Georgia says, “I can’t help feeling defensive when my kids tell such a distorted version of our divorce.” Georgia doesn’t understand how her adult kids, now in their 30s and 40s, came to see their parents’ divorce so inaccurately. So many years later, they are expressing intense emotions of betrayal, abandonment, and confusion, Georgia says. Why?

It is possible that they assumed roles in childhood that they shouldn’t have carried. Many become mediators, confidants, or emotional caretakers without realizing it. Their resentment often emerges later. “I didn’t ask them to take on these roles!” Georgia says, defensively. I reassure her that children cope with divorce by unconsciously stepping into these roles.

Years later, adult children of divorce may perceive and feel

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