No free pass

A Christian News Wire article, written by a counselor, tells of a family torn apart by a wife's decision to have an affair and leave her husband and two young sons.

Over the next few months, I met with the boys weekly and was deeply impacted by their grief. I talked briefly with their mom and dad separately (depending on who had brought them to the session), and could tell that both parents were really good people who were suffering from some really bad decisions. Their mom told me that her husband was a great man, but said that she didn't want to work on the marriage because she had simply fallen in love with someone else. She said that she didn't want to have to choose between her own happiness and her children's happiness. She wanted to make sure that her boys would be o.k. so that she could marry her lover without guilt. I listened compassionately, but couldn't relieve her guilt. Nor was it my desire to do so. I could see that even if the boys would eventually recover from the trauma they were experiencing, they clearly would have been happier if their mom and dad had decided to work things out.

...If the question is simply, "Can children recover from their parent's divorce?" the answer is typically "yes." But before they arrive at a state of recovery, there is usually a lot of heartache along the way. And sometimes it lasts a lifetime.

If you are wavering in your decision to divorce or not to divorce, and believe that there is even a thread of hope to have a good marriage, please consider giving your marriage a shot.