{"product_id":"between-two-worlds-isbn-9780307237118","title":"Between Two Worlds","description":"Is there really such a thing as a “good divorce”? Determined to uncover the truth, Elizabeth Marquardt—herself a child of divorce—conducted, with Professor Norval Glenn, a pioneering national study of children of divorce, surveying 1,500 young adults from both divorced and intact families between 2001 and 2003. In \u003ci\u003eBetween Two Worlds\u003c\/i\u003e, she weaves the findings of that study together with powerful, unsentimental stories of the childhoods of young people from divorced families. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe hard truth, she says, is that while divorce is sometimes necessary, even amicable divorces sow lasting inner conflict in the lives of children. When a family breaks in two, children who stay in touch with both parents must travel between two worlds, trying alone to reconcile their parents’ often strikingly different beliefs, values, and ways of living. Authoritative, beautifully written, and alive with the voices of men and women whose lives were changed by divorce, Marquardt’s book is essential reading for anyone who grew up “between two worlds.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Makes a persuasive case against the culture of casual divorce.”\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e—\u003ci\u003eWashington Post\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“A poignant narrative of her own experience . . . Marquardt says she and other young adults who grew up in the divorce explosion of the 1970s and 1980s are still dealing with wounds that they could never talk about with their parents.”—\u003ci\u003eChicago Tribune\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eElizabeth Marquardt is the director of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values, a nonpartisan think tank focused on children, families, and civil society. Her essays and op-ed pieces have appeared in the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune,\u003c\/i\u003e and elsewhere. She lives in Chicago with her husband and two children.\u003cb\u003e1: Growing Up Divorced\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    When I was growing up, divorce was an all-but-nonexistent topic of   conversation. Beyond my own siblings I knew few other children of   divorce; much less did I have any sense that I was part of a   brand-new cohort, a generation of children marked by the first era of   widespread divorce. I did, however, always feel \"different\" as a   child; in the lingo of the seventies I thought of myself as a   \"weirdo.\" But I assumed my weirdness was part of who I was. Sometimes   I took pride in it, but more often I felt lonely because of it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    It was only in my early twenties that I began to understand how   common the experience of having divorced parents was. Only then did I   begin to wonder how divorce might have shaped me as a person. I was   born in 1970, just as the no-fault divorce revolution started   sweeping the country. California was the first state to pass such   legislation, in 1969, and virtually all the other states followed. My   own parents, high-school sweethearts who were among the top graduates   of their class in a small town in North Carolina, married in their   first year of college, had me in their sophomore year, and separated   when I was two years old.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    In the very early pictures of our family my dad has a shaggy haircut,   barely covering his ears, that scandalized his father. My mother   wears her hair differently in nearly every photo and is clad in   hippie regalia—pretty, homemade crocheted vests and snug-fitting   shirts and jeans. I am usually dressed in overalls or, for special   occasions, in dresses that she and her mother and grandmother sewed   for me.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I'm fascinated by those early pictures because I have no memory of   that time. I don't remember my parents living together, sharing a   home, or hugging, let alone arguing. In one home movie from that   brief era—I think my dad's younger brother was holding the   camera—my parents give each other a long, deep kiss. They're hamming   for the camera but there is unmistakable youthful passion there too.   It's the only time I've ever seen them kiss, and I watch it a little   embarrassed but also entranced. That's where I came from.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    My first memories are of my parents apart. I remember my mother and   first stepfather as the parents I called out to when I was scared in   the middle of the night. I remember living with my dad, a bachelor   getting his master's degree, for a long summer vacation at his   apartment. I've learned since that his friends were impressed that a   young man could feed, clothe, house, and love a little girl by   himself for an entire summer, every summer. When I look at men in   their early twenties around me, it seems hard to imagine. But even   though I knew that my parents were young, they seemed larger than   life, and capable of anything.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    In some ways I was a fortunate child of divorce: I could take both   parents' love for granted. So many like me lose a warm relationship   with their father or lose that relationship entirely. The trouble was   that I missed my mother and father terribly when I was separated from   one of them—and I was always separated from one of them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    As a result of my parents' divorce, my childhood was filled with   constant movement. I traveled often between my parents, spending   school years with my mother and long summers, holiday breaks, and   occasional weekends with my father. Even when I stayed in one place,   other people did not. My childhood was routinely peopled with new   faces—parents' boyfriends and girlfriends, new spouses, step and   half-siblings—that came and too often went.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The two people I loved the most and looked to as the rocks on which   my own identity was built, my mother and my father, lived completely   separate lives a six-hour drive apart. As I entered young adulthood I   began to sense that growing up with parents in two different worlds,   with me traveling between them, had shaped me in profound ways. I   started to read avidly about divorce, looking for an explanation.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat We Know About Children of Divorce\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    I learned a lot from the studies I read about children of divorce,   but there always seemed to be something missing. Most books and   articles focus on the social or economic consequences of divorce,   often showing the links between divorce and serious childhood   problems such as poverty, dropping out of school, juvenile   delinquency, early sexual activity, and teen pregnancy. For example,   a recently published study by a major researcher, E. Mavis   Hetherington, examined more than a thousand divorced families over   three decades and found that 20 to 25 percent of young adults from   divorced families experience \"long-term damage\"—serious social and   emotional problems—compared to 10 percent of young people from   intact families.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    These kinds of studies are valuable. Learning how many children of   divorce struggle with truly debilitating problems ought to makes us   question our society's high rate of divorce. I know some of these   young people, and my heart goes out to them. Yet studies such as   these are something of a blunt instrument; they capture only the most   dramatic negative effects of divorce on children. As far as I could   tell, I was not struggling with those kinds of problems, yet I   suspected that divorce had still deeply influenced who I was.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Among all the researchers, Judith Wallerstein has been a pioneer in   examining the more subtle psychological effects of divorce in   children and young people. By getting to know a sample of children of   divorce extremely well and returning again and again over the years   to talk with them, Wallerstein has painted a detailed and sensitive   portrait of the way divorce shapes the inner lives of many children,   whether or not they end up with severe, diagnosable symptoms. For   instance, her most recent book shows that experiencing parental   divorce during childhood has a \"sleeper effect\": its worst symptoms   often appear when children of divorce leave home and attempt to form   intimate relationships and families of their own, but do so with much   less ability to trust and little idea of what a lasting marriage   looks like.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    But there is an enormous story left untold. Although the number of   divorces stabilized in this country in the early 1980s, close to half   of first marriages still end in divorce. Today, one-quarter of all   young adults in this country between the ages of eighteen and   thirty-five have experienced the divorce of their parents. Many   people look around and see plenty of young people from divorced   families who seem just fine. These children of divorce graduate from   high school and even college or beyond, get jobs, get married, have   kids of their own. They are everywhere. If divorce causes such   serious problems, then how do we explain these young people?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Some in my generation have noticed and written about this seeming   contradiction. Several decided to write about their parents' divorce   because of the disconnect between the studies that focus on the   tragic consequences of divorce for some children and their own   experience of building lives that were outwardly successful but   still, they were certain, deeply marked by divorce. Among those   accounts are Split: Stories of a Generation Raised on Divorce, edited   by Ava Chin; The Love They Lost: Living with the Legacy of Our   Parents' Divorce, by Stephanie Staal; and Generation Ex: Adult   Children of Divorce and the Healing of Our Pain, by Jen Abbas.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Perhaps the most intriguing book by a Gen X-er about her parents'   divorce is one that does not even mention divorce in the title.   Rebecca Walker was born in 1969, the daughter of author Alice Walker   and attorney Mel Leventhal. She tells the story of her parents'   divorce in Black, White, and Jewish: Autobiography of a Shifting   Self. Although most reviewers focused on Walker's story of growing up   biracial, the overriding division in Walker's family life appears to   be not race but divorce.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    For Walker, whose parents divorced when she was in third grade,   Black, White, and Jewish is an attempt to make sense of her own   history, to locate and describe her own \"shifting self.\" The book   opens with the words \"I don't remember things.\" She writes, \"Without   a memory that can remind me at all times of who I definitively am, I   feel amorphous, missing the unbroken black line around my body that   everybody else seems to have.\" Walker locates the roots of her   shifting, ambiguous sense of self in her own early, shifting   experience of home. Only a child of divorce could write about home as   she does: \"I remember airports. . . . I am more comfortable in   airports than I am in either of the houses I call, with undeserved   nostalgia, Home. I am more comfortable in airports than I was in any   of the eight different schools where I learned all of the things I   now cannot remember. . . . I remember coming and going, going and   coming. That, for me, was home.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    These books are important additions to what we know about children of   divorce, amplifying and extending the story told by impersonal   statistics. As far as I can tell, none of these young authors ended   up with a psychiatric diagnosis, an arrest record, or a teen   pregnancy, but the effects of divorce, and the specific ways it   played out in each of their families, influenced by race, religion,   or class, were so important and persistent they felt moved to tell   their stories.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    When I told people I was writing this book, I sensed that some of   them thought it would be easy, that it must be a relief to hold my   divorced parents up to a critical light, spill my guts, and feel   vindicated. But this book is not meant to be triumphant or   vindictive, and neither, I believe, are the books by these other   young authors. Our voices are searching, reflective, and if anything   overly tentative. As I confirmed in my own study, we children of   divorce often feel extremely protective of our parents, especially   when we are young, and for that reason alone it can be hard for us to   speak truthfully about our childhoods. But if our culture is to   understand the real impact of divorce and if we are to understand our   own lives, we must try to put the experience into words. The love we   share with our parents—us for them and them for us—is strong enough   to withstand the whole, complex truth.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The individual stories of children of divorce point to the lingering   loss and pain that result from divorce even when the children look   \"fine.\" The long-term studies point to some of the obvious and   troubling differences we possess as a group. But no one has stepped   back and explained how divorce changes childhood itself. The new   study reported in this book explains how divorce reshuffles many core   features of middle-class childhood that our society takes for granted   and, in the process, shapes children's identities well into young   adulthood.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    This larger story must be told because, as a society, we still have   not grasped just how radical divorce really is. Too many people   imagine that modern divorce has become just a variation of ordinary   family life, like growing up in a large family, perhaps, or in a   military family that moves a lot. Sure, there may be some discomfort,   and some of the kids may end up with big problems, but doesn't   childhood as we know it stay basically the same? Most people assume   the answer is yes.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    They are wrong. In reality, divorce powerfully changes the structure   of childhood itself.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhy a \"Good Divorce\" Is No Solution\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The national debate about divorce has generally focused on the worst   outcomes, with many assuming there is no need to worry about the   children of divorce who appear to be fine. But I can think of few   other significant childhood experiences that our society treats in   the same way. Many people survive wrenching childhood traumas—child   abuse, war, an alcoholic or drug-addicted parent—and nevertheless   manage to become productive members of society. Yet no one would   suggest that because they have survived the ordeal and now look   \"fine,\" their experience of child abuse, war, or addiction was   apparently not that bad. On the contrary, our society sympathizes   with these young people. It takes active steps to try to help them   and to prevent other children, whenever possible, from growing up the   same way.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Further, when our society asks only if a child has been hurt, and   nothing more, it sets a very low bar for its expectations about   children's lives. I'm a mother now. When I first held my daughter did   I hope only that she would grow up and not be damaged? Of course not.   Like all parents, my husband and I want to protect our children from   suffering, but we also want them to thrive, to enjoy rich, loving   relationships and have happy, successful futures. Parents do not set   a low bar for their children, and neither should our society. Our   society must do more than ask whether divorce causes clear and   lasting damage to some children. It should also ask probing questions   about how divorce shapes the lives of many children who experience it.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Just as most debates about children of divorce focus on the gravest   and most obvious outcomes, most discussions about life in divorced   families focus on the hot-button issue of conflict. When researchers   examine how children fare in divorced families, many of them want to   know how well or how poorly the divorced parents get along. Do they   battle over custody of the child? Can they be in the same room   together without getting into a fight? Are they able to stick to   agreements on visitation and child support?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    Learning more about the conflicts between divorced parents is   undeniably important. But an overriding emphasis on the issue of   conflict has led to a troubling idea that has quickly gained   credibility in our culture. In recent years, some experts have   speculated that if couples divorce amicably and if both parents   continue to share in raising the child, then perhaps the negative   effects of divorce can be avoided. Experts urge parents, for the sake   of their children, to aim for what some call a \"good divorce.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e    The idea of the \"good divorce\" is attractive to many. Some divorced   parents are reassured because it suggests steps they can take to try   to protect their children if they must end a very bad marriage. Other   parents like the idea of a \"good divorce\" because it suggests they   can end a marriage that may be okay but not completely satisfying and   still do right by their children. Family court judges welcome it   because they want to make arrangements that, whenever possible, keep   both parents in the child's life, and they want to minimize conflict   between those parents. Some therapists like the idea because they   want to help these families and a \"good divorce\" gives them a role in   teaching parents how to divorce.A Pioneering National Study Reveals that Even Successful Young People Are Profoundly Shaped by Childhood Divorce","brand":"Harmony","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46304693453029,"sku":"NP9780307237118","price":18.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780307237118.jpg?v=1767722508","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/between-two-worlds-isbn-9780307237118","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}