalia (wool, no less, on this 95-degree day), called out jovially, "Come
> into the shade. Lecture in two minutes." And the other tourists scattered like
> rats, fleeing for the exhibits within the thick walls of the fortress. That
> left me to plop on a bench and have Edel to myself until Greg finally
> abandoned the cannons displayed up on the gun deck.
> 
> The early history of the city is stunning. Who knew that Spain sent 800
> settlers to this area, only 26 of them women, expecting them to intermarry, in
> this case with the Timucuan Indians? It was the pattern, Edel explained. "That
> was how a small country like Spain was able to colonize a good bit of this
> continent." 

> Who knew that the Spanish, with no history of slavery, attracted slaves from
> the British colonies to the north of Florida with the promise of land -- and
> freedom -- in exchange for converting to Catholicism? Oh, and intermarried
> with them as well. No, it's not taught in our history books, Edel said. "The
> original underground railroad ran south."

For the full article: http://tinyurl.com/6fwun9


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