By Terri Romanoff-Newman, PhD, L.P.

To My Mom and Dad

From Billy, Sara, and Jake

This is a letter from us, your kids, who you say you love. Billy is writing this because he is the oldest and knows how to write really well and we have had a meeting and he agreed to speak for us. We are unhappy and cry, especially at night.You yell and scream at each other and talk about us like we aren’t even there and that we don’t have any feelings

We know you don’t love each other anymore-we get it, so maybe you don’t love us either. Sara is afraid to come home from school and wants to stay overtime and be with her teacher and not with either of you. Jake is getting bullied because he cries a lot and I am very very angry and don’t know what to do with my feelings, but I want to hurt someone; maybe both of you. Why did you have us if you were just going to yell and say mean things about the people we love. You ask us to be polite and say please and thank you---why---so you could lie to us

I know this is our fault because if it wasn’t our fault why would you be purposely be hurting us? I cannot think at school and my grades have dropped. My Coach says that if they drop any more I will get kicked off the team and then who will be my friends? We are all in trouble in our own ways and no one will help us. I am afraid if I tell the School Counselor that she will call you and we will get punished or we could get taken away from our home like the lady who came from Child Services to talk to our class about children in trouble. HELP

Please do something to help us so we can be kids again and not have to worry all the time and Sara can want to come home and Jake can scare the kids that bully him and I can feel like someone in my family wants me. If you want to know what to do, try to talk to each other the way you would want us to talk to you and our teachers. Look at each other in the eye and don’t yell and scream. Don’t talk about one another when we are around unless it is nicely and be polite to each other during pick-up and drop-offs. Talk to us, pay attention, help us with homework, and stop crying in front of us-it makes us scared about who will take care of us kids. Please Get Help

Love, Your Kids, who love you a lot, but don’t feel loved right now.