Chapters
Transcript
Automatic transcript; may contain mistakes, especially in Hebrew.
This week's question is, my parents fight a fair amount, and unfortunately didn't try to hide it from me and my sisters, not then and not now. And even as we're older, it's still tough to watch. We all vowed we'd never be like that, never let our own kids one day feel stressed if there were, God forbid, any marital issues. But how do you do that? Because arguments, hopefully small ones, but still, are bound to come up. How can you guarantee your kids will always feel like they are in a loving home, even when things get a little tough? This is a really amazing question. The primary responsibility of a parent to a child is safety. And there is no greater threat to the safety of a child than the knowledge that their parents are not working in tandem with each other. The gift that we can give to our children is they can know that they are growing up in a loving home.
Even when Chassu Shalom parents get divorced, it's so important for the parents to create a loving environment for the children. And so even if they're not staying married, there still has to be a safe environment between the two parents. Which is why when people get divorced and it becomes so difficult for them to be together, often the children have such deep pain. Now while that's true in divorce, it can also certainly be true in marriage. And unfortunately today, many people do suffer from serious Shalom bias issues and the children are all too well aware of it. Obviously it goes without saying that it's absolutely inappropriate to express deep feelings for each other, especially if those feelings are not positive feelings, in front of our children. and yet children are exceptionally smart and exceptionally aware children know despite how much we may try to hide it from them children know exactly what is going on now they may not be able to articulate it and they may not know precisely what's going on but they can pick it up.
Read the full transcript
and as you mentioned in your question there's always going to be stuff trying not to have any stuff in your marriage is an exercise in futility marriage is designed conflict that's what it means azar connecto when we work through that we get to the joy of intimacy but before that it can be difficult and so when children are growing up when they're in their formative years it's important that even though there is strife in the marriage that the strife happens in a way that creates safety in the home so what does that look like well first of all as we said arguments should. never take place in front of children, especially when those arguments are heated and passionate. It's important that the children be shielded from that. Nevertheless, they're going to pick up on the fact that something is happening. And so what's really important is that we make up in front of our children. It's okay to fight. I don't mean fight in the sense of obviously inappropriate fighting, but it's okay for couples to have arguments. That's normal and that's natural. But the children should also see that the parents make up with each other,
that the parents love each other. That creates a... This way, when the children see Ima and Aba are fighting, they also know, but it'll be okay, they'll make up. And actually, that's really important role modeling for our children. Our children should know that we have the capacity to be loyal to each other, even in the face of an argument. And that's a skill that we can give them. That when they get married, they'll know it's probable that we're going to have fights with our spouse. And yet we can push through and maintain loyalty to each other. and forgive and be forgiven. And so it's important for the children to know that we love each other. Now, in your situation, even though you vowed you'd never be like that, of course, on some level, you will be. And I would encourage you to consider the following. Sometimes we bring the trauma of our youth into our marriage. And when we take vows, and I know you don't mean vows in the literal sense, but when we take vows, it seems like there might be some of the pain from when you were a child that's being brought into your marriage.
It's important to work that through and to process it, to be able to say, my parents' marriage was my parents' marriage, and my marriage is my marriage. So you don't have to go so much to the opposite extreme for the rest of your life. It doesn't need to be, I will make sure that my children never feel that way. In fact, the best way to make sure that your children feel that way is if it's so emotionally intense for you that they never feel that way. They'll pick up on that emotion. It's important to work it through. And to remember that your parents had their marriage, and you will have yours. They had their failings in their marriage. You'll probably have your failings in their marriage. And that's okay, because as I said, marriage is designed conflict. So make sure that you're not carrying that emotional baggage because that for sure will be given over to your children. So to sum up, number one, I know it can be really tough to grow up in a situation where there's fighting in the home. It's really unsafe. Our primary responsibility as parents is to create safety.
Make sure to work that through so that the children don't pick up on the opposite emotion of we're never going to show it, we're never going to show it. Number two, it's okay for children to know that their parents are fighting, that their parents are having an argument. That's not what creates the lack of safety. What creates the lack of safety is a feeling of disloyalty to one another, that there's no connectivity, that their home could fall apart. And even when the home does fall apart, it's still important to create safety.
Is this shiur filed in the wrong place? Let us know.