This is me, Lauren.
And that is my son, Jack, and we are playing in his messy room with trucks and having the absolute best time. A few seconds after this photo was taken, Jack grabbed my face with his chubby little baby hands and planted a big, sloppy, baby kiss on my cheek while giggling hysterically.
This photograph captures the good times. The happy times. The easy times. But, as a child of divorce, I know how fleeting these moments are and how quickly life can turn on you. In fact, I can still remember my parents sitting my sister and I down to explain that they were going to divorce and that life, as we knew it at least, was going to change. In that moment, I was filled with so many questions – none of which my parents had the answers to as they were still figuring out their next steps.
No parent can ever imagine being in that position – having to explain to their child that, for whatever reason, their entire world will be different. Trying to answer their child’s questions in age appropriate ways when you don’t have all of the answers. Hoping that things will not “get nasty” and that you will somehow learn the meaning behind all of the terms you spend hours endlessly googling – like “parenting time,” “co-parenting,” “custody,” “equitable distribution,” “divorce.”
