Often a family of three comes to the doctor, not the father, mother and child, but the mother, grandmother and child. When the child is sick, the mother and grandmother are accompanying the doctor. With the rising divorce rate in China, more and more children of divorced parents are coming to see the doctor, and many more of the children who see me after divorce are with their mothers than with their fathers. Why is this so? The lack of fatherly love and the absence of a father’s role in the growth of these children may be one of the major reasons. Although there are children who come to see me after divorce with their fathers, the fathers of these children are usually rarely with them either, and often times leave the children in the care of the elderly or other relatives in the family. The importance of fatherhood and fatherly love in a child’s development is not yet widely recognized or valued in our country, and I suspect that its negative effects will become more pronounced in the near future. If the mother’s desire for control is strong, the child may have a greater chance of developing mental illness or psychological problems. This kind of control by the mother is either obvious, such as the power mother, or more subtle, such as the mother who uses dependency to control her child, or the mother who uses excessive love to control her child. See the article on “Projective Identity” for more information on the mother’s excessive control over the child. What can be done to prevent mental illness or psychological problems in children with their mothers after divorce? 1. Mothers should take the initiative to create conditions that allow their children to spend more time with their fathers, or allow their fathers to spend more time with their children. Some mothers will say, his father is so bad and irresponsible that I won’t allow my child to be with him. This will need to measure the gains and losses, the mother is not allowed to meet with his father, this is usually more loss than gain, more harm than good; 2, the father should also take the initiative to contact the child, the busiest work should also regularly take time to spend more time with the child, more communication with the child, more understanding of the child’s feelings and needs. In the process of the child’s growth there are some things that can only be said to the father, only the father can help him. But in our clinic some fathers think that the monthly support has done their duty, the children have to look for him not even answer the phone; there are fathers who have gone without a trace after the divorce, the money has not given a point; 3, mothers do not complain, hate the husband’s emotions and concepts to the child, which will cause more harm to the child, a heart full of hatred will often live a very unhappy life. Do not intentionally or unintentionally in front of the child to scandalize the father, according to Maslow’s theory on “needs”, everyone needs to have a sense of belonging. For children, one of the most important things is their sense of belonging to their parents. Children learn and identify with their father’s character and characteristics to create a sense of belonging to their father. Now that the father is no longer around, the only way to understand, learn, and identify with the father’s character and characteristics is through the mother’s descriptions and comments about the father. If the mother constantly talks about how bad the father is, the child will learn and assimilate the father’s “badness” so that he will have a sense of belonging to the father. Some divorced mothers complain to me: Why is the child becoming more and more like his new father? The child also gambled, beat his wife, and beat me; 4. If the child is old enough, you can tell the child the fact of the divorce. Also let the child know that the parents are unhappy together, not because of the child, and finally the parents divorce is not because of the child. What’s more, let the child understand that his parents will still love him as much as before or even more after the divorce, and actively use their actions to fulfill their promises to the child in the future; 5. Don’t let the child get involved in the struggle between the parents, for example, forcing the child to go to the father for alimony knowing that the father is in some financial distress lately. One mother wanted to see her child’s father, and the father wouldn’t answer her phone, so the mother told her daughter on the Pearl River Bridge, “If you don’t go get your father, I’m going to throw you off this bridge.” 6, the mother should not only the child as the center, but also not too self-centered. Some mothers do not get love from their husbands and turn to their children to get love from them to compensate. The method is all child-centered, put all the heart on the child. This is apparently child-centered, but in fact may also be self-centered, with excessive love in exchange for the child’s special love for themselves, with the child’s 100% love in exchange for the child’s 100% love for themselves, with “love” to control the child. In the future, when the child suffers from mental illness or has some problematic behavior, the mother often blames the child for not knowing what to do, or says the child is not filial, in fact, these behaviors or symptoms of the child may be a subconscious rebellion against the mother’s excessive control. Also, because 100% of the child’s love has to be used to repay the mother, some children may grow up with romantic, marital, sexual orientation or psychosexual disorders. The mother and the child should each have their own space and clear boundaries with each other. On the one hand, the mother should care for and love her child and not neglect her child as much as possible because of her love, marriage, work and emotions, etc. On the other hand, she should have her own circle of life and not surround her child with everything, but give her child the freedom and space to grow; 7. In theory, parents who love each other must love their children and are more likely to love them. Conversely, parents who do not love each other are not likely to love their children healthily and are prone to pathological love, so divorced parents usually have to give a lot more in loving their children than those who are not divorced in order to do so. Without the love of a father and mother, a child is less likely to develop the ability to love himself or herself, to trust that others will love him or her, and to love life. Such a child will have low self-esteem as an adult, will be detached from others, retreat into their own world, insecure, and have sensitive and suspicious or hostile relationships; 8. After divorce, if there is absolutely no hope of remarriage, both parties should stop dragging their feet. The child is made from the mother’s egg and the father’s sperm. Deep down, the child always wants the mother and father to be united, although the child may consciously or superficially agree or approve of the parents’ divorce. However, as long as there is a ray of hope, the child’s subconscious mind will try to find a way to get the parents back together. If he or she does not have the ability to do so, the child’s subconscious mind may try to achieve this by making himself or herself sick or exhibiting problematic behavior. For this see the article: Sick children are the most loyal children to their families. From the systematics theory, apparently the child is sick, but in fact the family system is malfunctioning, just because the child is the weakest, so the family failure will choose to express through the child; 9. If the child has not quit breastfeeding at the time of the divorce, the child should quit breastfeeding in due course, and also sleep in a separate room from the mother in due course, regardless of whether the son or daughter, the mother should stop being overly intimate with the child after the child grows up; 10, Mothers should let go of their children and let them grow up, actively cultivate the ability and quality of independent thinking, independent decisions, independent actions, and independent consequences. Let the child understand that the enjoyment of rights and interests requires responsibility, know the relationship between giving love and getting love; 11, let the child more contact with other relatives, to develop a wide range of affection; also more for the child to find a small partner, to develop his feelings for his peers. It is best for the child to still have mature men around to care for its growth, so that it can learn, imitate and identify. If the mother remarries, the relationship between the stepfather and the child is important to the child’s growth, and the mother plays a very crucial role in it. The mother must pay attention to it and think and learn more about how to properly handle this complex relationship. If the child needs to receive psychotherapy, choose some sunshine, inclusive male therapists may be more appropriate; 12, words are better than teaching by example, the mother and father each after the blow of divorce do not give up on themselves, still show positive optimism, forward-looking mentality; tolerance and humility, independent and strong, still dare to love and hate, dare to bear the spirit; despite the other cheating also selfish, can still actively reflect on their own in 13, one of the important reasons for Chinese divorce is that both spouses have unclear boundaries with their respective families of origin, resulting in too much involvement of the family of origin. This over-involvement in the family of origin is bound to continue after divorce and is more likely to be natural. In the case of the mother, grandmother and children mentioned at the beginning of this article, it is easy to form a strong, closed symbiosis in which it is difficult for outsiders to intervene. For example, if the mother starts a relationship with a man, either the grandmother will find a reason to break it up or the child’s condition will fluctuate.