Jim writes to the email group:
I came out to my wife about two weeks ago now. I have two children (ages 1 and 2) and my wife and I are in the process of figuring out what to do. She had been saying that the children will be devastated and that they will never have a carefree childhood.. Who out there has children, and what have your experiences been?
Sam answers Jim:
Children deserve our best efforts at creating a happy, secure home life. That's a two-edged sword: if you and your wife can stay together happily, you can provide that environment for them in the usual way. But if you cannot be happy together, you cannot hide that from your children, and it does them no good to be raised in an environment in which the parents have a poor relationship. It is far better to divorce and establish two separate happy, secure environments for them.
I haven't dealt with this myself. I do have a nephew the same (teen)age as my own son, whose parents divorced in a nasty way when he was very young (about the age your kids are now). He has survived and thrived, despite living in a single-parent household and despite having little to no contact with his father since the divorce. So, while I would never regard divorce as a first choice, or one to be taken lightly, it does NOT mean that you're condemning your children to a lifetime of misery.
-Sam
Jeremy answers Jim:
Hi Jim,
I came out to my wife a year ago. We are still in the process of working things out and it was truly difficult but it is getting much better. I have grown children and finally told them 1 month ago. Their reactions were all different but nothing as bad as I feared. They will do their own processing in their own time and I will be here to help them, just like always.
My point is that yours will have a chance to grow up knowing the real you. That's a big plus in my book. They will never have to learn and then accept that they were deceived or that you had kept something this important from them. That was the most difficult part for my kids, even though they understood the reasons for the deception. The other thing I have learned is that no childhood is completely carefree anyway. It just isn't. Love and support will be the best defense against the problems that all kids face as part of growing up. You will be better prepared as a result of being honest and open today about who you really are. Good for you, and good luck.
-Jeremy
And Tony answers Jim:
I'm a mental health professional. On the basis of what I see in my office and the work I've done in schools and other community-based settings, I don't think there's such a thing as a "carefree childhood."
Every day I see kids who have been raised with every possible material and emotional advantage, yet who are severely disturbed. Kids see so much and experience so much outside the family circle that it's very difficult to discern where the upset has originated. There's also no predictability or control over what seems to damage one child and what allows another child to bounce back from adversity that seems objectively worse. Resiliency, which is part of temperament, seems to be an inborn quality.
What seems to be at issue is how you and your wife will come to terms with the change that has come into your relationship... Your kids may actually benefit from having role models of two adults who are able to deal with their differences maturely and amicably-- though I wouldn't expect them to be able to tell you that until they're about 35 or so!
You all will be doing some hard slogging through a lot of stuff before you come out on the other side of this. What will matter most, in the end, I think, will be the mutual respect you and your wife can show each other through the process. That may help your kids to not feel divided within themselves with regard to their feelings toward each of you.
Avoiding blame will be hard, but it's important. Your wife will need to work through the anger that is part of the loss she is feeling. It might be helpful for the two of you, as a couple, to seek professional assistance in mediating that. She needs to express the anger, you need to be at the receiving end of it, and you'll both need some help in coming to a place of forgiveness and acceptance in order to move on. It's not going to be easy, but it's work that you can't afford to ignore.
This is hard truth, but I hope it helps.
-Tony