ASK THE EXPERT:It is best to be truthful with your children about issues such as family history, writes DAVID COLEMAN.
I AM the father of our four-year-old girl and she is our only child. She was born one year after her mum and I were married. As I had been married previously (no children) I am wondering if, when and how I should tell this to our child and what effect it might have on our excellent relationship. I would fear it might lead her to believe that I loved someone more than her mother and might cause her to feel a lack of security or maybe I should not even broach the subject until she is much older?
Usually I suggest that parents are as truthful as possible with their children about things like family history, adoption or the nature of blended families. The only caveat is in the words “as truthful as possible” because sometimes there are good reasons to protect children from the full truth of a situation until they are psychologically or emotionally mature enough to cope with the information.
In your case, you have a piece of family history that, at some stage, she is highly likely to come to know. So, in answer to your first query, yes, I think you should tell her about your previous marriage.
I believe it is much better that she hears this information direct from you, rather than from a third party. I also think it is better to hear it sooner rather than later. If you delay telling her for a number of years it is possible that she may hear about it from someone else in the family. This could lead to greater insecurity because she will wonder why you never told her.
She may also believe that your previous relationship was a “bad thing” because you weren’t able to talk to her about it.
On the other hand, if your previous marriage is something that she feels she has always known about then there will never be anything shocking or worrisome about it. Also, once she knows, you don’t have to carry any anxiety about her accidentally finding out this “secret” past that you have.
You describe that you have an “excellent relationship” with your daughter and I would translate that to mean that she has a secure attachment to you and to her mum.
Her security is based on her lived experience of you and her mum being reliable, trustworthy and loving parents. That doesn’t change just because you were previously married.
Indeed, sharing information about your family history is very much a continuing part of your trusting relationship with her.
I would suggest that you and her mum talk to her together and that you mention it in a low key and factual way as part of a wider conversation about family. Once it has been brought into the open you can facilitate the expression and resolution of any anxieties that it might engender in her.
For example, at dinner some evening you might begin a conversation at the table about who is in both sides of the family and try to name all aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins and so on. This could lead to an opportunity to mention other people who are not part of the family but who have been important to you and your wife in your pasts.
Then, over the next while, take, or create, other opportunities to mention your ex-wife or your previous marriage. Because you and, importantly, her mum will seem at ease talking about your ex-wife then your daughter can use this to regulate her emotions.
If you seem warm about your previous marriage and confident that it is a simple episode from your past, then she is more likely to share that confidence that this woman is not a threat to you, her, her mum or your shared future family life.
Because there is obviously no taboo about your previous marriage it is also likely that she will ask questions, like every inquisitive four year old.
By encouraging questions you will get further insights into her thinking and understanding about what this means to her. By answering them as honestly as you can you build further trust and security in your relationship with her.
Even if she doesn’t ask questions you can use your conversations to prompt, or guess at, your daughter’s emotional reaction to this information.
You can say things like “you seem really surprised that I had another wife before your mum” or “you keep laughing, I am guessing you find it funny that I was married before!” or “you seemed really quiet when I spoke about my previous marriage, I wonder if you are worried that marriages sometimes finish up”.
These kinds of empathetic statements each hint at possible feelings she might have. If they are her true feelings then she will be empowered to talk further about them. If they don’t fit with her true feelings, you can either guess again or she might try to explain what she really feels. Either way, by bringing her feelings, whatever they may be, to the surface they can be reassured, understood and resolved as needed.
David Coleman is a clinical psychologist and broadcaster with RTÉ television. Contact info@firebrand.ie if you would like to take part in the next series of Teens in the Wildwith David
Readers’ queries are welcome and will be answered through the column, but David regrets he cannot enter into individual correspondence.
Questions should be e-mailed to healthsupplement@irishtimes.com