There is life after divorce for your children - if you and your ex-partnerlearn to get along, writes Tony Humphreys

Research now clearly shows that it is not divorce that affects children's emotional security, but the nature of the relationships that exist between ex-partners and between parents and children before the break-up.

There is little doubt that each parent suffers considerably when continuous unresolved conflict eats not only into the heart of the relationship, but also into the heart of their own self-belief and confidence. Children, too, are adversely affected when their parents' relationship is disharmonious and each parent, because of their own inner and marital turmoil, may find it difficult to notice or respond to the manifestations of their children's distress.

Children often wish for and support their parents' separation, but are often ill-prepared for the profound disruption that occurs when their parents finally separate. Even when the children remain in the family home, usually with their mother, family routine, family ethos and responsibilities change radically.

It is an established fact that separated mothers have major difficulties in the management of the challenging behaviour of their adolescent sons and the absence of the father as the arbiter or authority a mother calls upon in order to discipline a child can be sorely missed. There can be financial constraints and there is the difficulty for children of explaining to friends. Many children question their own contribution to the break-up and, particularly, when conflict between parents continues after the relationship ends, they tend to blame themselves. After all, when parents continue to fight after they part, what then was the real reason for the separation?

Children, too, have to negotiate a whole new relationship with their father, who, up to the break-up, may have relied on his partner to carry the emotional responsibilities within the family. It is certainly a truism that a mother, unhappy in her relationship with her spouse, rarely abandons her children on a daily basis in the same way that a father can. This is true before and after the separation. However, what is encouraging is that divorce is presenting fathers with the opportunities to get to know their children in ways that were not available when the family dynamic was largely mediated by the mother. However, it has to be said, that whilst 30 per cent of fathers disappear, mothers rarely if ever do.

While divorce presents opportunities for everybody in the family to grow individually and collectively, the first two years of the break-up is painful for all. However, though bleak in the short-term, the long-term prospects can be considerably better than they were pre-divorce.

Each parent has a major responsibility to recover a sense of self following the break-up. This is not easy as feelings of grief, loneliness, rage, panic, despair and resentment can be overwhelming. It takes patience and time to discover a sense of self and to create new supports.

In order for the family to benefit from the break-up of the marriage, the separated couple needs to be determined to resolve - or at least accept - their differences and to engage with each other in respectful ways. Certainly, this display of mature contact needs to exist when they are with the child or children, or making arrangements about them or discussing financial, educational and other family issues. It does children no end of good when they witness their separated parents being friendly with each other. Children see that it is not a disaster when relationships fail and that there is life after their parents part.

Parents need to be prepared for a time that children may not want to see the parent who leaves the family home and not slip into coercing the child to visit that parent. What is important is that the parent who has left does all in his power to maintain the relationship with his children. Divorce, then, rather than being a time of continued conflict, can be transformed into a time of opportunities for change for all members of the family.

Dr Tony Humphreys is a consultant clinical psychologist