Mike:  In a perfect world, if people go through a divorce as caring adults and try to put the good of the family unit ahead of their own personal satisfaction, then I would imagine things can go fairly well, but these situations unfortunately do seem to have the ability to bring out the worst in just about the best people. Is this something that you see reflected when you deal with children?  Can you tell that maybe somebody is trying to use a child to maybe take revenge on a spouse, and … [Read more...]

Mike:  One of the things that I would think is vitally important is especially at the very very beginning when these issues start coming out is to try as much as possible, again going back to one of the earlier things you were talking about--is trying not to assess blame, trying to be as neutral as possible because I can see how if emotions get too raw and you're too explicit with the children about what happened, then there's almost no way you can frame that discussion without passing … [Read more...]

Mike:  Once the worst suspicions are confirmed--that there is an affair going on--how much do children need to know, how much can they handle, and I would imagine it varies tremendously on age groups and maturity. But are there some rules that you try to lay out at the beginning when, if you're talking to a parent about this and they're saying, "I have to hide this, I have to cover it up.  My children can't know about this." Kristine:  Like you said, age and maturity are certainly … [Read more...]

Mike Hennessey:  This is Mike Hennessey, and on behalf of the team at Relationship Advice Cafe, I welcome you to the interview with today's guest, Kristin Gottesman. For free tips and insight on relationship advice from hundreds of experts and authors, please visit our website at www.relationshipadvicecafe.com.  Christine, can you please give us a brief background about yourself? Kristine Gottesman:  Yes, I'm a marriage and family therapist intern so I received my Master's Degree in … [Read more...]