To: the child of divorce

Your life is turned upside down, split into two. You don't know what to do or where you're supposed to be. You're being asked so many questions, you have no idea what the right answers are. You can't understand what's happening or what you did wrong.

You did nothing wrong. The cause was not you, but two people who can no longer love each other the way they used to. You may have seen it coming, or you may not have. You might have been really young or you might be a teenager, or even an adult when your parents decided they no longer wanted to continue a life together. No matter how old you are, having the two people who love you the most separate and take their lives elsewhere without each other is hard to swallow.

It's going to be tough, and it's going to add stress to every aspect of your life. It is impossible to be in two places at once, and it is impossible to make them both happy. They love you and they both want you around 24/7, but it is not that easy. That is an important thing to remind yourself of. You need to understand that now you are going to miss out on things, just as they are going to miss out on things with you, such as holidays. Holidays, in my opinion, are the most difficult part. Having to spend a holiday with one parent and not the other is the worst. It makes you feel like you are betraying your mom or your dad (whoever you miss out on seeing that Christmas). Even though you switch it up every year, it still sucks. There's no other way to describe it.

The drama that comes with divorce is inevitable. Especially if it wasn't a mutual decision, or if your parents are bitter and consumed with their own issues with each other. You are going to be put in the middle because that has been your position since you were an infant. They brought you into this world together and you belong to both of them, and now everyone needs to learn how to share. Along with this, though, it is important not to feel like a trophy that is being fought over. You are a person, and you are their child.

Life is going to get messy and complicated in all aspects. But you are going to be okay. Everybody is going to learn how to make it work and you are going to create a system, and hopefully that system will work for everybody. As you grow up, it is important to know that your happiness is what is most important. You are going to spend far too long trying to satisfy both of your parents and trying to keep everybody happy. At the end of the day, though, you may very well be the one unhappy, and that is not okay. Your parents are important, absolutely, but there is nothing easy or exciting about divorced parents. What makes you happy and what you want/need may not be what is going to make them both happy, and one (if not both) of them may not be the happiest, but they will understand. They may not understand at the moment, but eventually they will. Let's face it, they don't have any other choice. Not everybody is going to get their way.

Divorce is a heartbreaking thing, but so is an unhappy marriage. Couples will do what they feel is best for them and their families, and you may not understand it at the time, and you will probably have a million questions about why it is happening, and even if you never get all your answers, you have to keep moving. You have to continue playing the cards you were dealt, because if you stop playing your hand, your parents are going to steal your cards and play them to their advantage, and you are risking your own happiness by staying quiet.

You have become the messenger. The pawn. The travel-size shampoos that will swap from house to house. Nobody said it was fun, but you are going to make it work; you have no other choice. So, Child of Divorce... keep fighting, keep mediating as much as you can handle, but don't forget about yourself, because there will be times that you get lost in the middle of the fight–not intentionally, but it will happen. Most importantly, don't sacrifice your own happiness to satisfy anybody else in the situation, because you are what is being fought over in the first place, and you are what is most important to both of them, so be important to yourself as well.

Stay strong and keep going–lots of love,

The almost-20-year-old still stuck in the middle.

P.S. You probably left your favorite shirt at Dad's house. Give him a call, he'll drop it off at Mom's.