parents divorce personal essay

Personal Narrative Essay : The Divorce Of My Parents

When I was younger, growing up was not always the easiest thing. From a young age, I was faced with the difficulty of having divorced parents. Most of my friends did not have to go through this struggle, so it was hard to explain why I could not always hang out with them every weekend. “I can’t, I’m at my mom’s this weekend”, became a phrase I used quite often. However, when I was small, I thought it was kind of cool in a way because I got two birthdays, two Christmases, and two vacations. Eventually, both of my parents remarried. My father remarried my stepmother who also had two children who were both older than I was, but younger than my brother. My mother remarried and then had two more children with him. 

I felt as a kid, I missed out on some opportunities that other kids my age got to experience. Also growing up it was not always easy watching your two parents not get along. As I got older, it was very difficult to be able to do everything that I wanted to because it would mess up our schedule that we had, which made my mother kind of upset. When my younger siblings were born, things started going downhill. We had to watch our younger siblings all of the time, and it was our responsibility to keep them entertained. My sister and I are about five years apart, and my younger brother and I are about six years apart. So keeping them entertained was kind of difficult since we were all children.

I thought growing up that the one “hard” thing I would have to deal with was my parents divorce, however that was wrong. My mother got divorced for the second time. This came as a shock to me. At this point, I hardly ever saw my younger siblings. Between me starting competitive gymnastics, school, and their different schedules it could go months without seeing them which was very hard for me as a kid. I noticed right after the divorce my mother did not seem like herself, but at the age of nine, I had figured it was just the stress from the divorce. As time went on, the things that were happening continued. For example, she would cancel a weekend here and there or she would have friends over the whole weekend barely making time for us. However after one weekend, we quickly realized what it was.

It was Halloween in 2015 and it was my mother’s weekend. I was ten, my oldest brother was fifteen, my younger sister was six, and my youngest brother was five. My father told us to go downtown to the Trunk or Treat in town, so we could see friends and still go trick or treating. We were downtown for about twenty minutes before we left, and did not get to see my father who was expecting to see us dressed up. Earlier in the day, my mother and I were planning my eleventh birthday party since it was in two weeks. However, the topic changed quickly when we were talking about our plans for the rest of the night. My mother talked in a very serious tone about what we were doing. She made very strict rules of what we could do. At the time I did not realize what was going on until later. My mother had taken my siblings and I to an “adult” party. 

The day after everything had happened I was still very confused. When my mother was taking me and my brother back to our fathers, she had specifically told us not to tell him what had happened, and to say after we went downtown we went back home. As we got in the car with our father, he already knew what had happened. Still as a young child I did not understand anything that was truthfully happening. My brother had explained to me that our mother had some deeper lying issues that turned her to drugs and alcohol. Even at the age of ten I knew those things were bad, and they could have seriously harmed me or my siblings. My father was furious with my mother, as he had every right to be because she had potentially endangered me and my siblings lives by being there at a young age. My father was granted full custody of my brother and I, after it was taken to court.

As a child having to experience things like this made it very difficult to talk to my friends at some points. Every once and a while I would leave school early to have to talk to someone, but when my friends asked I simply said that I had some kind of appointment. It was very hard for me to be able to come to terms with the fact that my mother would not be a part of my life. I struggled with this for a while, and I kind of started shutting people out because I did not know how to express my feelings, and I did not know how to feel. I was angry, upset, hurt, and so many more feelings that confused me at a young age. I had also convinced myself that somehow it was my fault, and that I had done something wrong for things to end up the way that they had.

Six years later, I have come to terms with this. I have understood that there was nothing I did or could have done to cause this. Sure, every once in a while I will get upset over it but it will happen. I have also realized that I have an amazing support system, and that I can talk to anyone whenever I need to. I have an amazing family that has helped every step of the way, my friends have always been there for me whenever I needed them, my boyfriend who has become a big part of my life who I can call any hour of the day if I needed him. I know many people are not blessed with having such a great support system, but I am very fortunate to have one, and for that I am forever grateful.

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Home — Essay Samples — Life — Divorce — My Experience of Growing Up with Divorced Parents

My Experience of Growing Up with Divorced Parents

• Categories: Divorce Parents

About this sample

Words: 407 |

Updated: 8 November, 2023

Words: 407 | Page: 1 | 3 min read

Works Cited

• Amato, P. R., & Kane, J. B. (2011). Life-course pathways and the psychosocial adjustment of children of divorce. Journal of Family Issues, 32(2), 153-171.
• Emery, R. E. (2019). Two homes, one childhood: A parenting plan to last a lifetime. Penguin.
• Fabricius, W. V., & Luecken, L. J. (2007). Postdivorce living arrangements, parent conflict, and long-term physical health correlates for children of divorce. Journal of Family Psychology, 21(2), 195-205.
• Fine, M. A., & Fine, G. A. (2014). Handbook of divorce and relationship dissolution. Routledge.
• Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (1999). The seven principles for making marriage work: A practical guide from the country's foremost relationship expert. Three Rivers Press.
• Hetherington, E. M., & Kelly, J. (2002). For better or for worse: Divorce reconsidered. W. W. Norton & Company.
• Irwin, R. L., & Ryan, J. M. (2013). Counseling and divorce. Springer Science & Business Media.
• Kelly, J. B., & Emery, R. E. (2003). Children's adjustment following divorce: Risk and resilience perspectives. Family Relations, 52(4), 352-362.
• Wallerstein, J. S., Lewis, J. M., & Blakeslee, S. (2000). The unexpected legacy of divorce: The 25 year landmark study. Hachette UK.
• Walsh, F. (2016). Normal family processes: Growing diversity and complexity. Guilford Publications.

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Personal Narrative: My Experience With Divorced Parents Essay

When I was five years old, my parents got divorced. Through the separation process, and some years after, my parents fought a lot. They sometimes brought my 2 sisters and I into it, which was really frustrating. Growing up with parents who are divorced has been a struggle for me throughout my life. It’s hard to put into words my experience and ongoing trials I go through with divorced parents. My parents met when my mom was in her early twenties and my dad was thirty. They got married a couple years following the time they started dating.

Shortly after getting married, they had my older sister Maddy, then me, and after that they had my younger sister Cassie. I can clearly remember us being a happy family. I had the best parents who worked as a team. We did a lot of stuff together as a family, gardening, playing outside, and staying active. We lived in a big house off of 85th in Green Lake, Seattle. I remember being young when the fighting started, yelling and screaming. It scared my sisters and me a lot. No one wants to witness their parents fighting as a kid.

When I was five, Maddy seven, and Cassie three, our parents got divorced. Once the process was finished, my mom got custody of us and took us to live in a house with her. My dad stayed at our house in Ballard and we moved into a house with my mom and her new boyfriend, which is also whose baby she was carrying. Over the next few years, we had been back and forth between both parents. I remember I sometimes hated leaving my mom and dad. I wished I could be with both of them at the same time. Me and my sisters lived in a new house in Everett, with our then new Step dad, Mom, and baby sister Meghan.

Whenever we went over to my dads, there was always something my parents were fighting about, whether it involved us or not, we would always get an earful from both of them. This point of their separation really affected me the most. I didn’t realize until I got older that we should have never been exposed to that part of their lives, considering how young we were. Another part of their divorce was dealing with a step dad I’ve never been fond of, and neither were my sisters. It was somewhat of a culture shock, him growing up in Mexico, and for us, as we began living with a guy who wasn’t even our dad.

I would always ask my mom why she couldn’t have married someone else. Someone we liked. My step dad was the type of guy who only cared about his “real” children, not us. It became a constant struggle for attention from my Mom. When we were young, my sister and I were treated like maids around the house when my step dad was around. He is honestly one of the main reasons why the divorce was so heartbreaking for me and my siblings. I feel as if my mom had married someone who supported her and loved her unconditionally; it would have made more of a positive impact during this hard time in our life.

Later on, around fourteen or fifteen years of age, I saw my dad slip away from me. I saw him less and less every month. This crushed me; I didn’t understand it at all. Once I got to high school, I never saw my dad. I would try to think of the last time | had seen him and I couldn’t even remember when it was. My dad had lost both of his parents in the last year and I always had this feeling he had never moved on from the divorce. My dad has always been stubborn and I think he has always held onto that part of his life. How could you not?

I remember my dad had told me when I was in middle school, that he had been an alcoholic . He said he drank a lot when he was young but stopped once he had kids. Shortly after realizing how little I saw my dad, I started getting phone calls and texts from family members, saying they had smelled alcohol on his breath. When I heard this, I was crushed. I didn’t believe them; I was so mad at them for telling me that. I thought to myself how my dad could choose alcohol over his daughters. I think somehow over the next years of high school I just pretended he doesn’t exist.

I did this because as a young teen, I should not have had to constantly worry about my dad. After a couple of years knowing about his drinking, my sisters and I found out he got a DUI. I hated him; I was shocked and didn’t understand why he would go down this road and do this to himself. We finally had to confront him about his drinking. Me and my sisters told him we wouldn’t be seeing him if he continued going down the wrong path. He has been sober ever since then. His actions are inexcusable but I believe they were the repercussions of divorce.

This shows just how serious divorce is and what problems it causes in people’s lives. Today, I still go through phases where I think about what life would be like if they never got separated. I constantly compare my family to others with married parents. Dealing with divorce hasn’t been easy to deal with, but it’s normal for me now, something you get used to. Which sounds crazy, but it is the way I have to think to be happy. Divorce has been challenging for me and I don’t think it will ever get easier. To be able to move on my life, I just have to think more positively about the situation .

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Calculate for all schools

Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, how to write a college essay about divorced parents.

Hi all, my parents recently got divorced and it's had a big impact on my life. I want to write about it in my college essay, but I don't want it to sound too negative. Any advice on how to approach this topic and share my story in a meaningful way?

When writing a college essay about your parents' divorce, it's important to focus on personal growth and development rather than the negativity of the situation. Here are some tips to help you approach this topic in a meaningful way:

1. Focus on your growth: Highlight how the experience of your parents getting divorced has led to personal growth or development. Perhaps you learned valuable lessons about resilience, independence, or empathy from the situation. Show how these qualities have made you a stronger person and will benefit you in your future academic and personal pursuits.

2. Share a specific personal anecdote: Avoid talking about your parents' divorce in general terms. Instead, focus on a specific event or moment from your life that illustrates the impact of the divorce on you. This will make your essay more engaging and relatable to the reader.

3. Balance positivity and realism: While it's important not to dwell on the negative aspects of your parents' divorce, you also want to be honest about the challenges you faced. Try to strike a balance between acknowledging the adversity you've been through and emphasizing the positive growth or realizations that emerged from the situation.

4. Demonstrate self-awareness: Being introspective about how the experience has shaped you is crucial. Show that you have a deep understanding of your emotions, thoughts, and reactions throughout the process. This shows maturity and self-awareness, which are qualities that colleges value in their applicants.

5. Relate the experience to your goals: Explain how your parents' divorce and the lessons you learned from it have influenced your academic, career, or life goals. This will help the reader understand the significance of your story and see how it's relevant to your aspirations.

6. Proofread and revise: Finally, make sure to revise, proofread, and seek feedback from a trusted teacher, counselor, or mentor to ensure your essay is well-written and effectively conveys your message.

By focusing on your personal growth, sharing a specific anecdote, balancing positivity with realism, demonstrating self-awareness, and relating your experience to your goals, you can write a meaningful college essay about your parents' divorce that will resonate with admissions officers.

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CollegeVine’s Q&A seeks to offer informed perspectives on commonly asked admissions questions. Every answer is refined and validated by our team of admissions experts to ensure it resonates with trusted knowledge in the field.

Personal Narrative: My Experience With Divorced Parents Essay

When I was five years old, my parents got divorced. Through the separation process, and some years after, my parents fought a lot. They sometimes brought my 2 sisters and I into it, which was really frustrating. Growing up with parents who are divorced has been a struggle for me throughout my life. It’s hard to put into words my experience and ongoing trials I go through with divorced parents.

My parents met when my mom was in her early twenties and my dad was thirty. They got married a couple years following the time they started dating. Shortly after getting married, they had my older sister Maddy, then me, and after that they had my younger sister Cassie. I can clearly remember us being a happy family. I had the best parents who worked as a team. We did a lot of stuff together as a family, gardening, playing outside, and staying active. We lived in a big house off of 85th in Green Lake, Seattle.

I remember being young when the fighting started, yelling and screaming. It scared my sisters and me a lot. No one wants to witness their parents fighting as a kid. When I was five, Maddy seven, and Cassie three, our parents got divorced. Once the process was finished, my mom got custody of us and took us to live in a house with her. My dad stayed at our house in Ballard and we moved into a house with my mom and her new boyfriend, which is also whose baby she was carrying.

Over the next few years, we had been back and forth between both parents. I remember I sometimes hated leaving my mom and dad. I wished I could be with both of them at the same time. Me and my sisters lived in a new house in Everett, with our then new Step dad, Mom, and baby sister Meghan. Whenever we went over to my dads, there was always something my parents were fighting about, whether it involved us or not, we would always get an earful from both of them.

This point of their separation really affected me the most. I didn’t realize until I got older that we should have never been exposed to that part of their lives, considering how young we were. Another part of their divorce was dealing with a step dad I’ve never been fond of, and neither were my sisters. It was somewhat of a culture shock, him growing up in Mexico, and for us, as we began living with a guy who wasn’t even our dad. I would always ask my mom why she couldn’t have married someone else.

Someone we liked. My step dad was the type of guy who only cared about his “real” children, not us. It became a constant struggle for attention from my Mom. When we were young, my sister and I were treated like maids around the house when my step dad was around. He is honestly one of the main reasons why the divorce was so heartbreaking for me and my siblings. I feel as if my mom had married someone who supported her and loved her unconditionally; it would have made more of a positive impact during this hard time in our life.

Later on, around fourteen or fifteen years of age, I saw my dad slip away from me. I saw him less and less every month. This crushed me; I didn’t understand it at all. Once I got to high school, I never saw my dad. I would try to think of the last time I had seen him and I couldn’t even remember when it was. My dad had lost both of his parents in the last year and I always had this feeling he had never moved on from the divorce. My dad has always been stubborn and I think he has always held onto that part of his life.

How could you not? I remember my dad had told me when I was in middle school, that he had been an alcoholic. He said he drank a lot when he was young but stopped once he had kids. Shortly after realizing how little I saw my dad, I started getting phone calls and texts from family members, saying they had smelled alcohol on his breath. When I heard this, I was crushed. I didn’t believe them; I was so mad at them for telling me that. I thought to myself how my dad could choose alcohol over his daughters. I think somehow over the next years of high school I just pretended he doesn’t exist.

I did this because as a young teen, I should not have had to constantly worry about my dad. After a couple of years knowing about his drinking, my sisters and I found out he got a DUI. I hated him; I was shocked and didn’t understand why he would go down this road and do this to himself. We finally had to confront him about his drinking. Me and my sisters told him we wouldn’t be seeing him if he continued going down the wrong path. He has been sober ever since then. His actions are inexcusable but I believe they were the repercussions of divorce. This shows just how serious divorce is and what problems it causes in people’s lives.

Today, I still go through phases where I think about what life would be like if they never got separated. I constantly compare my family to others with married parents. Dealing with divorce hasn’t been easy to deal with, but it’s normal for me now, something you get used to. Which sounds crazy, but it is the way I have to think to be happy. Divorce has been challenging for me and I don’t think it will ever get easier. To be able to move on my life, I just have to think more positively about the situation.

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152 Brilliant Divorce Essay Topics & Examples

For those who are studying law or social sciences, writing about divorce is a common task. Separation is a complicated issue that can arise from many different situations and lead to adverse outcomes. In this article we gathered an ultimate list of topics about divorce and gathered some tips to when working on the paper.

The Phone That Tore Us Apart

Our long-distance marriage was hard to sustain — and hard to end.

By Patti Niemi

What tore us apart was displayed on a table in the courtroom — a phone. As the judge stated for the record, I was appearing for my divorce “telephonically.”

This was 17 years ago, pre-Zoom. From my home in Oakland, Calif., 2,000 miles from the Midwestern courtroom where my husband sat, I pressed the receiver to my ear and heard coughs and murmurs, chairs scraping and doors closing. The judge asked my husband for the date of our marriage. He couldn’t answer.

“Why is it always the man who forgets?” asked the judge.

Someone laughed. (I pictured a bailiff acting like the sidekick on “Judge Judy.”)

“July 19, 1998,” my husband finally said.

We had started dating eight years before that day, as young musicians in a Miami training orchestra. Everybody there had the same goal: to win a position in a permanent orchestra and make music for a living.

More than a job, music was our identity. Auditions are brutal. There are few openings, and it’s not uncommon for 100 players to try out for each. My husband and I faced this likelihood: If we got lucky and won jobs, they would probably be in different cities.

After four years in the orchestra, I won a percussion job with the San Francisco Opera. Some years later, after freelancing in New York, my husband joined an orchestra in the Midwest. Most couples in our situation would break up, but neither of us was willing to choose between job and relationship. So, for six months of every year — the length of my opera season — we committed to a long-distance relationship and eventually a long-distance marriage.

Now that marriage was coming to an end. I tried to picture my husband in the courtroom. It was late October. He would be wearing a light winter jacket, his dark blue one. Was he crying? I doubted it. Unlike me, he had an audience. When musicians are onstage, we hide our feelings. If we play well, we smile and bow. If we play badly, we smile and bow. We have learned to show only the good side.

“You have no minor children?” asked the judge.

“No,” he said.

After Sunday matinees during my season, I often would take BART to the airport and fly east on an overnight flight that was half empty. I learned to book a seat in the back, hoping to lie down. I drank coffee and stumbled through O’Hare, looking for my connecting regional flight.

After 24 hours together, I would leave on Tuesday morning, arriving back in San Francisco in time for rehearsal. On one visit we spent a whole week together — I happened to be with him on 9/11, and it took me five days to get a flight back.

Over the years we established a rhythm. Adding children to the composition didn’t seem possible.

But I was fine with that because we had so much. To fall in love with my husband’s playing was to fall deeply in love with him. I loved his dedication to his art, how all his emotions came through the music. I loved his devotion to his parents and to our ancient kitty, Blackie, about whom he wrote a beautiful eulogy. We were two musicians in tune with each other — we never had to explain performance anxiety or justify the need to practice. He and I loved being together, even if it just meant practicing in the same house.

As the years became a decade and then longer than a decade, “being together” was exactly what we lacked. For half of every year since we left Miami, we had words but not touch; we shared references but not experiences. When his mother had a breakdown and entered the hospital, I was thousands of miles away, as I also was when he and a flute player were victims of an attempted armed robbery as they loaded the car before an early morning gig. He missed my opening night opera the first year, and every year after.

Musicians must be comfortable with solitude — we spend hours by ourselves in practice rooms. But solitude in our personal lives was harder to bear.

In San Francisco I never came home to an empty house. Shortly after moving there, I agreed to house-sit for friends and never left. They became my West Coast family. I was surrounded by the chaos and companionship of three children and two adults. Over the years, I hadn’t seen the isolation building for my husband, the toll taken from years of leaving me at the airport, where each pickup was just a prelude to a drop-off.

Being lonely within a marriage is the worst kind of loneliness. Even for two musicians, sound wasn’t enough. Eventually, the distance just became too much.

Now, back in the courtroom, there was silence. I pictured the judge running down a list, checking boxes. He stated that neither of us was seeking spousal support, that each of us had health insurance. He confirmed that we had divided our assets.

Getting divorced involved a slow-motion unraveling of what we had built. His grandmother’s wedding ring went into my fire safe — I couldn’t envision the logistics of sending it back without crying. Our joint bank account was divided in two. (On the phone to the bank representative I couldn’t even say the word; I said we were “separating.”)

In front of my West Coast house, a FedEx driver unloaded my percussion instruments: snare drums, cymbals, marimba and vibraphone. My ex-husband took custody of all the clarinet music I’d once adored — I stopped going to Peet’s Coffee because Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto was on their playlist, and I couldn’t bear to hear it.

We had only one major asset to divide. Outside a UPS store on Shattuck Avenue, I broke down crying after quitting claim to our home. Five years earlier we had purchased our dream house. The notary’s signature dissolved the dream.

Only 30 minutes had passed since I’d phoned in for my divorce. Our marriage ended at 7 a.m. Pacific Time. My ex left the courtroom, went to the parking garage and called me. Across the miles, we cried together.

I was gutted. He and I had spent summers in Santa Fe, and after our divorce I dreamed of the region’s arroyos — hollows where something had been but no longer was. My house, with its five occupants, was too full of life — I took to driving the streets of Oakland. Alone in my car, I howled.

Night after night I went to work in the pit, a place where opera’s most common theme — love gone wrong — constantly unfolded onstage. Leonora chooses poison over a forced marriage. Madama Butterfly chooses seppuku over spousal humiliation. Senta throws herself into the sea as her Flying Dutchman departs.

The stories didn’t help, but the music did.

One of the operas in our rotation was “Der Rosenkavalier.” Near the end of the opera, the Marschallin and the two young lovers come together to sing about aging, love and loss. Their voices weave together and overlap; the inner lines, struggling to be heard, break through and cross one another. Their bodies resonate together.

In the trio’s final moments — when their voices are soaring, each stretching to reach higher than the others’ — there is so much resistance and conflict between them that we ache for resolution. When the music finally resolves, so do the relationships, and the older woman, with quiet dignity, steps aside.

Over time, grief, like music, modulates. A divorced couple is lucky if each person finds a separate peace. Harmony, though, requires two voices.

In the early years after our divorce, my ex and I still talked every day. We couldn’t let go of that connection. It was a habit, a comfort; we needed each other’s voice. During the opera’s intermissions, I would climb the stairs from the basement to find a private place to call him, leaving the sounds of the opera behind. Cellphone to my ear, my ex and I would discuss music, maestros, colleagues.

A few years later, we talked about Al and Tipper Gore, who had just announced their separation. “It’s sad,” I said. “They were married 40 years. But I guess it’s sadder to stay married and be unhappy.”

“It’s overrated,” my ex said.

“What is?” I asked. “Marriage or divorce?”

“Happiness,” he said.

Across the miles we laughed, together.

As a married couple, our voices hadn’t been enough. For two people reeling after a divorce, however, the phone had become a lifeline, a gentle landing as we eased our way into our new, separate lives.

Patti Niemi , a writer and percussionist in San Francisco, is the author of the memoir “ Sticking It Out .”

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Tales About Love to Nourish Your Soul

The Cost of the American Dream:   A physical relationship is nearly impossible  for a hard-working Bangladeshi taxi driver and his wife, who longed for each other.

Who Is Trusted to Have a Child?:  A married gay man and emergency pediatrician wrestle with expectations of having a “traditional” family life .

A Fetish for a Second Skin: As a gay Korean American, he yearned for the privilege of being heterosexual or white. So he began wearing latex , a new skin.

The Slap That Changed Everything: She kept trying to laugh off and normalize sexual aggression by men. Eventually, it all caught up to her .

Seeking a Lover, Not a Nurse: Disability shouldn’t make someone undesirable  or impractical as a romantic partner.

Two Kisses We Never Talked About: Sometimes you really have to show up for your ex. This was one of those times .