We didn’t agree on a lot of things when we were married. We had a lot of feelings clouding our judgement. There was a lot of stress distracting us from prioritizing. After our divorce was finalized and everything was written in ink and signed off on, it all got easier.
It wasn’t quite overnight, but over time we grew closer and more capable of healthy communication when it comes to our kids. We had been on the same page before we got married and now we are back on the same page. We just needed to get rid of some of the other aspects of our relationship to become the parents we were meant to be.
So while some minor details aren’t always agreed on, we seem to always find a good place to land when it comes to the big issues. Like our children’s wellbeing, mental health, and meeting their individual needs.
Our daughter comes with a whole host of needs. Not all of which made sense to us at first. And not all of which came with any sort of “how to” guide. Allowing our child to transition was the simplest and hardest thing to come to terms with. We both knew who she was and who she needed to be allowed to be. We both were terrified of messing this up. We consulted wit ha specialist. We met with other families, some in real life, some virtually. We took it slowly and followed her lead.
Most recently, we signed documents and mailed out a check. We finally gave our girl what she needed in order to be able to live her life. A child shouldn’t have to come with an explanation or a “heads up” before starting a new class. A child shouldn’t always have to enter a new arena by waiting on the outskirts while their parents explained to the adults in charge what to expect. And now, she won’t have to.
I showed up to the play date with one kid. My friend was shocked. Where was my other kid? I guess the concept of having a split day isn’t something people are too familiar with. Many parents take one kid out for a special activity. Many kids go out with their friends or family without necessarily taking their sibling along. But once you start breaking down their schedules into parenting time, people tend to be far more hungry for that time.
Early on in the divorce process I worried about losing time with my kids. I worried about missing out on huge memories and all of their little milestones. I worried about all of it. As the kids got older though, I noticed that there were a lot of things we were all missing out on. A little one on one time started to become something to look forward to.
Our kids are their own people. They have their own hobbies, interests, all of it. And they have an amazing ability to interrupt each other and a strong desire to steer conversations and play in their own direction. It became apparent that they needed one on one time.
The split day was born. It was such a raging success from the very first one that we knew we had to work this into our parenting schedule. It made it so much more clear too that this wasn’t about my days or about my exes days. All of this is about the kids days.
Birthday parties are much easier to navigate without an extra sibling. Bringing a 4 year old on a 4 hour hike is surprisingly doable when it’s one 4 year old instead of 2. A trip to the museum became a truly interactive learning event rather than a push-me pull-me down a spiral of exhaustion. The kids missed each other and were happy to be reunited at the end of the day. They were eager to share their experiences. They were thrilled to have had one of us to themselves. So yeah, split days are a thing. And we like them.
When
a 5 year old transgender child started asking about eggs (in the context of
mammals), their parent knew she was in for an interesting discussion. In
response to the “do you have eggs” question posed by the child, their parent
(assigned female at birth) informed them that she does have ovaries with eggs
in them. When the child asked if she
also has eggs, the parent replied that most people do not have both eggs and testicles. To that, the surprised child said “WAIT! Mama, you don’t have balls?”
This
conversation and this child’s surprise highlights the idea that children are
flexible in thinking and if not taught a specific version of gender role
concepts and expectations of gender conformity, a child has the potential to
accept the world around them and to develop naturally without constraints in
what is considered common social norms.
Parental modeling and teachings have a significant influence on
children’s own concepts of self (Bosacki, 2014).
Gender Development
If someone has never thought about their gender identity,
it is probably because their gender identity matches the sex they were assigned
at birth. A doctor makes a determination
based upon genitals or chromosomes at the time of birth as to whether to mark
the “female” checkbox or the “male” checkbox at the time of birth, and while
that designation will create an individual’s sex assigned at birth, that
momentary designation does not determine a person’s actual gender identity
(Winter, 2015).
Gender, as compared with biological sex assigned at
birth, is a person’s psychological identification as either male, female or
non-binary. Transgender is the term used to describe an individual whose
biological sex assigned at birth does not match their gender identity
(Goldstein, Corneil, & Greene, 2017).
Research shows that individuals start having recognition of gender
differences in their perceptions in infancy.
These are based upon social constructs as to what is embedded into
society as male or female gender-role identifiers (Dunham, Baron, Banaji,
2016).
Gender-related
self-identification of a child starts at age 2-3 years old. By that time, it is common for parents to
have immersed their child into gender stereotyping simply by way of clothing
and toy choices thus creating an environment where a child is encouraged to
conform to gender stereotyping associated with their sex assigned at birth
rather than an innate development of gender identity (Winters, 2017). Their environment can significantly affect
initial concepts of gender identity based upon the social feedback (both
positive and negative) associated with choices and preferences a child shows in
their environment such as color and play choices.
Within cognitive theories, children are
viewed as internally motivated who construct their own concepts of gender. Those concepts then morph into gender
conformity which children see as a way to conquer the concept of gender. Also, within this theory, children (ages 2
through 6 years old) may have phases of awareness, followed by rigidity, and
then flexibility (Halim et al., 2014) associated with their gender identity
based largely in gender expression. Utilizing
clothing as a tool, children can use their learned gender stereotyping to
express their own internalized gender concepts because the rigidity allows them
to try to conquer this rather complex concept (Halim et al., 2014).
Within a concept of social learning theory,
Albert Bandura opined that humans are neither entirely able to act inherently
independently nor entirely controlled by external forces and are, instead, able
to develop self-regulation to a degree that they have control over their own actions
(Wulfert, 2018). Self-regulation is
one’s ability to plan behavior but then modify based upon situational need to
adapt (Montroy et al., 2016). This
social theory as applied to gender development would lend itself to the idea
that children are able to recognize their own gender identity even if they are
exposed to social modeling and gender stereotyping.
There is, undoubtedly, a complicated
relationship between sex assigned at birth and gender identity. Social constructs have a significant
influence over defining gender roles and expectations and privileges associated
with a particular gender designation. As such, a child’s freedom to discovery gender
identity that is innate and self-determined lies significant with those adults
and peers creating the environment and modeling roles, gendered or otherwise,
for those children.
References
Bosacki, S. (2014). A Longitudinal Study of Children’s Theory of
Mind, Self-Concept, and Gender-Role Orientation. International
Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 6(2), 213-228.
Dunham, Y., Baron, A., & Banaji,
M. (2016). The development of implicit
gender attitudes. Developmental Science, 19(5), 781-789.
Goldstein, Z., Corneil, T.A., &
Greene, D. (2017). When Gender Identity
Doesn’t Equal Sex Recorded at Birth: The Role of Laboratory in Providing
Effective Healthcare to the Transgender Community. Clinical
Chemistry, 63(8), 1342-1352.
Halim, M., Ruble, D.,
Tamis-LeMonda, C., Zosuls, K., Lurye, L., & Greulich, F. (2014). Pink frilly dresses and the avoidance of all
things “girly”: Children’s appearance rigidity and cognitive theories of gender
development. Developmental Psychology, 50(4), 1091-1101.
Montroy, J., Bowles, R.,
Skibbe, L., McClelland, M., & Morrison, F. (2016). The development of self-regulation across
early childhood. Developmental Psychology, 52(11),
1744-1762.
Winter, G. (2015). Determining Gender: a social construct? Community Practitioner, 88(2), 15-17.
Wulfert, E. (2018). Social learning according to Albert
Bandura. Salem Press Encyclopedia of Health.
On October 10, 2018, the Appellate Division handed down an
unpublished decision in Scott v. Hill, a case that was appealed from Essex
County Superior Court, Family Division.
Plaintiff and Defendant were never married, but had a child
together in 2000. In 2015, the Court
entered an Order setting Defendant’s child support obligation at $140 per week,
plus $10 per week towards his arrears (which were initially $560), to be paid
through Probation. A biennial
cost-of-living adjustment was applied to Defendant’s obligation, thereby
increasing it to $143 per week in 2017.
Defendant retired in 2015 and began receiving Social
Security retirement benefits in the amount of $1,415 per month. Defendant made an arrangement with the Social
Security Administration wherein they would subtract $689 each month from his
benefit and send it directly to his son, commencing January 2016. Additionally, Defendant paid his $153 per
week in child support and arrearage obligation through Probation in accordance
with the 2015 court order.
In or around May 2017, Defendant became unable to make the
court-ordered payments through Probation and ceased doing so. However, the child continued receiving
Defendant’s Retirement benefit each month.
Defendant filed a motion asking the court to modify his child support
obligation and to give him a credit towards the arrears on record with
Probation.
The trial court denied Defendant’s request for a credit for
the Social Security retirement benefits paid to the child prior to the date
Plaintiff filed his motion, reasoning that N.J.S.A. 2A:17-56.23(a) barred
retroactive modification of arrears. The
trial court found that Defendant was only entitled to credit for Social
Security retirement funds that the child received after his motion was filed.
On Appeal, Defendant argued that he should get credit for
the Social Security retirement payments as well as a credit against future
obligations for any amount of the Social Security retirement payments that
exceeded the court-ordered obligation.
The Appellate Court recounted the holding in Diehl v.
Diehl, where the Court determined that a parent paying child support is
entitled to a credit against child support arrears that accumulated
contemporaneously with Social Security disability benefits paid to a
child. 389 N.J. Super. 443 (App. Div.
2006). The court in Diehl went on to say
that the benefits paid to a child that exceed the court-ordered child support
obligation cannot be fully credited against arrears or future support
obligations because it is considered a gratuity to the child. The Court clarified that social security
retirement benefits are treated the same as social security disability benefits
in the realm of calculating a child support obligation.
The Appellate Division ultimately ruled that the trial court
erred in determining that N.J.S.A. 2A:17-56.23(a) barred retroactive credit for
Social Security retirement benefits received prior to Defendant filing his
motion, and remanded the case to the trial court for calculation of an
appropriate credit. The Court also held
that he was not entitled to credit for social security the child received while
Defendant was paying child support through Probation, nor was Defendant
entitled to a credit towards future obligation, as both scenarios constituted
“gratuities” for the child as described in Diehl.
