Problems in the home hurting our children

YOUR CHILD is performing at the top of his class academically, and then suddenly, he starts declining rapidly. This is just one of the many signs that problems exist in the home and/or the school.

It is critical for parents to discern the cause of the problems. Parents and guardians often blame children without realising that it may be their relationships – as husband and wife – or other problems within the household that are affecting the child negatively.

Children are very sensitive, and what you think they don’t know, they know. For example, a parent may start coming in from work at later hours, or the parents are no longer sleeping in the same bedroom, or arguments increase and intensify, or a third party enters the equation and there is separation between the parents, or one parent goes outside of the marital relationship and has a child. What also affects the children is that one parent may lose his job and the lifestyle of the family changes and declines, and it affects them in many ways.

So while parents are focusing on their problems, the children are slipping through the cracks and are suffering. Some start joining gangs and getting into wrong groups.

Children become attached to things and relationships very easily like the home they’ve always lived in, the community, church, and even the church building they have known since birth. So when drastic changes take place, there needs to be counselling because the issues that seem minor to adults can go as far as leading to suicidal thoughts in the child. For some, even losing a home affects a child so much that the child holds on to it even into adulthood.

Divorce affects our children far more than we think, and so everything must be done to save the marriage. Contrary to popular belief, parents cannot afford to make big decisions independently. They have to take the children into consideration because we cannot afford to produce cold-hearted killers. Our focus must change. While they have their place, gun control, growing an economy, and making big agreements with financial giants – whether globally or locally – cannot be the sole or most important focus.

Without strong familial structures on a national level, everything else we try to do will be in vain.