The Impact of Divorce on a Teenager :: Impact of Divorce on Children

All over the world, parents decide to divorce and this leaves children hurt and confused. The children may lose contact with one parent or they might decide to makes some bad decisions in their life due to the feeling of neglect. Some of the bad choices could be mental health disorders and struggling in academics. There are impacts on teens that could be short term but there are also long term effects too, because most of them look up to their parents as role models. (decent statement of theme) Family clearly impacts teenagers, especially a divorce. [Why this last sentence? This is a â€Å"no duh† comment=you knew it before you started. Maybe it works as a 1st sentence, but not a last one.] In the book The House on Mango Street, written by Sandra Cisneros, the main character, Esperanza, was affected by many external forces, including family. Esperanza is a young teen who just moved to Mango Street, and she doesn’t like her house because it’s ugly, and she dreams of another house that her family has promised one day. â€Å"I have inherited her name, but I don’t want to inherit her place by the window (Cisneros 11). This was in reference to her great grandmother who didn’t want to marry, but Esperanza’s great grandfather kidnapped her and forced her to marry, where Esperanza’s great grandmother never forgave him and looked out a window for the rest of her life. Esperanza didn’t chose her name, her family did, and she didn’t chose who her family is either. The external force of family is an issue in real life just as it is in this novel, and the teens learn to either love it or hate it. [Whoa! Where’s the divorce here? Why not use the mothers who are single parents? Isn’t that closer to divorce?] Adolescents tend to find ways to let out their emotions and try to escape their problems, and this unfortunately leads them to make poor decisions that hurt them more than they know that it would be. Alcohol actually is a depressant because it slows down the function of the central nervous system and it cause people to lose coordination and not be able to think straight. [Again, whoa! Where’s the divorce here? Why start with drinking? Suggestion: if this is what some teens do when faced with divorce, then maybe this should go as your 2nd or 3rd comment, not your 1st.