Good Question

Where do 10K and 5K's behavioral problems stem from?

Fantastic question. I've lots to say on the topic. My first assumption before I thought long and hard about it was the divorce. Divorce has driven children to hell and back causing a huge range of problems along the way. Then I thought more about it. As far as 5K is concerned there has never been an alternate situation. She was a one night drunken oops after the separation. She's never known anything but having a Mommy house, and a Daddy and K house. So it can't be the divorce. Then I thought, well 10K and 5K are so much alike, maybe his feelings about the divorce has just rubbed off on her. But then he came to live here and they spend less than 8 days together a month, so if that's how it was, it should have gotten better when he came to live with us. Which it didn't. So the conclusion I came to is two-pronged. It's hereditary, and it's how they were raised by their mother. I say hereditary because my husband was that strong-willed child. He was defiant till the end, raised by good missionary Christians, with a sister who was the 'good child'. He went down a really bad road, a road we're terrified 10K is running straight for. He sucked at school, his middle name was trouble, and he lived that until he was 32. C dealt with issues similar to 10K's, since he was adopted and I feel adopted children suffer from a lot of the anger and despair that divorced kids have. The other side I feel takes 70% of the reason 10 and 5 are the way they are. I believe it's because of how their mother is. No discipline, no boundaries, a friend instead of a mom. I think this creates an inner tension. Kids don't want to be in control, they want to be kids. They want to feel like home is a safe environment, where they can let go and know someone else is in charge. They don't have that. When C and Her were married, C was never home. When he did get home all they would do was fight. 10K remembers it. That's about all he remembers about their marriage. It wasn't a happy or safe place to be. Home was scary. 8K doesn't remember much of anything, so it's a fantasy for her. It's a dream of a life I took away. A different basket of problems for a different post. Mostly I think that because of their similarities, although living in different households now, it has to do with their mother. The conflict she instills in them, the need to choose a side, the scariness of being in control there, and the desire she has for a best friend not a child all add up to behavior problems. I feel 5K is going to wind up where 10K is, without a doubt. She is strong-willed, that coupled with the loosest reins imaginable gives us the same equation we had with 10K. How could we expect the outcome to be any different? 2+2=4 the first time you add it...the second time it doesn't equal 5 now does it?

Well that's my 2 cents. :)