My 11 year old child does not share

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…important things that happen at his dads house. I am specifically referring to the death of his grandmother which I found out about through a newspaper memorial 2 weeks after the fact.

My first marriage was annulled and we (obviously) have a son. He lives with me and visits his dad every other weekend and occasionally a weekday. I thought we were communicating/ working together well but now feel that is not the case and am especially concerned since my son did not feel comfortable sharing the news of his grams death with me.

Am I out of line? I don’t want to “butt into” his dads family but feel its important for a child to share these things and their feelings with their parentS (I personally would have called his dad to tell him about a tragedy in my family so he would have known but his dad told me that he assumed our child would have told me…)

Any advice on how can I encourage an open dialogue with my child in this situation?
 
First of all, boys are not girls. And an eleven year old boy is starting to get into the “men don’t share feelings” stage. So don’t be surprised that you see more and more of this. Contrary to common opinion, boys and men don’t always best process their feelings by talking about them. Girls yes. But not so much boys.

But since you are the mother you naturally will want to know these kinds of things because they will have some impact on your son.

I think you need to tell your son (over and over again) that when something significant like a death in the family or a serious illness or accident occurs that you would like to know about it because you want to know about the important things in your son’s life. And you may also want the opportunity to pray for those family members with your son.

But you also have to make it clear you are not trying to pry into his father’s personal matters that don’t involve you.
 
Tell your ex that you do not want to make your son the message carrier between the two of you.
 
Please whatever you do, DO NOT put your son in the middle for ANY reason. It is NOT his problem for communication problems between you and his father. Let him be a child.

Kathy
 
Katie1723 said:
Please whatever you do, DO NOT put your son in the middle for ANY reason. It is NOT his problem for communication problems between you and his father. Let him be a child.

Kathy
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I agree with this.
 
Katie1723 said:
Please whatever you do, DO NOT put your son in the middle for ANY reason. It is NOT his problem for communication problems between you and his father. Let him be a child.

Kathy
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Thank you for your concern but I NEVER implied I would EVER put my child in the middle. I thought I mentioned that if a tragedy happened in my family I would speak with my sons father directly.

It is a very hard for me to know that my childs loved one passed away and he did not share it with me. I am here looking for advice in helping him open up NOT to be judged. Your comment was judgmental, mean, hurtful, and not at all helpful.
 
LOLMOM: I think it may be his age. He is closing in on the age of “i’m not telling anyone about my feelings because they might expect me to talk and talk and talk and I don’t want to talk and talk and talk”…kwim?

Perhaps you could try asking him to let you know about major events, because if they are important to him, they are important to you as well, and so that you can pray for the family members, that you are not trying to be nosy, you don’t want to make him uncomfortable, but you would really like him to tell you these things, and then assure him that if he tells you, it doesn’t mean an in depth conversation has to happen, he can tell you and then you can just reply, “thanks for telling me, would you like to talk about it?” and if he says no, then he won’t be pressured to talk about it.
 
lolmom said:
Thank you for your concern but I NEVER implied I would EVER put my child in the middle. I thought I mentioned that if a tragedy happened in my family I would speak with my sons father directly.

It is a very hard for me to know that my childs loved one passed away and he did not share it with me. I am here looking for advice in helping him open up NOT to be judged. Your comment was judgmental, mean, hurtful, and not at all helpful.
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Obviously you took what I said the wrong way, and for that I am sorry. However, I stand by what I said. I was/am involved where a child was/is being put in the middle by her mother. That is no place for any child to be…ever. I am merely cautioning you to be careful not to let that happen to your son. And it is easy to do, regardless how hard you try not to. Please be careful.

Kathy
 
I am divorced and have two, 10 and 12. There are many things they do not tell me that one would think a normal child would. However knowing their dad, and knowing how hard it has been sitting between the two of us, I just accept some things.

My children didn’t tell me their great grandmother on their dad’s side had died. I found out several months after the fact. My son would have been about 10yrs at the time. When I said to him ‘you didn’t tell me nanna such and such had died’ he seemed surprised I didn’t know. Children often assume parents ‘just know’ things or someone else tells them.

My children are loathe to tell me anything after they return from their week with their dad, as they are worried dad will become upset that they are telling me things that have to do with him and his life.

If my kids tell me something they tell me. If they don’t, they have a reason and I don’t worry about it. It has nothing to do with open dialogue. It has to do with the fact that they are worried if they say something somehow it will get back to dad, and it might cause some conflict and they will get into trouble.

Kids who have gone through divorce worry about many things, assume many things and pick up on many things. They often have difficulty due to their ages about what they can relay to the other parent and what they can’t. The least I can do for my kids is not add to any of the trauma they have gone through by making them feel they have to tell me things, and yes a death in the family would be something one might feel should be relayed, but I know why they don’t, and I respect that. Also I don’t know exactly what their dad has told them, whether he has told them not to tell ‘mum’ anything. Most likely he has. My kids are loyal to their parents, very loyal, and that includes closed communication about what happens at mum’s and what happens at dads, and I am ok with that. My son often doesn’t see any significance about telling me news, maybe due to him being a 12yr old boy, and my daughter worries dad will think she is somehow dobbing on him and his life. I just ask how was your week with dad and did you do anything exciting; and if they choose to disclose things they do, if they don’t they don’t.

We forget when we’ve gone through a divorce, that there might have been times we have said something negative about the other party and the kids have heard that, and those times do shape our children’s behaviour when it comes to communication, because they’ve witnessed our reaction to something the other spouse has done or not disclosed and they don’t want any reaction to come back on them if they can help it. I call it self preservation and I wished I had done some things different.
 
Okay, nothing here but spectulation . . .

Since he is the child of a divorce, I suspect your child figured out very young that his life was better if he didn’t discuss his father at your house, and didn’t discuss you at his father’s home. That’s pretty common . . . and probably a pretty good strategy from a kid’s point of view. That way, he’s sure not to say something he shouldn’t say, and not to betray either parent in any way by giving too much information. At 11, it is likely that he has just established the pattern of telling nothing . . . he isn’t really old enough to discern what **should **be told – and, I agree, his grandmother’s death is something of which you should be aware (and the father should have told you, yes, but he may have assumed the child would and this secrecy would have been as much of a surprise to him as to you). Your son may well know that something that makes one parent upset (broken hearts, financial problems, disagreements with friends, whatever), is not supposed to be discussed with the other parent. And he put this into that category and just didn’t tell.

Maybe?
 
Sounds like he is a normal 11 year old boy.

“How was school?” - FINE

“How was your visit with dad?” - FINE

They are good at monosyllabatic responses, unless you ask about cheat codes on a video game.
 
I guess I gave too much personal information in my question. There seems to be assumptions being made that would not have been made had I just asked for advice on getting my 11 year old to open up and communicate with me more.

It’s just not right to make statements like, “he is the child of a divorce” . Its is indescribably hurtful and turns our family into “stereotype”.

I have never asked him to (and I pray that I haven’t made him feel that he needed to) hide anything he does here from his dad. I have been blessed with a remarkable child and while I realize I am not perfect and our family is not a perfect traditional family, I do my best to raise him to be loving and love God, as well as, give him what he needs to have a wonderful childhood and hopefully a long happy adulthood.
 
kage_ar said:
Sounds like he is a normal 11 year old boy.

“How was school?” - FINE

“How was your visit with dad?” - FINE

They are good at monosyllabatic responses, unless you ask about cheat codes on a video game.
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Thank you, I appreciate you saying that 🙂
 
lolmom said:
I guess I gave too much personal information in my question. There seems to be assumptions being made that would not have been made had I just asked for advice on getting my 11 year old to open up and communicate with me more.

It’s just not right to make statements like, “he is the child of a divorce” . Its is indescribably hurtful and turns our family into “stereotype”.

I have never asked him to (and I pray that I haven’t made him feel that he needed to) hide anything he does here from his dad. I have been blessed with a remarkable child and while I realize I am not perfect and our family is not a perfect traditional family, I do my best to raise him to be loving and love God, as well as, give him what he needs to have a wonderful childhood and hopefully a long happy adulthood.
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I am also a child of divorced parents, and what I found growing up was that it is best to separate the two worlds, and not let them overlap any more than absolutely necessary. What happened at Dad’s place stayed at Dad’s place, and what happened at Mom’s place stayed at Mom’s place.

It was just a whole lot easier that way, and saved a lot of misunderstandings and hurt feelings. There is nothing worse that being the cause of your parent getting his or her feelings hurt, so it was always just best to stay quiet.
 
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