You Aren't Alone
With an unhappy family comes a whole host of emotions that are confusing and overwhelming. They're important to be aware of, but it's even more important for you to realize that these are completely normal. We all experience things differently, but I guarantee you that any teen who has lived in an unhappy family has experienced at least one of these emotions.
#1: Anger
It’s pretty easy to feel angry with your parents for fighting all the time. You may feel like you’re more mature than them, since they’re always arguing over silly things. You may think, “Why can’t they grow up?!” and be angry with them for putting you, the kid, in this situation.
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#2: Shame
#3: Fear of Abandonment
When your parents are unhappy with each other, it’s easy to worry that they both might just take off and leave. However, this is one fear you should never be concerned about. Why? It’s against the law to abandon a child. Period. You will always have someone to take care of you, and you will never be abandoned. Addressing the emotional side of this, though, no matter how cheesy it may sound, even if your parents don’t love each other it doesn’t mean that they don’t love you. So even if they do eventually leave each other and separate, that doesn't mean they'll leave you, too.
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#4: Guilt
This is how you may feel when your parents fight about you. It may be about your grades, or how clean your room is, but the subject doesn’t really matter. What is important is that you realize that you are not at fault for their arguments. In an unhappy relationship, parents often use their kids as an excuse to fight. It’s not really about you, it’s about them. If you weren’t there, would your parents stop fighting and magically realize they loved each other? No. They’d just fight something else to argue about, like washing the dishes or leaving the television on mute. You are not the cause of their problems – they are.
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#5: Feeling Split
With fighting parents, you can often feel split, not only between them, but also within yourself. Part of you may be thinking, “Hurry up and divorce, already!” However, the other side of you may still want your parents to stay together, no matter how unhappy your family is. If you think about it, feeling split like this makes sense. On the one hand, if your parents divorce they’ll finally stop fighting. On the other hand, everything will change and your family will be “broken.”
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#6: Fear of the Unknown
If your parents are fighting, it’s hard to know what will come next. Will they stay together? Will they divorce? What’s going to happen? It’s pretty scary feeling so out of control. But that’s what this website’s here for - to give you an idea of what will happen, even if your parents do divorce.
Part of dealing with an unhappy family is learning to accept all of these emotions. You don’t have to be the perfect child – it’s okay to feel ashamed, angry, afraid, or even not to know what you feel. There are ways to deal with these emotions, though. Check out the Coping page for ideas. |