of the children were relieved by their parents' decision to divorce despite the high incidence of exposure to physical violence during the marriage.
             We have learned that a child's early response to divorce and separation is not governed by any balanced understanding of the issues that led to the parents' decision. Nor are children much affected, if at all, by living in a community with a high incidence of divorce. Instead, at the time of the parental separation the child's attention is riveted entirely on the disruption of his or her own family, and he is intensely worried about what is going to happen to him. Whatever its shortcomings, the family is perceived by the child at this time as having provided the support and protection he needs. The divorce signifies the collapse of that structure, and he feels alone and very frightened.
             The age and developmental groupings into which the children's responses fell, with a regularity which we had not fully anticipated, provided a congenial way of categorizing their concerns, feelings, and behaviors at the time of the marital breakup. Some of our cases illustrate the close similarities as well as the striking differences which emerged.
             One major legacy of divorce is discontinuity in many parent-child relationships, in which the changes of separation, divorce, and its extended aftermath are reflected in unexpected and far-reaching alternations in the child's relationship with both parents. As the family breaks apart, each parent-child relationship essentially swings free of the structure that has held it in place. The chain of reactions so abruptly set off may reverberate for several years and lead to new relationships greatly at variance with those that obtained when the family was together-relationships, indeed, that have no real
             ...