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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Divorce — My Experience of Growing Up with Divorced Parents

My Experience of Growing Up with Divorced Parents

Categories: Divorce Parents

About this sample

Words: 407 |

Updated: 8 November, 2023

Words: 407 | Page: 1 | 3 min read

Works Cited

Amato, P. R., & Kane, J. B. (2011). Life-course pathways and the psychosocial adjustment of children of divorce. Journal of Family Issues, 32(2), 153-171.
Emery, R. E. (2019). Two homes, one childhood: A parenting plan to last a lifetime. Penguin.
Fabricius, W. V., & Luecken, L. J. (2007). Postdivorce living arrangements, parent conflict, and long-term physical health correlates for children of divorce. Journal of Family Psychology, 21(2), 195-205.
Fine, M. A., & Fine, G. A. (2014). Handbook of divorce and relationship dissolution. Routledge.
Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (1999). The seven principles for making marriage work: A practical guide from the country's foremost relationship expert. Three Rivers Press.
Hetherington, E. M., & Kelly, J. (2002). For better or for worse: Divorce reconsidered. W. W. Norton & Company.
Irwin, R. L., & Ryan, J. M. (2013). Counseling and divorce. Springer Science & Business Media.
Kelly, J. B., & Emery, R. E. (2003). Children's adjustment following divorce: Risk and resilience perspectives. Family Relations, 52(4), 352-362.
Wallerstein, J. S., Lewis, J. M., & Blakeslee, S. (2000). The unexpected legacy of divorce: The 25 year landmark study. Hachette UK.
Walsh, F. (2016). Normal family processes: Growing diversity and complexity. Guilford Publications.

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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, how to write a college essay about divorced parents.

Hi all, my parents recently got divorced and it's had a big impact on my life. I want to write about it in my college essay, but I don't want it to sound too negative. Any advice on how to approach this topic and share my story in a meaningful way?

When writing a college essay about your parents' divorce, it's important to focus on personal growth and development rather than the negativity of the situation. Here are some tips to help you approach this topic in a meaningful way:

1. Focus on your growth: Highlight how the experience of your parents getting divorced has led to personal growth or development. Perhaps you learned valuable lessons about resilience, independence, or empathy from the situation. Show how these qualities have made you a stronger person and will benefit you in your future academic and personal pursuits.

2. Share a specific personal anecdote: Avoid talking about your parents' divorce in general terms. Instead, focus on a specific event or moment from your life that illustrates the impact of the divorce on you. This will make your essay more engaging and relatable to the reader.

3. Balance positivity and realism: While it's important not to dwell on the negative aspects of your parents' divorce, you also want to be honest about the challenges you faced. Try to strike a balance between acknowledging the adversity you've been through and emphasizing the positive growth or realizations that emerged from the situation.

4. Demonstrate self-awareness: Being introspective about how the experience has shaped you is crucial. Show that you have a deep understanding of your emotions, thoughts, and reactions throughout the process. This shows maturity and self-awareness, which are qualities that colleges value in their applicants.

5. Relate the experience to your goals: Explain how your parents' divorce and the lessons you learned from it have influenced your academic, career, or life goals. This will help the reader understand the significance of your story and see how it's relevant to your aspirations.

6. Proofread and revise: Finally, make sure to revise, proofread, and seek feedback from a trusted teacher, counselor, or mentor to ensure your essay is well-written and effectively conveys your message.

By focusing on your personal growth, sharing a specific anecdote, balancing positivity with realism, demonstrating self-awareness, and relating your experience to your goals, you can write a meaningful college essay about your parents' divorce that will resonate with admissions officers.

About CollegeVine’s Expert FAQ

CollegeVine’s Q&A seeks to offer informed perspectives on commonly asked admissions questions. Every answer is refined and validated by our team of admissions experts to ensure it resonates with trusted knowledge in the field.

Essay on Divorced Parents

Students are often asked to write an essay on Divorced Parents in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Divorced Parents

Understanding divorced parents.

When two people who are married decide they can no longer live together as a couple, they may choose to get a divorce. This means they legally end their marriage. When these individuals are parents, their children might have to adjust to living with each parent at different times.

Feelings Involved

Children with divorced parents often feel a mix of emotions. They might be sad, confused, or even angry. It’s important for them to know that it’s okay to talk about these feelings and that both parents still love them very much.

Changes in Daily Life

After a divorce, kids might move houses, change schools, or see their parents dating new people. These changes can be tough, but with time, kids usually find a new routine that works for them.

Positive Outcomes

Sometimes, after the initial sadness, children may find that they have happier parents who can take better care of them. Many kids grow up to be strong and understanding because of what they’ve learned from their parents’ divorce.

250 Words Essay on Divorced Parents

Kids may feel many emotions when their parents split up. They might feel sad because their family won’t be the same, or they might worry about where they will live and if they will see both parents often. It’s important for kids to know it’s okay to have these feelings and to talk about them.

Living Arrangements

After a divorce, kids might live with one parent most of the time and visit the other, or they might spend equal time with both. Each family finds a way that works for them. The most important thing is that kids feel loved and taken care of.

Getting Support

Sometimes, talking to friends, family, or a counselor can help kids deal with the changes. Schools also have people to talk to, like teachers or guidance counselors. It’s good to have someone to share your thoughts and feelings with.

Life Goes On

Even though it can be tough when parents divorce, over time, everyone starts to adapt to the new situation. Kids can still have a happy life, do well in school, and enjoy time with both parents. Remember, a divorce ends a marriage, not the relationship between parents and their children.

500 Words Essay on Divorced Parents

When two people decide not to be married anymore, we say they are divorced. This means that they no longer live together as husband and wife. Parents who get divorced go through a big change in their lives, and so do their children. It’s a time that can be filled with different feelings like sadness, confusion, or even relief if there were a lot of arguments at home.

Why Parents Get Divorced

Life after divorce.

After parents get divorced, life can change in many ways for a family. Children might have to move to a new house, change schools, or spend time living with each parent separately. This can be hard at first, but with time, everyone starts to get used to the new way of things.

Feelings and Emotions

It’s normal for children to have a lot of different feelings when their parents get divorced. They might feel sad because their family is not the same anymore, or they might be angry or confused. Talking to someone they trust, like a family member or a counselor, can help children understand and deal with these feelings.

Even though divorce can be hard, there can also be good things that come out of it. Sometimes, there might be less arguing at home, and parents might be happier living apart. This can make home a more peaceful place for children. Parents can also sometimes focus more on being the best mom or dad they can be when they are not worried about marriage problems.

Moving Forward

Over time, children and their parents learn how to move forward after a divorce. They create new routines and traditions. Parents might start new hobbies or find new ways to spend quality time with their children. It’s a process of learning and growing for both children and parents.

If you’re looking for more, here are essays on other interesting topics:

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

How to Write Your College Essay About Divorced Parents

When you plan to write your college essay about divorced parents, you may be concerned about the practicality and appropriateness of the topic. This essay topic seems to be something that a lot of people ask about. Usually, they ask this:

“Is it okay to write my college essay about divorced parents?”

Here’s our honest opinion: writing your college essay about divorced parents is okay if –and only if– it demonstrates that you are a wise investment to the university ROI-wise.

Okay, so that sounds sort of weird, right? Why not give a straightforward “yes” or “no” answer? What the heck is an “ROI”? What does any of this even mean?

Well, as admissions experts, we’ve seen how the college admissions process can be much more complicated than that. The line between a good essay topic that can sway the admissions decision from rejected to accepted –or accepted to rejected– is very thin. There are no cut-and-dry formulas that can guarantee acceptance or rejection. However, there is a fundamental mindset you should adopt when writing your college essay about divorced parents.

Think of the admissions process from a utilitarian perspective. Remember: at the end of the day, you are sending your applications and transcripts because they are tools to help the university screen you. The admissions office has a duty of screening your value as a candidate to their university. You can choose to write your college essay about divorced parents as long as you show that you are a good return of investment (ROI) to the school. That means the school should have a good reason for reserving a spot for you in their institution, investing money on you, spending professor time on you, and accommodating you.

You need to show that your college essay about divorced parents makes you a great candidate for that.

Therefore, the question should not be “can I write my college essay about divorced parents”. Instead, it should be, “how can I write my college essay about divorced parents in a way that makes me the best asset to the school?”

Sounds difficult, right? “What if they think I’m too whiny?” “What if it doesn’t make me seem strong?”

Trust us. There are some fantastic college essays about divorced parents that we’ve seen and edited. Some of these essays managed to help students get into fantastic schools like Berkeley and USC. We’ll show you how to do exactly that below.

Table of Contents:

The Anatomy of a Good College Essay About Divorced Parents.

How to avoid being cliché., demonstrating value as a candidate in your college essay., the danger of mental instability and unsafe family background..

There are many things that make a good college essay. All college essays must demonstrate some value to the admissions office, and show how you are someone worth investing in. However, the anatomy of a college essay about divorced parents can differ.

We’ve deconstructed the parts that make up a good essay about this topic. Here is a general outline of what you should have.

A strong hook that stands out from the rest of the sob stories.
An introduction that reveals some of what happened with the divorce.
A deeper articulation and description of what exactly that felt like.
A section covering the insinuation behind what had happened.
Demonstrating how you have grown or surpassed the obstacles of divorce.
How does this make you a great candidate for the school.

We understand that the college admissions essays are not always long enough to contain all six of these sections. Sometimes you’ll be limited in your word count, and have to make sacrifices along the way. Or, you’ll have to make things shorter.

One of the things you should definitely have in your college essay, no matter the topic, is at least some insinuation –whether implied or written clearly in a single paragraph– about why your experience makes you a good fit for the school (i.e. why you’re worth investing in).

One of the dangers of talking about family problems in your college essay is writing something that comes across as cliché.

With how competitive college admissions processes are in the past few years –and how they’re getting harder with every passing year– it is critical that you have a method of standing out amongst the crowd more now than ever before. Should you write an essay that sounds cliché, you won’t be able to stand out as well. The college admissions essays are an asset. They are the only section in your whole college application that gives you the chance to talk your way into college outside of measurements like GPAs and test scores. If your essay sounds too much like what others write, you won’t be able to capitalize on the essay section as much as you could have to differentiate yourself from the rest.

So, how does one avoid being cliché when writing their college essay about divorced parents?

The first order of business is to recognize that despite many applicants who also have divorced parents, your experience is different from the rest. You may have gone through a similar event in your life along with others, but your experience and manner of processing the emotions are different. Let’s look at an example.

Dario: Mother divorced father due to the father’s hot temper. Dario’s big takeaway is his lack of a father figure, and learning to cope with that.
Anatoly: Mother divorced father due to the father’s hot temper. Anatoly’s big takeaway is his trust issues due to feeling abandoned by both family members.

Notice how both applicants have something similar in their experience? Just because they experienced something similar does not mean they will be affected the same way. Thus, just because someone has a similar topic to your essay does not mean it will immediately be cliché. Your experiences and emotional struggles are unique. Therefore, to avoid being cliché, you need to write in detail about what your experience was like.

If your experience made you feel more lost due to lack of a parental structure, you should be specific about those feelings. Perhaps your experience was different because said feelings made focusing on school difficult for you; however, you managed to learn how to cope and succeed academically despite the familial struggles.

However it is you plan to make your college essay stand out amongst the rest of the applicants writing about family divorce, you should make sure that it is hyper specific about its details. If you do not know whether you’ve written your college essay well enough, consider scheduling a free consultation with us over the phone . We will get back to you within 24 hours.

This is going to be the most important part of writing your college essay about divorced parents.

As we said in the beginning of this article guide, the college admissions process boils down to a calculation of whether you are a good candidate ROI-wise. That means that the essays need to frame you as someone who is a wise investment. Think to yourself: why would the university you’re applying for want to bother investing their time, money, and resources giving you an education?

There are a number of ways you can answer this. I’ve listed a few below.

Accepting you as a student would give the university good press.
Accepting you as a student would revivify a part of the school that needs development. (not enough people of color, a stem culture that needs more business acumen, etc)
Accepting you as a student would greatly contribute to the school’s department which you’re applying for.
Accepting you as a student would improve the overall sociability of the school, thereby improving the experience of other students and creating a positive ripple effect.

Okay, now let’s take a look at how we’re going to write a college essay while demonstrating our value as a worthy candidate to the university. Think about the topic of being a child of divorced parents. What was your experience like? What did it do to you as a result? In what ways have you grown and developed as a person over time? Is there a way that growth experience can be translated to your future experience at university? In other words, think in this order:

That last step is the crux of your execution. You need to show that the lessons you’ve learned or the experiences you’ve developed from your parent’s divorce reveals some strength or skill applicable to the school.

So, let’s say that you want to write about your relationship with your family turning sour after a messy family divorce. You’e realized your mother had been keeping an affair with your father. This has inexorably ruined your relationship with women as a whole, and you’ve struggled to have a healthy relationship that views women in a positive light without judgment. Thus, you’ve gone on a personal journey with your father to rekindle your relationship with trusting women as a whole. Through this, you’ve discovered critical feminist theory, and had constructive discussions with people who were willing to have uncomfortable conversations with you about rekindling your trust issues with women. Today, you are someone who champions a hybrid of feminist critique as an antidote to negative toxic viewpoints of women. You also hope to use these philosophies to help other struggling men who feel that they have developed a strained relationship with the opposite sex.

This is a red flag that you should be careful about.

When writing your college essay about divorced parents, you should consider the possibility of a Sword of Damocles. Whilst writing this essay topic, the admissions officers may have the idea that a broken family due to divorced parents can lead to mental instability and unsafe conditions at the back of their mind.

With the rise of mental health issues amongst students, the admissions offices at universities must take extra consideration when tackling issues such as mental health. In particular, they have to be more careful now than ever before about letting in students who they believe may be a threat to the community due to mental instability. Therefore, it is imperative that you establish in the essay that despite having a family of divorced parents, you are in no way potentially posing an issue to the school.

That means reassuring that your academic performance is unaffected, and in the future you will be safe and secure with no extraneous issues.

If you are struggling to write a good college essay about divorced parents, you may want to consider speaking with a professional college essay editor and advisor. Contact us for a free consultation. We will get back to you within 24 hours, and can provide you with a free review + advising on your application essay.

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Should You Talk about Divorce in Your College Admissions Essay

The hello college team.

Last Updated on August 29, 2024

As a high school student, you should plan out your college application essay s carefully. You want to write a strong piece centered around a topic that is personal, compelling, and unique. But figuring out what that personal, compelling, unique topic is can be difficult.

Some students feel that there are so many important moments they want to write about in their essay that they can’t choose among them. Other students may have the opposite experience: feeling as if there’s nothing that makes them special and so no topic around which to build an essay. But, because this is your only chance to personally connect with admissions officers , it’s still important to pick a topic that will provide readers a sense of your character and your story. To accomplish this, some students decide to talk about their passions or times in their lives that made them re-evaluate themselves, and some students discuss heavier topics, such as personal loss.

In particular, many students want to write about their experience of their parents’ divorce in their college application essay . This is a tricky topic to navigate in a personal statement, but it can be done. We’ll talk below about whether you should write about divorce and, if you do decide to focus on the topic, how best to frame your essay.

Can You Write about Divorce in Your College Essay ?

Because it can be hard to properly articulate how someone’s parents’ divorce or a loved one’s death helped them grow as individuals, many college advisors try to steer students away from writing about these more serious situations. It’s very easy, if the essay isn’t well structured, for the tragedy of divorce or death to overshadow the writer’s personal qualities that they are trying to highlight for admissions officers .

Still, this doesn’t mean that you can’t write about your parent’s divorce and how it shaped you. Depending on how you frame the divorce, you can make the topic work in your favor, but you need to make sure that you’re writing about your role in the divorce in a way that is flattering and that shows—through concrete examples—how you grew as a result of your experiences.

When Should You Write about Divorce in Your College Application Essay ?

Students can write about almost any topic, as long as they answer the essay prompt and show colleges that they have the right qualities to attend their school. However, if you plan on writing about divorce in your essay, we recommend thinking about a few key factors.

First, consider how much time has passed since the divorce. If your parents have just divorced this year, it might not be appropriate to write about this as your essay topic. A divorce is a traumatic event for students of any age, so you want some distance between yourself and the divorce, enough that you can properly process its effects on your life. If your parents are recently divorced, it may be harder to gain the necessary perspective and clarity to write a strong essay.

Next, ask yourself if you have a good reason for writing about your parent’s divorce. Some students simply pick this topic because they feel like they need to write about a challenging time in their life. However, it’s best if you have other strong reasons for writing about your parent’s divorce—generally some personal growth or resilience that the divorce highlights. If you can’t show clearly how the trauma of divorce led you to grow or develop, it may be best to seek a different topic.

Any essay about divorce is bound to highlight emotional hardships, but you want to be careful that those challenges don’t become the central focus of the essay. It’s okay to show vulnerability in your application, and opening up about challenging experiences can help your essay stand out and seem more unique. But you’re having suffered doesn’t inherently make you a more attractive candidate to colleges. Rather, you want to be able to show how that suffering it connects to your college ambitions, how it led you to become more resilient or more focused or how it directed you toward a career assisting people who have similar traumatic experiences.

Really, anyone writing about this topic needs to show admissions officers that they’ve emerged from this experience stronger, a better potential asset to colleges they’re applying to.

How to Write a Strong College Application Essay about Divorce

If you’ve considered your options and writing about your parents’ divorce still seems like your best option, there are many ways to approach the topic. We have a few pointers to help you set up your essay and grab admissions readers’ attentions below:

Create a Solid Outline

As with any essay, planning is everything. You want to create a solid outline that will really help admissions officers understand you and your experience of your parents’ divorce. Start by writing a strong hook that isn’t overly cliché. You might begin by describing a particularly difficult moment in the divorce, though this runs the risk of highlighting too strongly the negative aspects of your experience. To overcome that problem, you might instead paint a picture of your current life, of the ways in which you’ve improved following the divorce .

You can analyze the situation a little, but make sure that, throughout the middle part of your essay, you talk about how the divorce positively shaped your outlook on life. What lessons did you learn? How did you grow? How are you stronger for having undergone these difficult experiences? Answer these questions well, then talk about how these life lessons prepared you for your chosen college.

Try Not to be a Cliche

While divorce is difficult for everyone involved, especially children, you need to remember that a lot of people go through a divorce. That means that plenty of students have written on this topic—and your reader will likely be familiar with common tropes of the genre: slammed doors and angry voices, financial challenges and difficult relocations. So, you need to help yourself stand out by making your writing more unique.

The best way to do this is by presenting your experiences with enough specificity that the experience you’re describing is yours and no one else’s. Slammed doors may be a cliché of arguments, but if you describe the how, after they slammed the door, you watched your parent walk away through the door’s cut glass window, their image fractured into a thousand fragments by the prismed glass, no one will mistake your story for that of another student. Through specificity and concrete imagery, you can make your essay stand out..

It’s true that similarities will exist in anyone’s account of a divorce, but you can make your essay distinctive by adding personal details. The most important thing is to tell admissions how you specifically overcame the divorce and learned from this experience.

Have Other People Read Your Essay

Finally, have people you trust look over your essay. It might be uncomfortable letting other people read such a personal essay, but you want to make sure that you’re submitting the best possible writing for your college application. Friends and family members can give you constructive feedback and even tell you how to improve your writing. They can also check for grammar and other spelling mistakes so your essay is fully polished and ready for submission!

At HelloCollege , we know how difficult it can be to prepare for college and aim to make the process as simple and easy as possible. We want to help you get accepted into the university of your dreams! Schedule a free consultation today.

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Divorce and its Impacts on Family Members Cause and Effect Essay

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Introduction

Impacts of divorce, how divorced spouses cope with the divorce.

Divorce has become a common aspect of our society. Current divorce statistics have been estimated to be 50% in America. This portrays a society where people are moving from a situation where family institutions were used as refugees and comfort zones to a one where they are viewed as a place of doom and suffering.

We cannot deny that divorce has devastating and far reaching effects than we are ready to admit. This paper looks into the impacts of divorce to the various members of the broken marriage, and how they try to live through it.

The effects of divorce are experienced by each and every member of the family regardless of who was at fault.

“The effects of divorce can change virtually every aspect of a person’s life including where a person lives, with whom they live with, their standard of living, their emotional happiness, their assets and liabilities, time spent with children and other family…” (eJustice 2002),

Effects of divorce to couples themselves

Even though the couple is the author of the outcome of the marriage, it does not affect them any less. The effects are on all aspects of life i.e., socially, financially, and psychologically.

Socially, individuals relations with the outside is influenced by the persons failed marriage. “Divorced individuals generally experience more social isolation and have smaller social networks than do married individuals” (Henley & Parsley, 2011).

This may result from self pity and feelings of inadequacy that may be developed by the individual in question. Further, there are societies where divorced people are viewed as failures and are allocated a lower social standing as compared to married people. In such traditional societies, divorced people and especially women are not allowed to remarry. So they may end up spending their lives in solitude and unhappy.

Moreover, even where it is completely allowed to remarry, “remarriages are less stable than first marriages…Therefore; divorce appears to influence future marital relationships, making them less stable and more vulnerable to dissolution” (Henley & Parsley, 2011).

Economically, a person’s normal life is disrupted and normally one of the couple may have to establish a home elsewhere, which requires funds. Further, divorce legal proceedings can be quite expensive, to hire lawyers and paying witnesses not to mention countless hours spent in courtrooms. In addition, the property accumulated during the subsistence of the marriage is ordinarily split up between the couple and these lowers the standards of living from both ends.

Sometimes, a couple may be unable to obtain judicial help in determining property ownership leaving weaker party, especially women, under the mercy of the other couple. This normally causes unfairness where the party refuses to divide the property in his possession fairy, not to mention hiding some of the property, leaving the other party financially starved.

Researchers have reached a conclusion that there is a disparity between the economic situation of women and that of men after divorce, with women generally being on the lower edge while men experiencing an economic upsurge (Braver and O’Connell 1998).

Psychologically, research has revealed that divorced people portray higher rates of anxiety and depression, low self-esteem and psychological instability, with those having more than one divorce experiences exhibiting more of these tendencies as compared to those with one.

Researchers has it that those who stay married, even though they were unhappy before, are likely to be happier five years later in the marriage as opposed to those who opted for divorce (Waite & Gallagher 2000, P. 148).

The psychological impact causes health implications to the couple. It has been shown that both spouses will greatly suffer a decline in mental health but this may affect women more than men. Further, a couple diagnosed with a terminal illness is more likely to recover within the marriage as compared to a divorced individual (Goodwin et al 1987, P. 3125-3130).

This shows that there are deeper issues associated with divorce besides the financial hurdles and social effects.

Impacts to Children

Divorce has profound implications on the children of the marriage. This is regardless of whether they are adult children or otherwise. Study has shown that divorce has serious implications on development of children and affects their future relationships. These effects may be discussed in terms of what the child has to lose resulting from the divorce. These may include such things as economic loss, lack of parental care and other social disruptions.

Economically, since children are moving from an institution where there are two breadwinners to, in most cases, one-breadwinner family it is normal that the financial status will have to be adjusted to suite the new family setting. This will mean cutting costs to incorporate all the needs of the family to the now constrained family budget.

In extreme cases, where the single parent is unemployed and without a stable source of income, the children may be forced to survive without basic necessities. It has been established that, “[children] in single-parent families have less than one-third the median per capita income of kids from two-parent families, and half of them fall below the poverty line in any given year, compared with 10% of their counterparts in intact families” (Magnet 1992, p 43)

Parental factor has various aspects to it. First of all, divorced parents will no longer live together. The children who were used to being with both parents will have to live with one of them. Adjusting to these new casual relationships between parents may pose problems to most children.

Mostly the children grow up without having the fatherly input in their lives. For children below 5 years, “sleep disturbances and an exacerbated fear of separation from the custodial parent are common. There is usually a great deal of yearning for the non-custodial parent” (Eleoff 2003).

It was concluded that youth of around 20 years still carry around with them painful memories ten years after their parents’ divorce. Billings and Emery (2000) among the things that still weigh down on them is the loss of the relationship with their fathers.

Further, the parent bestowed with the custody of the children may not be very effective on his/her own on the over burdened parental obligation. It could be the ordinary imperfections of a parent or it could have arisen from the after-effects of the divorce process. As argued out before, the psychological stability of the parent may be in question, and this is transmitted to the children, albeit unknowingly.

“In the wake of a divorce, most custodial mothers exhibit varying degrees of disorganization, anger, decreased expectations for appropriate social behavior of their children, and a reduction of the ability of parents to separate the child’s needs and actions from those of the adult” (Eleoff 2003).

The other issue on parents is the fact that, after divorce, parents will remarry and the children will have a different set of parents, step parents. Obviously, the step family will not function as naturally as a normal family does.

More often than not, there will be conflicts of loyalties between step parent and biological parent for the child. “Evidence suggests that each change in parenting arrangements represents a risk factor, thus increasing the likelihood that a child will react negatively to their post-divorce environment”(Demo & Supple 2011).

Social disruptions involve such things as moving houses, changing schools and having adapting new and very different surrounding for the child. Sometimes, it means that the new surroundings are worse off than the one the child is used to. This may be due to financial strains on the single parent.

Study has shown that, constant moving for children of single parent families, increased school drop-outs and chances of unplanned pregnancies. (Crowder and Teachman 2004)

When these children move from their original home and schools, they lose their friends and are forced to start all over again in life, a situation that most children have a problem adjusting to.

Overall, children experience such internal and emotional conflicts as low self-esteem, unfamiliarity to the new surroundings and set of parents, feelings of rejection especially from the parent who is not living with them and feelings of hopelessness and insecurity.

Despite the devastating impacts of a divorce, all the members have to find a way of surviving the divorce. Some of the factors that help family members cope may be economical, social or personal factors.

Personal factors have to do with the personal attributes that are specific to an individual. They include such matters as age, level of education, financial security and psychological stability. Research shows that older people are less likely to cope with a divorce as compared to younger people owing to their impaired chances of remarriage and due the comfort they have established in the marriage all those years.

Also, a person who is financially stable will be more likely to adjust to new family set-up as opposed to people who are unemployed. This is made stronger by the now widely adopted principle of property settlement between spouses, which requires a 50-50 property division. This ensures that both spouses’ living standards are least affected by the divorce.

Also, parties will seek to establish new social networks for support. Some spouses will start new romantic relationships or even remarry so as to forget their former spouses as well as help in the hardships of day to day living.

Divorce is a horrible ordeal to go through. The post-divorce experiences are beyond devastation, both to the members of the family involved and to the society at large. Parties should try to resolve their disputes before rushing for divorce and it should only be a last resort.

Many studies have been done on the level divorce with statistics showing that they are currently very high. However, there hasn’t been conclusive research on what are the causes of this rapidly increasing pandemic or even on how it could be stopped.

Therefore, future studies should concentrate more on how we can combine efforts to reduce the occurrence of more divorces. It is a duty and responsibility of each and every member of the society to uphold and protect the sanctity of the institution of the marriage.

Braver, S. L and O’Connell, D. (1998) Divorced Dads: Shattering the Myths. New York: Putnam.

Billings, L & Emery, R. E. (2000). Distress among young adults in divorced families: Journal of Family Psychology , 14, 671-687.

Crowder, K & Teachman, J. (2004). Do residential conditions explain the relationship between living arrangements and adolescent behavior? Journal of Marriage and Family , 66, 721-738.

Eleoff, S. (2003). An Exploration of the Ramifications of Divorce on Children and Adolescent: The Pennsylvania, State University College of Medicine eJustice.

Goodwin, S et al. (1987). The Effect of Marital Status on Stage, Treatment, and Survival of Cancer Patients; Journal of the American Medical Association 258: 3125-3130.

Henley, K & Pasley, K. (2011). Divorce- Effects On Children, Effects On Couples, Effects On Parents: Effects on couples .

Magnet, M. (1992). The American Family : Fortune 10 Aug: 42-47.

Waite, L & Gallagher, M. ( 2000). The Case for Marriage. New York: Doubleday p.148.

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Essay Samples on Divorce

Divorce is a complex and deeply personal process that involves the legal dissolution of a marriage. It marks the end of a once-promising union and triggers a range of emotions, from sadness and anger to relief and newfound independence. Understanding the intricacies of divorce and its effects is crucial when writing college essays about divorce.

How to Write College Essays About Divorce

When exploring the subject of divorce, it is important to delve into the factors that contribute to its occurrence and look at college essays about divorce examples. These can include communication issues, incompatibility, domestic abuse, financial strain, or even external factors such as societal expectations or cultural norms. Discussing these causes helps paint a comprehensive picture of the complexities surrounding divorce.

To provide a well-rounded perspective for an example of college essay about divorce, consider including statistics or research findings related to divorce rates, average durations of marriages, or common age groups affected by divorce. This data can help support your arguments and provide a factual foundation for your essay.

Additionally, it is crucial to examine the legal aspects of divorce. Different jurisdictions have specific laws and regulations governing the process, including property division, alimony, child custody, and visitation rights. Incorporating information about these legal frameworks can add depth to your essay and showcase a comprehensive understanding of divorce proceedings.

While divorce can be emotionally challenging, it also offers opportunities for personal growth and self-discovery. Discuss the psychological and emotional impacts divorce can have on individuals, as well as strategies for coping and rebuilding one’s life after the end of a marriage.

Lastly, explore the societal implications of divorce. Analyze how divorce impacts the perception of marriage, family structures, and gender roles. Consider the evolving attitudes towards divorce in different cultures and how society supports or stigmatizes individuals going through this process in the divorce essay example.

Cause and Effect of Broken Family: Exploring the Impact on Individuals and Society

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The Effects Of Divorce On Children And Young Adolescents

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Common Social Problems Encountered In Family Life And How They Affect The Marriage

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Why Divorces Become More Frequent: Research Study

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Best topics on Divorce

1. Cause and Effect of Broken Family: Exploring the Impact on Individuals and Society

2. Growing Up with Divorced Parents: Discussing the Topic of Divorce With Your Children

3. Growing Up With Divorced Parents: The Impact of Divorce on the Children

4. The Effects Of Divorce On Children

5. The Effects Of Divorce On Children In America

6. The Effects Of Divorce On Children And Young Adolescents

7. The Causes Of Divorce That Lead To The Annulment

8. The Causes Of Divorce And The Ruined Marriages

9. The Causes Of Divorce: The Reason Marriage Fails

10. The Causes And Effects Of Divorce

11. Main Reasons For Divorce In The United States And How It Impacts Family

12. My Personal Opinion On Why Divorce Shouldn’t Be Legalized

13. Common Social Problems Encountered In Family Life And How They Affect The Marriage

14. Divorce Rates In Kenya And Means To Reduce Them

15. Divorce Process And Finances In Hennepin County

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Essays About Divorce: Top 5 Examples and 7 Prompts

Essays about divorce can be challenging to write; read on to see our top essay examples and writing prompts to help you get started.

Divorce is the legal termination of a marriage. It can be a messy affair, especially if it includes children. Dividing the couple’s assets also often causes chaos when divorce proceedings are in session.

Divorce also touches and considers religion and tradition. Therefore, laws are formed depending on the country’s history, culture, and belief system.

To help you choose what you want to talk about regarding this topic, here are examples you can read to get an idea of what kind of essay you want to write.

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1. Divorce Should Be Legalized in the Philippines by Ernestine Montgomery

2. to divorce or not to divorce by mark ghantous, 3. what if you mess up by manis friedman, 4. divorce: a life-changing experience by writer louie, 5. divorce’s effects on early adult relationships by percy massey, 1. the major reasons for divorce, 2. why i support divorce, 3. my divorce experience, 4. how to avoid divorce, 5. divorce and its effects on my family, 6. the consequences of divorce, 7. divorce laws around the world.

“What we need is a divorce law that defines clearly and unequivocally the grounds and terms for terminating a marriage… Divorce is a choice and we all should have the freedom to make choices… in cases where a union is more harmful than beneficial, a divorce can be benevolent and less hurtful way of severing ties with your partner.”

As the title suggests, Montgomery and his other colleagues discuss why the Philippines, a predominantly Catholic country, needs to allow divorce. Then, to strengthen his argument, he mentions that Spain, the root of Christianity, and Italy, where the Vatican City is, administer divorce.

He also mentions bills, relevant figures, and statistics to make his case in favor of divorce more compelling. Montgomery adds that people who want a divorce don’t necessarily mean they want to marry again, citing other motives such as abuse and marital failure.

“Divorce, being the final step in a detrimental marriage, brings upon the gruesome decision as to whether a married couple wishes to end that once made commitment they had for each other. As opposed to the present, divorce was rare in ancient times…”

Ghantous starts his essay with what divorce means, as not only an end of a commitment but also the termination of legal duties and other obligations of the couple to each other. He then talks about divorce in ancient times, when men had superior control over women and their children. He also mentions Caroline Norton, who fought with English family law that was clearly against women.

“So even though G‑d has rules,… laws,… divine commandments, when you sin, He tells you: ‘You messed up? Try again.’ That’s exactly how you should be married — by treating your spouse the way G‑d treats you. With that much mercy and compassion, that much kindness and consideration.”

Friedman’s essay discusses how the Torah sees marriage and divorce and explains it by recounting a scene with his daughters where they couldn’t follow a recipe. He includes good treatment and forgiveness necessary in spouses. But he also explains that God understands and doesn’t want people in a failed marriage to continue hurting. You might also be interested in these essays about commitment .

“Depending on the reasons that led up to the divorce the effects can vary… I was fourteen years old and the one child that suffered the most emotional damage… My parents did not discuss their reasons for the divorce with me, they didn’t have to, and I knew the reasons.”

The author starts the essay by citing the famous marital promise: “For better or worse, for richer or poorer,” before going in-depth regarding the divorce rate among Americans. He further expounds on how common divorce is, including its legalities. Although divorce has established legal grounds, it doesn’t consider the emotional trauma it will cause, especially for children.

Louie recounts how his life changed when his dad moved out, listing why his parents divorced. He ends the essay by saying society is at fault for commercializing divorce as if it’s the only option.

“With divorce becoming more prevalent, many researchers have taken it upon themselves to explore many aspects of this topic such as evolving attitudes, what causes divorce, and how it effects the outcome of children’s lives.”

Massey examines the causes of divorce and how it impacts children’s well-being by citing many relevant research studies. Some of the things he mentions are the connection between the child’s mental health, behavioral issues, and future relationships. Another is the trauma a child can endure during the divorce proceedings.

He also mentions that some children who had a broken family put marriage on a pedestal. As a result, they do their best to create a better future family and treat their children better.

Top 7 Prompts on Essays About Divorce

After adding to your knowledge about the subject, you’re better prepared to write essays about divorce.

There are many causes of the dissolution of marriage, and many essays have already discussed these reasons. However, you can explain these reasons differently. For example, you can focus on domestic abuse, constant fighting, infidelity, financial issues, etc.

If you want to make your piece stand out, you can include your personal experience, but only if you’re comfortable sharing your story with others.

If you believe divorce offers a better life for all parties involved, list these benefits and explain them. Then, you can focus on a specific pro of legalizing divorce, such as getting out of an abusive relationship.

If you want to write an essay to argue against the negative effects of divorce, here’s an excellent guide on how to write an argumentative essay .

This prompt is not only for anyone who has no or sole guardian. If you want to write about the experiences of a child raised by other people or who lives with a single parent, you can interview a friend or anyone willing to talk about their struggles and triumphs even if they didn’t have a set of parents.

Aside from reasons for divorce, you can talk about what makes these reasons more probable. Then, analyze what steps couples can take to avoid it. Such as taking couples’ therapy, weekly family get-together, etc. To make your essay more valuable, weigh in on what makes these tips effective.

Essays About Divorce: Divorce and its effects on my family

Divorce is diverse and has varying effects. There are many elements to its results, and no two sets of factors are precisely the same for two families.

If you have an intimate experience of how your immediate and extended family dynamic had been affected by divorce, narrate those affairs. Include what it made you and the others around you feel. You might also be interested in these essays about conflict .

This is a broad prompt, but you can narrow it down by focusing on an experience you or a close friend had. You can also interview someone closely related to a divorce case, such as a lawyer, reporter, or researcher.

If you don’t have any experience with divorce, do not know anyone who had to go through it, or is more interested in its legal aspects, compiles different divorce laws for each country. You can even add a brief history for each law to make the readers understand how they came about.

Are you looking for other topics to write on? Check out our general resource of essay writing topics .

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Putting Divorce into Context in Your Applications

October 4, 2019

Applications

After years of working with students, I’ve seen that dealing with divorce as a part of the college process can be challenging for students. While many family separations are amicable or mutually chosen, many others contain feelings of loss, grief, anger and sadness . If you are a student who has faced the challenges presented by divorced parents in any way, this blog is for you!

In my last two blogs ( Part 1 / Part 2 ), I gave advice to divorced families regarding finances and the college search process . Making sure your family understands their financial plan and has a good process in place can help things go much more smoothly. However, when it comes to filling out the application, you – the student – will be faced with clearly explaining how divorce affected you.

For many students, the timing of a parents’ divorce could not be worse – when it happens during high school, it can distract you from activities, destabilize your financial support, impede on your emotional support system, and/or a hamper your studies right when grades are most important . Even if it happened several years ago, you may still be struggling with the reshuffling of your life. In these cases, it is important that you explain this to colleges. Here are three of the best ways to do that.

1) You can write about these circumstances in the additional information section of the Common Application . This section allows you to write up to 650 words “if you wish to provide details of circumstances or qualifications not reflected in the application.” When writing a summary of your parents’ divorce, keep it fairly factual (as opposed to highly emotional), and point clearly to how the circumstances of divorce impacted your application – primarily academic work and extracurricular activities. Typically, you would want an explanation for this section to be shorter than your main essay, so around 150-300 words, but you can use as much space as needed, and should, when appropriate. I recommend doing this when circumstances dictate, as you have little to lose and everything to gain, even if you don’t want to “whine” or “ask for pity” as many of my students say.

2) Write your main Common Application essay about your parents’ divorce. I am very cautious to recommend this strategy, but it can be effective for some students. The primary problem with writing about a highly emotional or traumatic event in your life is that you haven’t always fully processed the event. This makes it very difficult to gain the needed perspective. Frequently, students end up writing with less skill, more difficulty, and less cohesion, because they are trying to explain an experience that taps deep emotions, particularly negative ones. So, how to decide if this is an appropriate topic for your essay? First, decide if writing about this event gives admissions readers unique insight into who you are. Second, ask yourself if this topic will provide better insights about who you are than all other possible topics. Third, make time to write in a journaling style, and then, get feedback from a trusted adult about whether the thoughts present you well and add to the strength of your application.

3) Finally, your school counselor recommendation is another appropriate place for colleges to learn about family circumstances that might have affected your application to college. If you have experienced challenges related to divorce, be sure to communicate those to your counselor. For example, after your parents split up, you might not have been able to visit a particular college to demonstrate interest. You could need more time for your college search , have less time to devote to extracurricular activities because of your living situation, have gone through a period of time where your academics were affected negatively, or have had to get a job. Regardless of the circumstance, be sure to set a meeting with your counselor to fully explain the circumstances and why you’d like them to be included in the letter. Your counselor can help contextualize your circumstances in the school recommendation letter or forms.

While divorce presents challenges for many students, I’ve also worked with many students who found strengths, hopes, or new opportunities because of the change of circumstance in their lives. Living through a challenge can cause you to become more mature or more flexible. Further, it can introduce more support people – such as stepparents – into your life. Look for those positives and emphasize those in your applications, so colleges will see you gaining self reliance, optimism, and strength.

Divorce Blog Part 1

Divorce Blog Part 2

Nicole has dedicated the entirety of her 20 year career to encouraging higher education opportunities. After graduating from Vanderbilt, she worked in her alma mater’s admissions office. The, she completed her PhD in Counseling so she could bring that expertise into college counseling. Nicole partnered with her former Vanderbilt colleague, Fitz Totten, to form Find The Right College and support their mission to make trustworthy advising more accessible.

Want to be ahead of the College Admission process?

Personal Narrative: My Experience With Divorced Parents Essay

When I was five years old, my parents got divorced. Through the separation process, and some years after, my parents fought a lot. They sometimes brought my 2 sisters and I into it, which was really frustrating. Growing up with parents who are divorced has been a struggle for me throughout my life. It’s hard to put into words my experience and ongoing trials I go through with divorced parents.

My parents met when my mom was in her early twenties and my dad was thirty. They got married a couple years following the time they started dating. Shortly after getting married, they had my older sister Maddy, then me, and after that they had my younger sister Cassie. I can clearly remember us being a happy family. I had the best parents who worked as a team. We did a lot of stuff together as a family, gardening, playing outside, and staying active. We lived in a big house off of 85th in Green Lake, Seattle.

I remember being young when the fighting started, yelling and screaming. It scared my sisters and me a lot. No one wants to witness their parents fighting as a kid. When I was five, Maddy seven, and Cassie three, our parents got divorced. Once the process was finished, my mom got custody of us and took us to live in a house with her. My dad stayed at our house in Ballard and we moved into a house with my mom and her new boyfriend, which is also whose baby she was carrying.

Over the next few years, we had been back and forth between both parents. I remember I sometimes hated leaving my mom and dad. I wished I could be with both of them at the same time. Me and my sisters lived in a new house in Everett, with our then new Step dad, Mom, and baby sister Meghan. Whenever we went over to my dads, there was always something my parents were fighting about, whether it involved us or not, we would always get an earful from both of them.

This point of their separation really affected me the most. I didn’t realize until I got older that we should have never been exposed to that part of their lives, considering how young we were. Another part of their divorce was dealing with a step dad I’ve never been fond of, and neither were my sisters. It was somewhat of a culture shock, him growing up in Mexico, and for us, as we began living with a guy who wasn’t even our dad. I would always ask my mom why she couldn’t have married someone else.

Someone we liked. My step dad was the type of guy who only cared about his “real” children, not us. It became a constant struggle for attention from my Mom. When we were young, my sister and I were treated like maids around the house when my step dad was around. He is honestly one of the main reasons why the divorce was so heartbreaking for me and my siblings. I feel as if my mom had married someone who supported her and loved her unconditionally; it would have made more of a positive impact during this hard time in our life.

Later on, around fourteen or fifteen years of age, I saw my dad slip away from me. I saw him less and less every month. This crushed me; I didn’t understand it at all. Once I got to high school, I never saw my dad. I would try to think of the last time I had seen him and I couldn’t even remember when it was. My dad had lost both of his parents in the last year and I always had this feeling he had never moved on from the divorce. My dad has always been stubborn and I think he has always held onto that part of his life.

How could you not? I remember my dad had told me when I was in middle school, that he had been an alcoholic. He said he drank a lot when he was young but stopped once he had kids. Shortly after realizing how little I saw my dad, I started getting phone calls and texts from family members, saying they had smelled alcohol on his breath. When I heard this, I was crushed. I didn’t believe them; I was so mad at them for telling me that. I thought to myself how my dad could choose alcohol over his daughters. I think somehow over the next years of high school I just pretended he doesn’t exist.

I did this because as a young teen, I should not have had to constantly worry about my dad. After a couple of years knowing about his drinking, my sisters and I found out he got a DUI. I hated him; I was shocked and didn’t understand why he would go down this road and do this to himself. We finally had to confront him about his drinking. Me and my sisters told him we wouldn’t be seeing him if he continued going down the wrong path. He has been sober ever since then. His actions are inexcusable but I believe they were the repercussions of divorce. This shows just how serious divorce is and what problems it causes in people’s lives.

Today, I still go through phases where I think about what life would be like if they never got separated. I constantly compare my family to others with married parents. Dealing with divorce hasn’t been easy to deal with, but it’s normal for me now, something you get used to. Which sounds crazy, but it is the way I have to think to be happy. Divorce has been challenging for me and I don’t think it will ever get easier. To be able to move on my life, I just have to think more positively about the situation.

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Carol R. Hughes, Ph.D., LMFT, and Bruce R. Fredenburg, M.S., LMFT

I'm an Adult Child of Divorcing Parents. What Will Help Me?

Two sisters share what helped them cope during their parent's divorce..

Posted May 30, 2024 | Reviewed by Gary Drevitch

The Challenges of Divorce
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Adult children of "gray divorce" face identity crises, strained relationships, and emotional turmoil.
Coping strategies include intense physical exercise, therapy, writing, and setting clear boundaries.
Strong family support and understanding between siblings can be crucial for physical and emotional healing.

This is the third in a series of posts about the experiences, feelings, and healing journey of two sisters, who are adult children of gray divorce. Read the previous post here .

For over 30 years, couples over 50 have been divorcing in record-setting numbers worldwide. Researchers have named this phenomenon "The Gray Divorce Revolution" and predict it will triple by 2030. The adult children of these divorcing couples frequently say they are unprepared to handle what is happening in their family and feel painfully alone.

I spoke with Sophia and Eleana* (not my patients), two sisters who were adults when their parents began their divorce process. Sophia is a 27-year-old journalist based in the UK, and Eleana is a 30-year-old talent management /development expert and a career coach living in Germany.

Carol: You refer to the "limbo phase" of your parents' divorce journey. What was the most significant for you during that phase?

Eleana: The most significant way that the limbo phase impacted me was in my relationship with our father because it made it even harder for me to rebuild trust with him. It was a phase of almost promises. Those were either communicated promises or promises that I would try to derive from a situation. It often led to situations of disappointment. That made it harder for me to rebuild a neutral relationship with our father.

Carol: What other difficulties arose for you at that time?

Eleana: Another significant difficulty for me in the limbo phase was that I could tell how much our mother was struggling as the person who was left behind in the relationship and was having to rebuild trust in someone who had an affair. My mindset of "I need to build new relationships individually with our parents" was impossible for me to do. Honestly, I was aware as an adult that I was in a situation that was extremely emotionally loaded and full of emotions, anger , and sadness. It was tough for me to build a neutral relationship with anyone.

Carol: How did the closeness of your family affect you?

Sophia: We are fortunate to be so close as a family. Not everyone has that. And especially as third-culture kids, having moved around for so many years, family was very important to us. Holidays and traditions became even more important to us when we were living abroad. So, our mom was always trying to keep that alive. We're Germans and love Christmas, which was a big thing every year in our household. But at the same time, we were very codependent and up in each other's business all the time. When that broke apart, there was that feeling of, "Who am I now? What role do I play now?"

This was not just in relation to our family members, but also to ourselves. I had a full-blown identity crisis afterward of really questioning my roots because family means stability, it means safety, it means home. And when that broke apart, I had to rethink everything. It's even more vital as an adult because you're so aware of everything.

Eleana, this has been going on for a very long time, and you and I have been on a similar journey of trying to deal with it. There are a lot of things that I did with you or shared with you. What helped you cope in the last few years?

Eleana: It varied from phase to phase. The first phase for me was trying to let go of a lot of anger that I had when it came to coping. I did that by going to the gym. I went to the gym seven days a week and did hardcore, high-intensity training. I was almost purging everything in my head as I was doing intensive exercises, trying to get out physically what I wasn't verbalizing. So, one way of coping was physical exercise, getting out there, being active, and getting that emotion out that way. That was one of the main ones for me.

Carol: What else helped you cope?

Eleana: After around two or three years, I decided to start seeing a therapist because I felt like I was very stuck in how I was progressing with things. I noticed that many things related to our family started drifting into my life, even my professional life and my life with my now husband. I decided I needed to seek some help, and I started with more psychotherapeutic work. Then, I transitioned into somatic therapy and even reiki, which is more on an energetic level. I tried everything out there to see what would work best for me. It was a nice holistic approach that really supported me.

Another thing that helped me was learning how to communicate my boundaries , learning how to communicate when I needed space and why I needed space so that it wasn't passive-aggressive , but a very clear, "This is what's happening for me, and can we please not talk about X, Y, Z, so that I can be at my best for you." That was the conversation. So, open communication and boundary setting were very important.

And finally, my relationship with my sisters really helped me cope throughout the whole time because my friends didn't understand. They hadn't gone through it, and other family members didn't understand. They were always curious about how our mother was doing or how our father was doing. They weren't ever asking about us. So, we sisters were the only people who understood what was happening and what was going on. Even though we had vastly different reactions to the situations, we had the preexisting relationship to respect what the other person was going through, accept it, and listen. I count myself really lucky that we had that. And I'm aware that not everyone has that. So that was a huge one.

Sophia: For me, there are a lot of similarities: the holistic approach to therapy, and a lot of podcasts and books. I'm a journalist, so I love to write. Writing down my feelings, journaling, and writing letters to people, even if it didn't mean I sent them off to them, was really a useful tool. We always recommend trying different things to anyone. Even if you don't think it would help you, you'd be surprised by what approach can support you.

* Names and details changed to protect patient confidentiality.

To find a therapist, visit the Psychology Today Therapy Directory .

Susan L. Brown and I-Fen Lin, “The Gray Divorce Revolution: Rising Divorce Among Middle-Aged and Older Adults, 1990-2010,” Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences 67, no. 6 (2012): 731–41, doi:10.1093/geronb/gbs089.

Carol R. Hughes, Ph.D., LMFT , and Bruce R. Fredenburg, M.S., LMFT , are psychotherapists and co-authors of Home Will Never Be the Same Again: A Guide for Adult Children of Gray Divorce .

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Persuasive & Argumentative Essays about Divorce: Free Tips

A divorce is a life-changing experience that affects spouses and their children (if there are any). Since divorce rates are relatively high in modern society, more and more people face this problem nowadays.

When you are assigned to compose an argumentative essay about divorce, you should be as careful as possible. Remember that the split-up of marriage can be a painful experience for everyone involved.

The article will give you useful advice on how to write an outstanding paper on the topic. Learn the essential features of the following types:

persuasive essay about divorce,
for and against essay,
causes and effects of divorce essay,

Check tips from Custom-writing.org below and write the best paper!

💍 How to Write It
📂 Essays by Type
✒ Causes and Effects

✍️ Divorce Essay Topics

💍 how to write a divorce essay.

The general structure of essays on divorce is quite common:

introduction;
conclusion.

Yet, there are some variations of what info to include in the body, depending on the essay type. The following structure is applicable for divorce argumentative essay. To learn about the features of other types, keep on reading our article.

Argumentative divorce essays are composed according to the standard structure:

1. Thesis Statement about Divorce

A divorce essay introduction isn’t anything extraordinary as you have to introduce your topic and position.

You should always give broad information about the issue and state the main problems you will discuss in your writing.
Make a general statement about the consequences of divorce or the common divorce effects on people.
Then write your thesis statement on divorce. Clearly explain to the audience the topic you’re going to discuss and your position on that topic. In case you find this task difficult, try using a thesis generator for argumentative essay . This will save you some time.

That’s it! Now your divorce essay introduction is ready.

What’s next?

2. Main Body

This section presents all of your ideas and arguments related to the topic of divorce.

Here you can write about the adverse effects of divorce on children or the most common reasons people divorce.
Use compelling arguments and support your ideas with examples.

There are tons of surveys and statistics about divorce on the internet, so it won’t be too challenging to gather the information you need.

3. Conclusion

In the last paragraph, you have to sum up your paper and leave a final expression.

Summarize every idea presented in your divorce essay.
Restate your thesis statement on divorce, relying on your reasoning.
Then list your concluding thoughts on this topic.

Make your sentences clear and easy to follow. Use synonyms to improve your writing style. Such an approach will help you convince the readers and express your thoughts better.

📂 Divorce Essays by Type

The content and reasoning of each paper on divorce depend primarily on the type of essay . See the following sections to understand how to write each of them.

Here are a few types you can consider:

Argumentative Essay about Divorce

When it comes to divorce, there are many disputable topics—for example, the reasons people separate or its impact on children. It’s easy to find support and statistics for both issues. And you’ll need them as facts are a crucial part of a divorce argumentative essay.

As a starting point:

Research your idea and choose a side to support. Make sure that among all argumentative essay topics about divorce, you selected the most interesting for yourself. In your thesis statement, concisely express your position, so the reader can quickly get it.

Then, start writing the entire essay. Regardless of what type of paper you are writing—anti or pro divorce argumentative essay—your writing should meet these requirements:

Base your points on logic;
Present both sides of the arguments, but support only one;
Take into consideration counterclaims;
Support all the arguments by valid evidence;
Use a calm, informative tone.

Don’t forget to incorporate quotes and figures to convince your readers.

Persuasive Essay about Divorce

What is the goal of writing persuasive essays ? It’s to convince your reader that your position on a particular problem is true.

Therefore, writing this paper means that you should identify an individual problem related to the topic. In the introduction of your persuasive essay about divorce, you should choose your side and deliver it to the reader.

Crucial note:

Similarly to an argumentative essay, you have to provide credible facts to support your position. Yet here, you use them to back up your opinion and persuade your reader.

While composing your persuasive essay about the legalization of divorce, remember its distinctive features:

Based on emotions;
Presents only one side of the argument;
Ignores counterclaims;
The tone is dynamic, emotionally-charged, and aggressive to some extent.

Cause and Effect Essay on Divorce

Whether it concerns old parents or a young couple, divorce typically has the same causes and effects. You can often see them clearly, even in books or movies.

The essay outline for the causes and effects of divorce essay is quite common:

Introduction.

In your divorce essay introduction, provide a general background and compose a clear thesis statement. For example, your thesis might look like this:

A divorce, caused by the spouses’ expectations mismatch, results in a lack of communication between children and one of the parents.

In this part of your essay, investigate the cause and effect of divorce, you stated before.

For the given thesis, the main points would be the following:

The primary cause of divorce is the mismatch in the spouses’ expectations from the marriage.

The divorce often results in a lack of children’s interactions with one of the parents.

Conclusion.

Synthesize all of your arguments and give your audience a space for a further investigation of your issue.

Narrative Essay about Divorce

If your assignment is to write a family essay, you can choose from a wide range of topics. For this purpose, a marriage essay or a divorce essay would be perfect.

In a short paper about your family, it isn’t easy to cover many topics. So choose only one.

Look through some narrative essay topics and select the one you like:

The story of my divorce: how did I decide to break up with my spouse?
My life completely changed after my parents divorced.
How my life looked like before the divorce with my wife/husband and how it looks now.
The way divorce destroys healthy communication between children and parents in my family.

For and Against Divorce Essay

As you know, both the negative and positive effects of divorce are disputable, making them appealing to discuss. There are many recent studies and relevant statistical data on the topic to help you write such an essay.

This topic would also be great for a speech on divorce.

Wondering what are the for and against divorce arguments? Take a look at the following:


If a person is in an abusive relationship, divorce might be the only option. It’s better to feel safe and protected than to be predisposed to violence.	You are still a family: you raise children and have a set of values. Consider preserving them and saving your family.
Are you that type of person that cannot forgive adultery? Then, break with your spouse and don’t waste your time.	Are you sure you and your partner are capable of living on their own? Often, spouses are financially dependent and cannot afford to lead the household after the divorce.
If a spouse continually mistreats their children and is unwilling to change their behavior, consider getting divorced.	If you decided to divorce after a single quarrel, don’t hurry up! Reconsider your decision and give your relationship a try.

✒ Divorce: Causes and Effects

We have a pleasant bonus for you! Below, you can find useful arguments and insightful ideas that you can use in your papers on divorce. Apply our concepts in any type of essay, adjusting them to your topic.

Divorce essays can cover the following issues:

Generally Known Facts on Divorces

When covering this issue in your persuasive essay on divorce, you will have to cover the problem altogether. Include the common marriage problems that psychologists all over the world study. Use their statistical data on divorces when crafting your argument.

Divorce is quite a broad topic, and you may want to narrow it down. With so much information available, you could write a research paper on divorce without any difficulty.

Statistical Data on Divorces

Good divorce essays should include enough statistical data. It will add more scientific value and reveal your research abilities. Besides, facts and figures present many exciting topics to comment on.

For example:

You can do significant research concerning divorce causes and consequences. Draw a contrast between divorce in several countries, or examine the age and education of people who officially separate more often.

Reasons for Divorces

What does an essay on divorce mean without discussion of its reasons?

Find out different sociologists’ viewpoints on the reasons for divorces. Then underline the cause you consider to be the most truthful one.

You can also provide your own theory on the grounds for divorces in your persuasive essay on divorce. The key point is to prove the accuracy of your statement.

Divorce Prevention Ideas

If there is a problem, there must be some solution. So, think of the possible ways to make a marriage work.

Investigate divorce causes from a scientific point of view. Examine the primary studies that reveal why people actually break up. Also, discuss the precautions that can help married couples avoid significant conflicts.

Effects of Divorce on Children

Parents sometimes forget that their divorce isn’t only about them but also about their children. It causes psychological problems for kids, which you can classify in your paper. Don’t forget to add some statistical data on divorce to support your arguments.

Every child reacts differently to their parents’ breakup. It’s a rare case when divorce consequences are positive, making the effects on kids an urgent topic to discuss.

Positive Effects of Divorce

Sometimes divorce isn’t a catastrophe but rather the only way to heal wounds and begin a new life. Often, people don’t recognize that they need to change their lives for the better. This situation is primarily related to abusive marriages or those with regular cheating.

In these cases, the positive effects of divorce may seem easy to understand. However, psychologists have to make great efforts to persuade people to end their relationships. Write a paper making this same argument.

Negative outcomes of divorce on children.
Connection between divorce and antisocial behavior of children.
Family crises and the issue it causes: divorce, remarriage, stepparents, adoption.
Effect of divorce on teenagers’ academic performance.
Causes and consequences of divorce .
What can be done to decrease divorce rates in America?
Does parental divorce affect the rates of juvenile delinquency ?
The most widespread reasons for divorce.
Analyze marital success factors and Gottman’s predictors of divorce.
Impact of divorce on child’s mental health.
Change of divorce law throughout history.
Positive and negative changes in children’s behavior after divorce.
Divorce : a disaster or a benefit?
Is cheating one of the main reasons of divorce?
Gender stratification impact on divorce trends.
Effect of divorce on family relationship.
Do divorced parents change their child-rearing styles?
List of factors typically associated with higher divorce rates.
The support required for all the members of divorced and single-parent families .
Analyze the reasons for high divorce rates .
Does divorce only impact adolescent in a bad way?
Effect of poverty on divorce rates.
Specifics of divorce in the UAE.
Does divorce lead to depression?
Family therapy and its role in decreasing divorce rates.
The impact of divorce on children-parents relationship.
Evaluation of child custody in divorce proceedings.
How to manage the stress of divorce.
Effect of divorce on children’s self-esteem.
How to minimize the devastating consequences of divorce.
Addiction as the reason for divorce.
Effective communication in marriage and its role in preventing divorce.
Divorce as the only way out of an abusive relationship.
Financial issues of divorce and how to overcome them.
Parental support is the best way to help children to go through divorce.
How do adolescents adjust to parental divorce?
Do boys and girls react to the parental divorce the same way?
Social media can destroy relationship and lead to divorce.
Can Christian counseling help couples to resolve their issues and avoid divorce?
Poverty among divorced women.
Young marriage has more chances to break-up.
Respect is the best way to get marriage satisfaction and avoid divorce.
Is interfaith marriage doomed to divorce?
Why a successful marriage may end in divorce?
Marriage contract will help to facilitate the legal side of divorce process.
Reduction of the number of divorces.
Personal development after divorce.
How family relationships influence future marriage and divorce chances of children.
Child support in case of marriage divorce.
Will lack of family and work balance definitely result in divorce?

If you are stuck on writing, you can always ask us for help! Whether you need a persuasive essay on divorce or any other paper, we are here and ready to assist.

Thanks for reading the article! Share it with friends who may need our tips or assistance.

🔗 References

Essay Introductions
Transitional Words and Phrases
Argumentative Paper Format
The Writing Process
Divorce Argument Essay: Bartleby
Cause and Effect Essay: The Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Roane State Community College and UNC at Chapel Hill Writing Center
Counterargument: Gordon Harvey, the Writing Center at Harvard University
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Wow! Thanks for this! This will help me on my speech topic a lot! Thank you Jack‼️

Dissociation and Confabulation in Narcissistic Disorders

* corresponding author(s):.

Narcissists and psychopaths dissociate (erase memories) a lot (are amnesiac) because their contact with the world and with others is via a fictitious construct: The false self. Narcissists never experience reality directly but through a distorting lens darkly. They get rid of any information that challenges their grandiose self-perception and the narrative they had constructed to explicate, excuse and legitimize their antisocial, self-centred and exploitative behaviors, choices and idiosyncrasies.

In an attempt to compensate for the yawning gaps in memory, narcissists and psychopaths confabulate: They invent plausible "plug ins" and scenarios of how things might, could, or should have plausibly occurred. To outsiders, these fictional stopgaps appear as lies. But the narcissist fervently believes in their reality: He may not actually remember what had happened-but surely it could not have happened any other way!

These tenuous concocted fillers are subject to frequent revision as the narcissist's inner world and external circumstances evolve. This is why narcissists and psychopaths often contradict themselves. Tomorrow's confabulation often negates yesterday's. The narcissist and psychopath do not remember their previous tales because they are not invested with the emotions and cognitions that are integral parts of real memories.

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Feedback from other people regulates the narcissist’s sense of identity, self-worth, boundaries, even his reality test (his correct awareness of the world around him). The narcissist needs this constant input to maintain a sense of continuity. Thus, the narcissist’s nearest and dearest-his sources of secondary narcissistic supply-serve as “external memories” and as “flux regulators” whose function it is to maintain a regular, stable flow of affirming and cohering data.

The narcissist was conditioned-from an early age of abuse and trauma-to expect the unexpected. His was a world in motion where (sometimes sadistically) capricious caretakers and peers often engaged in arbitrary behaviour. He was trained to deny his True Self and nurture a false one.

Having invented himself, the narcissist sees no problem in re-inventing that which he designed in the first place. The narcissist is his own creator.

Hence his grandiosity.

Moreover, the narcissist is a man for all seasons, forever adaptable, constantly imitating and emulating, a human sponge, a perfect mirror, a non-entity that is, at the same time, all entities combined.

The narcissist is best described by Sartre's phrase: "Being and Nothingness". Into this reflective vacuum, this sucking black hole, the narcissist attracts the Sources of his Narcissistic Supply.

To an observer, the narcissist appears to be fractured or discontinuous.

Pathological narcissism has been compared to Dissociative Identity Disorder (formerly the Multiple Personality Disorder). By definition, the narcissist has at least two selves. His personality is very primitive and disorganized. Living with a narcissist is a nauseating experience not only because of what he is-but because of what he is not. He is not a fully formed human-but a dizzyingly kaleidoscopic gallery of mercurial images, which melt into each other seamlessly. It is incredibly disorienting.

It is also exceedingly problematic. Promises made by the narcissist are easily disowned by him. His plans are ephemeral. His emotional ties-a simulacrum. Most narcissists have one island of stability in their life (spouse, family, their career, a hobby, their religion, country, or idol)-pounded by the turbulent currents of a dishevelled existence.

Thus, to invest in a narcissist is a purposeless, futile and meaningless activity. To the narcissist, every day is a new beginning, a hunt, a new cycle of idealization or devaluation, a newly invented self.

There is no accumulation of credits or goodwill because the narcissist has no past and no future. He occupies an eternal and timeless present. He is a fossil caught in the frozen lava of a volcanic childhood.

The narcissist does not keep agreements, does not adhere to laws and regards consistency and predictability as demeaning traits. The narcissist hates kiwi one day-and devours it passionately the next.

DISSOCIATIVE GAPS AND CONFABULATION

Narcissists and psychopaths dissociate (erase memories) a lot (are amnesiac) because their contact with the world and with others is via a fictitious construct: The False Self. Narcissists never experience reality directly but through a distorting lens darkly. They get rid of any information that challenges their grandiose self-perception and the narrative they had constructed to explicate, excuse and legitimize their antisocial, self-centred and exploitative behaviors, choices and idiosyncrasies.

THE TWO SELVES

We often marvel at the discrepancy between the private and public lives of our idols: Celebrities, statesmen, stars, writers and other accomplished figures. It is as though they have two personalities, two selves: The "true" one which they reserve for their nearest and dearest and the "fake" or "false" or "concocted" one which they flaunt in public.

In contrast, the narcissist has no private life, no true self and no domain reserved exclusively for his nearest and dearest. His life is a spectacle, with free access to all, constantly on display, garnering narcissistic supply from his audience. In the theatre that is the narcissist's life, the actor is irrelevant. Only the show goes on. The False Self is everything the narcissist would like to be but, alas, cannot: Omnipotent, omniscient, invulnerable, impregnable, brilliant, perfect, in short: Godlike. Its most important role is to elicit narcissistic supply from others: Admiration, adulation, awe, obedience and in general: Unceasing attention. In Freud’s tripartite model, the False Self supplants the Ego and conforms to the narcissist’s unattainable, grandiose and fantastic Ego Ideal.

The narcissist constructs a narrative of his life that is partly confabulated and whose purpose is to buttress, demonstrate and prove the veracity of the fantastically grandiose and often impossible claims made by the False Self. This narrative allocates roles to significant others in the narcissist’s personal history. Inevitably, such a narrative is hard to credibly sustain for long: Reality intrudes and a yawning abyss opens between the narcissist’s self-imputed divinity and his drab, pedestrian existence and attributes. I call it the Grandiosity Gap. Additionally, meaningful figures around the narcissist often refuse to play the parts allotted to them, rebel and abandon the narcissist.

The narcissist copes with this painful and ineluctable realization of the divorce between his self-perception and this less than stellar state of affairs by first denying reality, delusionally ignoring and filtering out all inconvenient truths. Then, if this coping strategy fails, the narcissist invents a new narrative, which accommodates and incorporates the very intrusive data that served to undermine the previous, now discarded narrative. He even goes to the extent of denying that he ever had another narrative, except the current, modified one.

The narcissist’s (and the codependent’s) introjects and inner voices (assimilated representations of parents, role models and significant peers) are mostly negative and sadistic. Rather than provide succour, motivation and direction, they enhance his underlying ego-dystony (discontent with who he is) and the lability of his sense of self-worth. They induce in the child shame, blame, pain, guilt, rage and a panoply of other negative emotions.

As Lidija Rangelovska notes, the paradox is that the child’s ego-dystonic shame and guilt emanate from the very primitive defenses that later comprise and underlie his False Self. Having been told repeatedly how “bad”, “worthless”, “disappointing” and injurious he is, the child comes to believe in his self-imputed delusional ability to hurt and damage family members, for instance.

Such imaginary capacity is the logical extension of both the child’s grandiosity (omnipotence, “I have the power to hurt mommy”) and his magical thinking (“I think, I wish, I hate, I rage and thereby, with the unlimited power of my mind, I cause real calamities out there, in the real world”). So, it is the child’s natural primary narcissistic defenses that enable him to feel so miserable! These defenses allow him to construct a narrative which corresponds to and justifies the judgemental, hateful appraisals and taunts of his abusers. In his young mind, he accepts that he is bad because he is all-powerful and magical and because he leverages his godlike attributes to act with malice or, at the very least, to bring misfortune on significant others.

To skirt this inner overwhelming negativity, the child “appropriates” precisely these defenses and bundles them into a protective shield, thus sequestering his vulnerable, fragile self. Occupied by the ongoing project of his budding pathological narcissism, the child’s defenses are no longer available to construct and buttress the narratives offered by the abusive voices of his tormentors. Moreover, by owning his fantastic grandiosity and harnessing it, the child feels as empowered as his abusers and no longer a victim.

Introjects possess a crucial role in the formation of an exegetic (interpretative) framework which allows one to decipher the world, construct a model of reality, of one’s place in it and consequently of who one is (self-identity). Overwhelmingly negative introjects-or introjects which are manifestly fake, fallacious and manipulative-hamper the narcissist’s and codependent’s ability to construct a true and efficacious exegetic (interpretative) framework.

Gradually, the disharmony between one’s perception of the universe and of oneself and reality becomes unbearable and engenders pathological, maladaptive and dysfunctional attempts to either deny the hurtful discrepancy away (delusions and fantasies); grandiosely compensate for it by eliciting positive external voices to counter the negative, inner ones (narcissism via the False Self and its narcissistic supply); attack it (antisocial/psychopathy); withdraw from the world altogether (schizoid solution); or disappear by merging and fusing with another person (codependence.)

Once formed and functioning, the False Self stifles the growth of the True Self and paralyses it. Henceforth, the ossified True Self is virtually non-existent and plays no role (active or passive) in the conscious life of the narcissist. It is difficult to "resuscitate" it, even with psychotherapy. The False Self sometimes parades the child-like, vulnerable, needy and innocent True Self in order to capture, manipulate and attract empathic sources of narcissistic supply. When supply is low, the False Self is emaciated and dilapidated. It is unable to contain and repress the True Self which then emerges as a petulant, self-destructive, spoiled and codependent entity. But the True Self’s moments in the sun are very brief and usually, inconsequential.

This substitution is not only a question of despair and alienation, as Kirkegaard and Horney observed, respectively. Following on the footsteps of the Danish proto-existentialist philosopher, Horney said that because the Idealised (=False) Self sets impossible goals to the narcissist, the results are frustration and self hate which grow with every setback or failure. But the constant sadistic judgement, the self-berating, the suicidal ideation emanate from the narcissist's idealised, sadistic, Superego regardless of the existence or functioning of a False Self.

The False Self is a kind of positive projection: The narcissist’s attributes to it all the positive and desired aspects of himself, thereby endowing it with a quasi-separate existence. The False Self fulfils the role of a divinity in the narcissist’s obsessive-compulsive private religion: The narcissist worships it and adheres to ceremonies and rituals via which he interacts with it. The True Self, on the other hand, is ignored at best and usually denigrated. This process is akin to projective splitting: When parents project onto the golden child positive traits and talents even as they attribute to the scapegoat child negative, undesirable qualities. In this sense, the narcissist a parent with two offspring: His two selves.

There is no conflict between the True Self and the False Self. First, the True Self is much too weak to do battle with the overbearing False. Second, the False Self is adaptive (though maladaptive). It helps the True Self to cope with the world. Without the False Self, the True Self would be subjected to so much hurt that it will disintegrate. This happens to narcissists who go through a life crisis: Their False Ego becomes dysfunctional and they experience a harrowing feeling of annulment.

The False Self has many functions. The two most important are:

1. It serves as a decoy, it "attracts the fire". It is a proxy for the True Self. It is tough as nails and can absorb any amount of pain, hurt and negative emotions. By inventing it, the child develops immunity to the indifference, manipulation, sadism, smothering, or exploitation-in short: To the abuse-inflicted on him by his parents (or by other Primary Objects in his life). It is a cloak, protecting him, rendering him invisible and omnipotent at the same time.

2. The False Self is misrepresented by the narcissist as his True Self. The narcissist is saying, in effect: "I am not who you think I am. I am someone else. I am this (False) Self. Therefore, I deserve a better, painless, more considerate treatment." The False Self, thus, is a contraption intended to alter other people's behaviour and attitude towards the narcissist.

These roles are crucial to survival and to the proper psychological functioning of the narcissist. The False Self is by far more important to the narcissist than his dilapidated, dysfunctional, True Self.

The two Selves are not part of a continuum, as the neo-Freudians postulated. Healthy people do not have a False Self which differs from its pathological equivalent in that it is more realistic and closer to the True Self.

It is true that even healthy people have a mask [Guffman], or a persona [Jung] which they consciously present to the world. But these are a far cry from the False Self, which is mostly subconscious, depends on outside feedback and is compulsive.

The False Self is an adaptive reaction to pathological circumstances. But its dynamics make it predominate, devour the psyche and prey upon the True Self. Thus, it prevents the efficient, flexible functioning of the personality as a whole.

That the narcissist possesses a prominent False Self as well as a suppressed and dilapidated True Self is common knowledge. Yet, how intertwined and inseparable are these two? Do they interact? How do they influence each other? And what behaviours can be attributed squarely to one or the other of these protagonists? Moreover, does the False Self assume traits and attributes of the True Self in order to deceive the world?

Let's start by referring to an oft-occurring question:

Why are narcissists not prone to suicide?

The simple answer is that they died a long time ago. Narcissists are the true zombies of the world.

Many scholars and therapists tried to grapple with the void at the core of the narcissist. The common view is that the remnants of the True Self are so ossified, shredded, cowed into submission and repressed-that, for all practical purposes, the True Self is dysfunctional and useless. In treating the narcissist, the therapist often tries to construct and nurture a completely new healthy self, rather than build upon the distorted wreckage strewn across the narcissist's psyche.

But what of the rare glimpses of True Self oft reported by those who interact with the narcissist?

Pathological narcissism is frequently comorbid with other disorders. The narcissistic spectrum is made up of gradations and shades of narcissism. Narcissistic traits or style or even personality (overlay) often attach to other disorders (co-morbidity). A person may well appear to be a full-fledged narcissist-may well appear to be suffering from the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)-but is not, in the strict, psychiatric, sense of the word. In such people, the True Self is still there and is sometimes observable.

In a full-fledged narcissist, the False Self imitates the True Self.

To do so artfully, it deploys two mechanisms.

RE-INTERPRETATION

It causes the narcissist to re-interpret certain emotions and reactions in a flattering, socially acceptable, light. The narcissist may, for instance, interpret fear as compassion. If the narcissist hurts someone he fears (e.g., an authority figure), he may feel bad afterwards and interpret his discomfort as empathy and compassion. To be afraid is humiliating-to be compassionate is commendable and earns the narcissist social commendation and understanding (narcissistic supply).

The narcissist is possessed of an uncanny ability to psychologically penetrate others. Often, this gift is abused and put at the service of the narcissist's control freakery and sadism. The narcissist uses it liberally to annihilate the natural defences of his victims by faking empathy.

This capacity is coupled with the narcissist's eerie ability to imitate emotions and their attendant behaviours (affect). The narcissist possesses "emotional resonance tables". He keeps records of every action and reaction, every utterance and consequence, every datum provided by others regarding their state of mind and emotional make-up. From these, he then constructs a set of formulas, which often result in impeccably accurate renditions of emotional behaviour. This can be enormously deceiving.

PSYCHODYNAMIC VIEW

The narcissist's True Self is introverted and dysfunctional. In healthy people, Ego functions are generated from the inside, from the Ego. In narcissists, the Ego is dormant, comatose. The narcissist needs the input of and feedback from the outside world (from others) in order to perform the most basic Ego functions (e.g., "recognizing" of the world, setting boundaries, forming a self-definition or identity, differentiation, self-esteem, and regulating his sense of self-worth). This input or feedback is known as narcissistic supply” .Only the False Self gets in touch with the world. The True Self is isolated, repressed, unconscious, a shadow.

The False Self is, therefore, a kind of “hive self” or “swarm self”. It is a collage of reflections, a patchwork of outsourced information, titbits garnered from the narcissist’s interlocutors and laboriously cohered and assembled so as to uphold and buttress the narcissist’s inflated, fantastic and grandiose self-image. This discontinuity accounts for the dissociative nature of pathological narcissism as well as for the narcissist’s seeming inability to learn from the errors of his ways.

In healthy, normal people ego functions are strictly internal processes. In the narcissist, ego functions are imported from the surroundings, they are thoroughly external. Consequently, the narcissist often confuses his inner mental-psychological landscape with the outside world. He tends to fuse and merge his mind and his milieu. He regards significant others and sources of supply as mere extensions of himself and he appropriates them because they fulfil crucial internal roles and as a result, are perceived by him to be sheer internal objects, devoid of an objective, external and autonomous existence.

Forcing the narcissist's False Self to acknowledge and interact with his True Self is not only difficult but may also be counterproductive and dangerously destabilising. The narcissist's disorder is adaptive and functional, though rigid. The alternative to this (mal) adaptation would have been self-destructive (suicidal). This bottled up, self-directed venom is bound to resurface if the narcissist's various personality structures are coerced into making contact.

That a personality structure (such as the True Self) is in the unconscious does not automatically mean that it is conflict-generating, or that it is involved in conflict, or that it has the potential to provoke conflict. As long as the True Self and the False Self remain out of touch, conflict is excluded.

The False Self pretends to be the only self and denies the existence of a True Self. It is also extremely useful (adaptive). Rather than risking constant conflict, the narcissist opts for a solution of "disengagement".

The classical Ego, proposed by Freud, is partly conscious and partly preconscious and unconscious. The narcissist's Ego is completely submerged. The preconscious and conscious parts are detached from it by early traumas and form the False Ego.

The Superego in healthy people constantly compares the Ego to the Ego Ideal. The narcissist has a different psychodynamic. The narcissist's False Self serves as a buffer and as a shock absorber between the True Ego and the narcissist's sadistic, punishing, immature Superego. The narcissist aspires to become pure Ideal Ego.

The narcissist's Ego cannot develop because it is deprived of contact with the outside world and therefore, endures no growth-inducing conflict. The False Self is rigid. The result is that the narcissist is unable to respond and to adapt to threats, illnesses and to other life crises and circumstances. He is brittle and prone to be broken rather than bent by life's trials and tribulations.

The Ego remembers, evaluates, plans, responds to the world and acts in it and on it. It is the locus of the "executive functions" of the personality. It integrates the inner world with the outer world, the Id with the Superego. It acts under a "reality principle" rather than a "pleasure principle".

This means that the Ego is in charge of delaying gratification. It postpones pleasurable acts until they can be carried out both safely and successfully. The Ego is, therefore, in an ungrateful position. Unfulfilled desires produce unease and anxiety. Reckless fulfilment of desires is diametrically opposed to self-preservation. The Ego has to mediate these tensions.

In an effort to thwart anxiety, the Ego invents psychological defence mechanisms. On the one hand the Ego channels fundamental drives. It has to "speak their language". It must have a primitive, infantile, component. On the other hand, the Ego is in charge of negotiating with the outside world and of securing a realistic and optimal "bargains" for its "client", the Id. These intellectual and perceptual functions are supervised by the exceptionally strict court of the Superego.

Persons with a strong Ego can objectively comprehend both the world and themselves. In other words, they are possessed of insight. They are able to contemplate longer time spans, plan, forecast and schedule. They choose decisively among alternatives and follow their resolve. They are aware of the existence of their drives, but control them and channel them in socially acceptable ways. They resist pressures – social or otherwise. They choose their course and pursue it.

The weaker the Ego is, the more infantile and impulsive its owner, the more distorted his or her perception of self and reality. A weak Ego is incapable of productive work.

The narcissist is an even more extreme case. His Ego is non-existent. The narcissist has a fake, substitute Ego. This is why his energy is drained. He spends most of it on maintaining, protecting and preserving the warped, unrealistic images of his (False) Self and of his (fake) world. The narcissist is a person exhausted by his own absence.

The healthy Ego preserves some sense of continuity and consistency. It serves as a point of reference. It relates events of the past to actions at present and to plans for the future. It incorporates memory, anticipation, imagination and intellect. It defines where the individual ends and the world begins. Though not coextensive with the body or with the personality, it is a close approximation.

In the narcissistic condition, all these functions are relegated to the False Ego. Its halo of confabulation rubs off on all of them. The narcissist is bound to develop false memories, conjure up false fantasies, anticipate the unrealistic and work his intellect to justify them.

The falsity of the False Self is dual: Not only is it not "the real thing"-it also operates on false premises. It is a false and wrong gauge of the world. It falsely and inefficiently regulates the drives. It fails to thwart anxiety.

The False Self provides a false sense of continuity and of a "personal centre". It weaves an enchanted and grandiose fable as a substitute to reality. The narcissist gravitates out of his self and into a plot, a narrative, a story. He continuously feels that he is a character in a film, a fraudulent invention, or a con artist to be momentarily exposed and summarily socially excluded.

Moreover, the narcissist cannot be consistent or coherent. His False Self is preoccupied with the pursuit of Narcissistic Supply. The narcissist has no boundaries because his Ego is not sufficiently defined or fully differentiated. The only constancy is the narcissist's feelings of diffusion or annulment. This is especially true in life crises, when the False Ego ceases to function.

From the developmental point of view, all this is easily accounted for. The child reacts to stimuli, both internal and external. He cannot, however, control, alter, or anticipate them. Instead, he develops mechanisms to regulate the resulting tensions and anxieties.

The child's pursuit of mastery of his environment is compulsive. He is obsessed with securing gratification. Any postponement of his actions and responses forces him to tolerate added tension and anxiety. It is very surprising that the child ultimately learns to separate stimulus and response and delay the latter. This miracle of expedient self-denial has to do with the development of intellectual skills, on the one hand and with the socialisation process, on the other hand.

The intellect is a representation of the world. Through it, the Ego examines reality vicariously without suffering the consequences of possible errors. The Ego uses the intellect to simulate various courses of action and their consequences and to decide how to achieve its ends and the attendant gratification.

The intellect is what allows the child to anticipate the world and what makes him believe in the accuracy and high probability of his predictions. It is through the intellect that the concepts of the "laws of nature" and "predictability through order" are introduced. Causality and consistency are all mediated through the intellect.

But the intellect is best served with an emotional complement. Our picture of the world and of our place in it emerges from experience, both cognitive and emotional. Socialisation has a verbal-communicative element but, decoupled from a strong emotional component, it remains a dead letter.

An example: The child is likely to learn from his parents and from other adults that the world is a predictable, law abiding place. However, if his Primary Objects (most importantly, his mother) behave in a capricious, discriminating, unpredictable, unlawful, abusive, or indifferent manner-it hurts and the conflict between cognition and emotion is powerful. It is bound to paralyse the Ego functions of the child.

The accumulation and retention of past events is a prerequisite for both thinking and judgement. Both are impaired if one's personal history contradicts the content of the Superego and the lessons of the socialisation process. Narcissists are victims of such a glaring discrepancy: Between what adult figures in their lives preached - and their contradictory course of action.

Once victimised, the narcissist swore "no more". He will do the victimizing now. And as a decoy, he presents to the world his False Self. But he falls prey to his own devices. Internally impoverished and undernourished, isolated and cushioned to the point of suffocation-the True Ego degenerates and decays. The narcissist wakes up one day to find that he is at the mercy of his False Self as much as his victims are.

Elsewhere ("The Stripped Ego") I have dealt with the classical, Freudian, concept of the Ego. It is partly conscious, partly preconscious and unconscious. It operates on a "reality principle" (as opposed to the Id's "pleasure principle"). It maintains an inner equilibrium between the onerous (and unrealistic, or ideal) demands of the Superego and the almost irresistible (and unrealistic) drives of the Id. It also has to fend off the unfavourable consequences of comparisons between itself and the Ego Ideal (comparisons that the Superego is only too eager to make). In many respects, therefore, the Ego in Freudian psychoanalysis is the Self. Not so in Jungian psychology [1-24].

"Complexes are psychic fragments which have split off owing to traumatic influences or certain incompatible tendencies. As the association experiments prove, complexes interfere with the intentions of the will and disturb the conscious performance; they produce disturbances of memory and blockages in the flow of associations; they appear and disappear according to their own laws; they can temporarily obsess consciousness, or influence speech and action in an unconscious way. In a word, complexes behave like independent beings, a fact especially evident in abnormal states of mind. In the voices heard by the insane they even take on a personal ego-character like that of the spirits who manifest themselves through automatic writing and similar techniques."

And further

"I use the term 'individuation' to denote the process by which a person becomes a psychological 'in-dividual,' that is, a separate, indivisible unity or 'whole'."

"Individuation means becoming a single, homogeneous being and in so far as 'individuality' embraces our innermost, last and incomparable uniqueness, also implies becoming one's own self. We could, therefore, translate individuation as 'coming to selfhood' or 'self-realisation'."

"But again and again I note that the individuation process is confused with the coming of the Ego into consciousness and that the Ego is in consequence identified with the self, which naturally produces a hopeless conceptual muddle. Individuation is then nothing but egocentredness and autoeroticism. But the self comprises infinitely more than a mere Ego… It is as much one's self and all other selves, as the Ego. Individuation does not shut one out from the world, but gathers the world to oneself."

To Jung, the self is an archetype, THE archetype. It is the archetype of order as manifested in the totality of the personality and as symbolised by a circle, a square, or the famous quaternity. Sometimes, Jung uses other symbols: The child, the mandala, etc.

"The self is a quantity that is supraordinate to the conscious Ego. It embraces not only the conscious but also the unconscious psyche and is therefore, so to speak, a personality, which we also are.... There is little hope of our ever being able to reach even approximate consciousness of the self, since however much we may make conscious there will always exist an indeterminate and indeterminable amount of unconscious material which belongs to the totality of the self."

"The self is not only the centre but also the whole circumference which embraces both conscious and unconscious; it is the centre of this totality, just as the Ego is the centre of consciousness."

"The self is our life's goal, for it is the completest expression of that fateful combination we call individuality…"

Jung postulated the existence of two "personalities" (actually, two selves), one of them being the Shadow. Technically, the Shadow is a part (though an inferior part) of the overarching personality (one's chosen conscious attitude).

The Shadow develops thus

Inevitably, some personal and collective psychic elements are found wanting or incompatible with one's personality (narrative). Their expression is suppressed and they coalesce into an almost autonomous "splinter personality".

This second personality is contrarian: It negates the official, chosen, personality, though it is totally relegated to the unconscious. Jung believes, therefore, in a system of "checks and balances": The Shadow balances the Ego (consciousness). This is not necessarily negative. The behavioural and attitudinal compensation offered by the Shadow can be positive.

Jung

"The shadow personifies everything that the subject refuses to acknowledge about himself and yet is always thrusting itself upon him directly or indirectly-for instance, inferior traits of character and other incompatible tendencies."

"The shadow is that hidden, repressed, for the most part inferior and guilt-laden personality whose ultimate ramifications reach back into the realm of our animal ancestors and so comprise the whole historical aspect of the unconscious… If it has been believed hitherto that the human shadow was the source of all evil, it can now be ascertained on closer investigation that the unconscious man, that is, his shadow, does not consist only of morally reprehensible tendencies, but also displays a number of good qualities, such as normal instincts, appropriate reactions, realistic insights, creative impulses, etc." (Ibid.)

It would seem fair to conclude that there is a close affinity between the complexes (split-off materials) and the Shadow.

Perhaps the complexes (also the result of incompatibility with the conscious personality) are the negative part of the Shadow. Perhaps they just reside in it, on closely collaborate with it, in a feedback mechanism. Perhaps whenever the Shadow manifests itself in a manner obstructive, destructive or disruptive to the Ego-we call it a complex. They may really be one and the same, the result of a massive split-off of material and its relegation to the realm of the unconscious.

This is part and parcel of the individuation-separation phase of our early childhood development. Prior to this phase, the infant begins to differentiate between self and everything that is not self. He tentatively explores the world and these excursions bring about a differentiated worldview.

The child begins to form and store images of his self and of the World (initially, of the Primary Object in his life, normally his mother). These images are distinct. To the infant, this is revolutionary stuff, nothing short of a breakdown of an erstwhile unitary universe and its substitution with fragmented, unconnected, entities. It is traumatic.

Moreover, these images in themselves are split. The child has separate images of a "good" mother and a "bad" mother, respectively associated with the gratification of his needs and desires and with their frustration. He also constructs separate images of a "good" self and a "bad" self, linked to the ensuing states of being gratified (by the "good" mother) and being frustrated (by the "bad" mother).

At this stage, the child is unable to see that people are both good and bad (that an entity with a single identity can both gratify and frustrate). He derives his own sense of being good or bad from the outside. The "good" mother inevitably and invariably leads to a "good", satisfied, self and the "bad", frustrating mother always generates the "bad", frustrated, self.

But the image of the "bad" mother is very threatening. It is anxiety provoking. The child is afraid that, if it is found out by his mother, she will abandon him. Moreover, the "bad" mother is a forbidden subject of negative feelings (one must not think about mother in bad terms!).

Thus, the child splits the bad images off and uses them to form a separate collage of "bad objects". This process is called "object splitting". It is the most primitive defence mechanism. When still used by adults it is an indication of pathology.

This is followed by the phases of "separation" and "individuation" (18-36 months). The child no longer splits his objects (bad objects to one, repressed side and good objects to another, conscious, side). He learns to relate to objects (people) as integrated wholes, with the "good" and the "bad" aspects coalesced. An integrated self-concept inevitably follows.

The child internalises the mother (he memorises her roles). He becomes his own parent (mother) and performs her functions by himself. He acquires "object constancy" (he learns that the existence of objects does not depend on his presence or on his vigilance). Mother always comes back to him after she disappears from sight. A major reduction in anxiety follows and this permits the child to dedicate his energy to the development of stable, consistent, and independent senses of self and introjects (internalized images) of others.

This is the juncture at which personality disorders form. Between the ages of 15 months and 22 months, a sub-phase in this stage of separation-individuation is known as "rapprochement".

The child, at this stage, is exploring the world. This is a terrifying and anxiety-inducing process. The child needs to know that he is protected, that he is doing the right thing and that he is gaining the approval of his mother. The child periodically returns to his mother for reassurance, affirmation, and admiration, as if making sure that his mother endorses his newfound autonomy and independence and accepts his separate individuality.

When the mother is immature, narcissistic, or suffers from a mental pathology, she withholds from the child what he needs: Approval, admiration, and reassurance. She feels threatened by his independence. She feels that she is losing him. She does not let go sufficiently. She smothers him with over-protection and indulgence. She offers him overpowering emotional incentives to remain "mother-bound", dependent, undeveloped, a part of a mother-child symbiotic dyad.

The child, in turn, develops mortal fears of being abandoned, of losing his mother's love and support. His unspoken dilemma is: To become independent and lose mother-or to retain mother and never have a self?

The child is enraged (because he is frustrated in his quest for his self). He is anxious (fearful of losing mother), he feels guilty (for being angry at mother), he is attracted and repelled. In short, he is in a chaotic state of mind.

Whereas healthy people experience such eroding dilemmas now and then-to the personality disordered they are a constant, characteristic emotional state.

To defend himself against this intolerable vortex of emotions, the child keeps them out of his consciousness. The "bad" mother and the "bad" self plus all the negative feelings of abandonment, anxiety and rage-are "split-off".

But the child's over-reliance on this primitive defence mechanism obstructs his orderly development: He fails to integrate the split images. The Bad parts are so laden with negative emotions that they remain virtually untouched throughout life (in the Shadow, as complexes). It proves impossible to integrate such explosive material with the more benign Good parts.

Thus, the adult remains fixated at this earlier stage of development. He is unable to integrate and to see people as whole objects. They are either all "good" or all "bad" (idealisation and devaluation cycles). He is terrified (unconsciously) of abandonment, actually feels abandoned, or under threat of being abandoned and subtly plays it out in his/her interpersonal relationships.

Is the reintroduction of split-off material in any way helpful? Is it likely to lead to an integrated Ego (or self)?

To ask this is to confuse two issues. With the exception of schizophrenics and some types of psychotics, the Ego (or self) is always integrated. That the patient cannot integrate the images of objects, both libidinal and non-libidinal, does not mean that he has a non-integrated or a disintegrative Ego.

The inability to integrate the world (as is the case in the Borderline or in the Narcissistic Personality Disorders) relates to the patient's choice of defence mechanisms. It is a secondary layer. The crux of the matter is not what state the self is in (integrated or not)-but what is the state of one's perception of the self.

Thus, from the theoretical point of view, the reintroduction of split-off material does nothing to "increase" the Ego's integration. This is especially true if we adopt the Freudian concept of the Ego as inclusive of all split-off material.

But does the transfer of the split-off material from one part of the Ego (the unconscious) to another (the conscious) in any way affect the integration of the Ego?

Confronting split-off, repressed material is still an important part of many psychodynamic therapies. It has been shown to reduce anxiety, cure conversion symptoms and generally, have a beneficial and therapeutic effect on the individual. Yet, this has nothing to do with integration. It has to do with conflict resolution.

That various parts of the personality are in constant conflict is an integral principle of all psychodynamic theories. Dredging split-off material to our consciousness reduces the scope or the intensity of these conflicts. This is so by definition: Split-off material introduced to consciousness is no longer split-off material and therefore, can no longer participate in the "war" raging in the unconscious.

But is it always recommended? Not in my view.

CONSIDER PERSONALITY DISORDERS

Personality disorders are adaptive solutions in the given circumstances. It is true that, as circumstances change, these "solutions" prove to be rigid straitjackets, maladaptive rather than adaptive. But the patient has no coping substitutes available. No therapy can provide him with such a substitutes because the whole personality is affected by the ensuing pathology, not just an aspect or an element of it.

Bringing up split-off material may constrain or even eliminate the patient's personality disorder. And then what? How is the patient supposed to cope with the world then, a world that has suddenly reverted to being hostile, abandoning, capricious, whimsical, cruel and devouring-just like it was in his infancy, before he stumbled across the magic of splitting?

A LIFE DISOWNED

The narcissist experience his own life as a prolonged, incomprehensible, unpredictable, frequently terrifying and deeply saddening nightmare. This is a result of the functional dichotomy-fostered by the narcissist himself-between his False Self and his True Self. The latter-the fossilised ashes of the original, immature, personality-is the one that does the experiencing.

The False Self is nothing but a concoction, a figment of the narcissist's disorder, a reflection in the narcissist's hall of mirrors. It is incapable of feeling, or experiencing. Yet, it is fully the master of the psychodynamic processes which rage within the narcissist's psyche.

This inner battle is so fierce that the True Self experiences it as a diffuse, though imminent and eminently ominous, threat. Anxiety ensues and the narcissist finds himself constantly ready for the next blow. He does things and he knows not why or wherefrom. He says things, acts and behaves in ways, which, he knows, endanger him and put him in line for punishment.

The narcissist hurts people around him, or breaks the law, or violates accepted morality. He knows that he is in the wrong and feels ill at ease on the rare moments that he does feel. He wants to stop but knows not how. Gradually, he is estranged from himself, possessed by some kind of demon, a puppet on invisible, mental strings. He resents this feeling, he wants to rebel, he is repelled by this part in him with which he is not acquainted. In his efforts to exorcise this devil from his soul, he dissociates.

An eerie sensation sets in and pervades the psyche of the narcissist. At times of crisis, of danger, of depression, of failure and of narcissistic injury-the narcissist feels that he is watching himself from the outside. This is not an out-of-body experience. The narcissist does not really "exit" his body. It is just that he assumes, involuntarily, the position of a spectator, a polite observer mildly interested in the whereabouts of one, Mr. Narcissist.

It is akin to watching a movie, the illusion is not complete, neither is it precise. This detachment continues for as long as the narcissist's ego-dystonic behaviour persists, for as long as the crisis goes on, for as long as the narcissist cannot face who he is, what he is doing and the consequences of his actions.

Since this is the case most of the time, the narcissist gets used to seeing himself in the role of the protagonist (usually the hero) of a motion picture or of a novel. It also sits well with his grandiosity and fantasies. Sometimes, he talks about himself in the third person singular. Sometimes he calls his "other", narcissistic, self by a different name.

He describes his life, its events, ups and downs, pains, elation and disappointments in the most remote, "professional" and coldly analytical voice, as though describing (though with a modicum of involvement) the life of some exotic insect (echoes of Kafka's "Metamorphosis").

The metaphor of "life as a movie", gaining control by "writing a scenario" or by "inventing a narrative" is, therefore, not a modern invention. Cavemen narcissists have, probably, done the same. But this is only the external, superficial, facet of the disorder.

The crux of the problem is that the narcissist really feels this way. He actually experiences his life as belonging to someone else, his body as dead weight (or as an instrument in the service of some entity), his deeds as a-moral and not immoral (he cannot be judged for something he didn't do now, can he?).

As time passes, the narcissist accumulates a mountain of mishaps, conflicts unresolved, pains well hidden, abrupt separations and bitter disappointments. He is subjected to a constant barrage of social criticism and condemnation. He is ashamed and fearful. He knows that something is wrong but there is no correlation between his cognition and his emotions.

He prefers to run away and hide, as he did when he was a child. Only this time he hides behind another self, a false one. People reflect to him this mask of his creation, until even he believes its very existence and acknowledges its dominance, until he forgets the truth and knows no better. The narcissist is only dimly aware of the decisive battle, which rages inside him. He feels threatened, very sad and suicidal-but there seems to be no outside cause of all this and it makes it even more mysteriously menacing.

This dissonance, these negative emotions, these nagging anxieties, transform the narcissist's "motion picture" solution into a permanent one. It becomes a feature of the narcissist's life. Whenever confronted by an emotional threat or by an existential one-he retreats into this haven, this mode of coping.

He relegates responsibility, submissively assuming a passive role. He who is not responsible cannot be punished – runs the subtext of this capitulation. The narcissist is thus conditioned to annihilate himself-both in order to avoid (emotional) pain and to bask in the glow of his impossibly grandiose fasntasies.

This he does with fanatic zeal and with efficacy. Prospectively, he assigns his very life (decisions to be made, judgements to be passed, agreements to be reached) to the False Self. Retroactively, he re-interprets his past life in a manner consistent with the current needs of the False Self.

It is no wonder that there is no connection between what the narcissist did feel in a given period in his life, or in relation to a specific event-and the way he sees or remembers these later on. He may describe certain occurrences or phases in his life as "tedious, painful, sad and burdening"-even though he experienced them entirely differently at the time.

The same retroactive colouring occurs with regards to people. The narcissist completely distorts the way he regarded certain people and felt about them. This re-writing of his personal history is aimed to directly and fully accommodate the requirements of his False Self.

In sum, the narcissist does not occupy his own soul, nor does he inhabit his own body. He is the servant of an apparition, of a reflection, of an Ego function. To please and appease his Master, the narcissist sacrifices to it his very life. From that moment onwards, the narcissist lives vicariously, through the good offices of the False Self.

Throughout, the narcissist feels detached, alienated and estranged from his (False) Self. He constantly harbours the sensation that he is watching a movie with a plot over which he has little control. It is with a certain interest- even fascination-that he does the watching. Still, it is mere, passive observation.

Thus, not only does the narcissist relinquish control of his future life (the movie)-he gradually loses ground to the False Self in the battle to preserve the integrity and genuineness of his past experiences. Eroded by these two processes, the narcissist gradually disappears and is replaced by his disorder to the fullest extent.

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Citation: Vaknin S (2020) Dissociation and Confabulation in Narcissistic Disorders. J Addict Addictv Disord 7: 39.

Copyright: © 2020 Sam Vaknin, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

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Sam Vaknin
Shmuel "Sam" Vaknin (born April 21, 1961) is an Israeli writer and professor of psychology. [1] [2] He is the author of Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited (1999), was the last editor-in-chief of the now-defunct political news website Global Politician, and runs a private website about narcissistic personality disorder (NPD).[3] [4]He has also postulated a theory on chronons and time ...