What special needs do children have at different ages?

Pre-School-Age Children's Needs: Very young children need frequent contact with both parents. Even short periods can be reassuring for young children. They need to be held, fed, bathed, read to, cuddled, played with and spoken to. Changes should be made as gradually as possible. Young children are very dependent and they need caring people to look after them.

School-Age Children's Needs: School-age children need longer periods with each parent. Sleeping over in each parent's home helps them adjust to the loss of the original family unit and helps them to feel at home with both parents. Six-to-eightyear-olds may need special reassurance that they did not cause the divorce. They need permission to love both parents and all the people in their lives who are good to them. School-age children benefit when both parents are interested and involved in their education and when both parents participate in teacher conferences and special school activities.

Adolescents' Needs: Adolescents are striving toward independence. They need: privacy; activities with other adolescents; some flexibility so they can reschedule plans with parents; freedom from overwhelming responsibility for major family decisions; continued guidance from parents about rules and standards for their behavior; parents who act like parents, not like pals; parents who do not constantly lean on them for moral support; cooperative parents who encourage them not to take sides; ongoing contact with both parents so they can experience each parent's strengths and weaknesses.

Children of all ages need to know that neither parent will abandon them and that family life with each will continue.

Why does a child need ongoing contact with both parents? If children lose contact with one parent following the separation or divorce, they experience great pain and a sense of rejection, even if they do not express this outwardly. Many children find it difficult to trust and forgive a parent who left them. The hurt brought about by the loss of a parent can remain with the children throughout their lives and may keep them from being willing to love and trust others.

Some children imagine the missing parent to be ''perfect," instead of a human being with strengths and weaknesses. The more they are kept from seeing a parent, the more they want to be with that parent.

Increasingly, courts are now favoring the parent who encourages access with the other parent. Experience shows that children tend to do best when they have ongoing contact with both parents.

What if a child does not want to see one parent? It often helps if the parent gives the child a chance to express their feelings. After listening, it is important for the child to be reassured of that parent's love. Children need to be given permission to love and enjoy both parents. When a child refuses contact with one parent, family counseling is often recommended. If this problem is neglected or ignored, the child may carry the anger and hurt into adulthood and lessen his or her chances for happiness.