UK Daily Mail has a heartbreaking article out today on how disintegrating marriages impact children, even well into adulthood. More often than not, divorce rips apart a child's world at a time when he/she does not have a voice or any control over the situation, and that pain can last a lifetime. Another example of adults prioritizing their own desires over the needs of children. And in a way, denying basic common sense that children need and deserve both their mother and father in their lives. Sound familiar?

"If you're divorced, or thinking about it, their testimony will shake you to the core."

I can still recall the sight of my boy dissolving, sobbing, still not believing that his parents would no longer live together.

I remember the message he recorded on his little cassette player, how he begged his dad to come back - and in turn the hackneyed platitudes delivered by the man who never understood, never wanted to understand, what he did to his child. 

The children in this documentary seemed like castaways, hungry and thirsty, dying to speak to someone about what happened to them and ask their parents questions still  left unanswered.

...I did my best to protect and steer my son through our divorce, but all too rarely are children caught in the middle of a divorce told why it is happening. And while some parents claim such an attitude is to protect them, in reality, of course, it's the adults whose interests and emotions are protected.

Conversations, you see, mess up game plans. They interfere with personal freedom and gratification. And induce guilt, that irksome emotion, for which there is no place in our modern world.

Separation, lone parents, remarriages, and the ensuing step-parents and siblings - the after-effects of divorce are now part of the fabric of 'normal' family life.

Read the full article here and get more info on filmmaker Olly Lambert's documentary, Mum and Dad are Splitting Up, on the BBC.