The ‘Secret Club’ No One Wants: Growing Up as a Child of Divorce

One woman shares how childhood wounds, anxiety and loss shaped her life — and how Christ led her toward grace, healing and freedom.

A young Amanda, pictured here with her parents shortly before their divorce. (Photo courtesy of Amanda Flageolle)

By Amanda Flageolle

I’d like to tell you a story. It isn’t a fairy tale, though it does have a happy ending. It isn’t a tragedy, though it does have loss and sadness. It’s a true story; it’s my story. My story of belonging to a secret club I never wanted to be in — the “secret club” for adult children of divorce.

Let’s start somewhat near the beginning. My parents, who loved each other, were married in the spring of 1984. It was neither of their first marriage (indeed, it was my mom’s third). History repeated itself, and thus occurred the first major tragedy in my young life. My parents, who always loved me, who always told me they loved me, divorced when I was 3, less than 4 years after they’d tied the knot. I don’t have any memories of them being together, and I spent much of my adolescent life assuming their divorce didn’t affect me because I was so young. Turns out I was another passing victim of the vicious cultural norming of divorce and the wounds it causes, especially to children.

Divorce Affects Children

You see, divorce is so much more than the sundering of a bond between two people who have children together. What was once one household is now two: two addresses, two phone numbers, two different states. What was once financial stability is now under siege as each parent separately tries to support themselves and the child. What once was a home becomes a place the child stays occasionally, or is completely lost.

The child can no longer be hugged by both parents simultaneously. She can’t go into the other room to ask Mom if Dad said no. She can’t give the drawing from school to both parents to put on the fridge. She has to choose. 

Now she lives with a single parent who can’t give her the same level of attention. The child can’t remain a child; she must learn to care for herself and self-parent. The parents themselves are wounded and sad, and the child bears the weight of emotionally parenting her parents — the opposite of how this beautiful relationship should be.

So, the child’s journey continues through later childhood and into adolescence, learning negative coping and self-protection habits.

Anxiety, Worry and Bad Habits

What did that look like? Growing up, everyone called me “the worrier.” I believed my anxiety was something I was born with, not something that had a traumatic cause. My mom would often say she didn’t have to worry about anything because Amanda worried about everything. I assumed it was simply part of my personality to worry. All the time. About everything.

I worried that my grades wouldn’t be good enough, that Mom would run out of gas or that Dad would think I didn’t love him as much because I wasn’t at his place very often. I was afraid I would be hungry, but I was also afraid that feeding me would be a burden. Anytime we had any kind of trip coming up, I couldn’t stop the “What if…” questions until I drove my mom completely up a wall.

My constant state of worriedness took the part of me that liked to dream and plan and turned it into a controller. I had so little agency; I wanted to control what I could. If I were in control, then I could avoid being disappointed or upset with someone else, because it was all up to me. I began to internalize that when things went wrong, it was my fault. It had to be, if I was in control of everything, right?

There are other examples of the effects of divorce in my life. I was a perfectionist; I began to lie; I said whatever I thought someone wanted to hear to avoid any kind of disagreement; we moved constantly.

Then, tragedy again: my first stepfather died when I was 12, leaving me grieving a parental loss as well as co-parenting my 6-year-old sister with my now single-working-mom. I threw myself into busyness: long hours at the theatre, epic fantasy novels, schoolwork, college a year early, 22-credit semesters, more theatre, work.

By the time I turned 16, more tragedy had struck, and I had decided I was too imperfect to be loved or in a lasting relationship. I was anxious all the time about not being good enough, about being a burden, about the imperfections in my past and in my personality. So much of this is a result of what I learned from my parents and their relationships: their relationships with one another, with my step- and half-siblings, and with their multiple marriages. I had never seen marriage as sacramental, as sacred or as joyful.

Healing and Wholeness are Possible

The happy ending? God blessed me with a deeply loving husband, and we’ve been married for over 13 years now.

So why am I sharing this story? I no longer want to live in the silence of my wounded childhood. I want to live free of the shame that I thought I deserved and couldn’t escape for so long.

Most importantly, if you’re also in this “secret club” of adult children of divorce, I’m sharing my story for you. In November 2024, I attended Life-Giving Wounds, a retreat meant for adult children of divorce and separation co-sponsored by the Archdiocese of Denver. At that retreat, for the first time, I heard stories like mine. Like ours. I cried to know that someone understood me in a way I hadn’t even understood myself. I learned that the loss of your parents’ love for you as a unit is a wound, no matter what age you were. Woundedness breeds shame, and as humans, we bury shame; at least, I did. Some days I still want to.

Healing is a lot of work. Jesus, the Divine Physician, wants to heal all our wounds, including this one. What we can’t do is heal on our own, but what we can do is choose to let him lead us on the healing journey.

The retreat changed my life. It changed my relationship with Jesus, my Savior. It changed my marriage and my relationship with my beautiful children. It changed how I look at myself and taught me to truly believe that my core identity is as a daughter of God. It opened my heart to working with a Catholic therapist to continue healing. The retreat showed me my perfect parents — Mary, our loving mother, and God the Father, who loves us always and perfectly.

If you are an adult child of divorce, know of my prayers for your heart, and for you to receive the grace and holy courage you need to begin — or continue — your own healing journey.