When you're a parent considering divorce, it's impossible to quiet the endless worries about how the split will affect your kids: Will their grades suffer, you wonder? Will they swear off committed relationships for the rest of their lives? Will they resent me?
But what parents often fail to realize is how strong and resilient kids can be -- and how experiencing the hardships of divorce can potentially make them stronger than they would have been otherwise.
Just ask HuffPost Divorce readers. On Sunday night, they shared with us the hard, but valuable life lessons they believe their kids learned because of their divorces.
Read what they had to say below, then tell us what lessons you think your kids learned from your divorce in the comment section.
1. "Open and honest communication is essential in any relationship."
2. "My kids have learned that sometimes two people need to be apart and that that's OK. They've also learned that you need to love yourself before you can love someone else."
3. "I showed my daughter that it is possible to be independent and not need a man when her father left me. I was able to walk away with my head held high, knowing I had exhausted all efforts."
4. "My 8-year-old daughter tells me, 'When I grow up I don't want to make the same mistake you did. I want to marry a man I can trust!' I don't know if I should be proud of her for that statement or feel a bit slapped in the face, but it is a lesson."
5. "They learned to not settle in life! Life is too short to allow divorce to drag you down. They've also learned that it's OK to come from a divorced family -- some people marry for the wrong reasons and people change."
6. "They've learned to be a strong person who can admit their wrongdoings and try to make them right. Because of my divorce, they know they can survive adversity and learn from mistakes."
7. "My kids know to love hard, love long, love strong, but to never be someone's fool."
8. "They learned that their mother will always put them first and will always have their back."
9. "My son was 5 and my daughters were 1 when I divorced their mom. They're still young, but I think what they will takeaway later is that marriage takes a lot of work."
10. "That opposites attract, but they don't last."
11. "Since my divorce, my children learned that you can have a firm foundation and that your home can be a sanctuary."
12. "To be independent and make enough money to support yourself so you never have to rely on anyone else."
13. "That love changes shape many times over the course of a lifetime -- but that it's possible to work at getting along with someone if you can let go of your own fears and hurt."
14. "They've learned that both of their parents love them, even if we're not together."
15. "They learned the importance of self-respect."
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