Explaining Divorce to Kids: What One Parent Can Do (Even Alone) with Therapist Oona Metz

There’s a particular loneliness that comes with realizing you may have to explain a divorce to your children on your own. In this episode of Divorce Happens, Olivia Howell sits down with therapist and divorce expert Oona Metz to talk about one of the most emotionally charged moments in the divorce process: helping kids understand what’s happening when one parent refuses, avoids, or can’t show up for the conversation. It’s an episode for the parent lying awake at night, rehearsing sentences and worrying about getting it “wrong.”

Oona brings nearly 30 years of clinical experience and more than 15 years leading women through divorce support groups into this conversation, offering both professional insight and deep compassion. She shares what children actually need during divorce—not perfect language, not mutual parental agreement, but honesty, emotional steadiness, and reassurance. Through client stories and real-world examples, Oona explains how kids process divorce differently at different ages, why one regulated parent can provide enormous emotional safety, and how to answer hard questions without oversharing, blaming, or asking children to carry adult emotions.

Throughout the episode, Olivia and Oona emphasize a powerful mindset shift: you don’t need your ex’s cooperation to protect your children’s emotional wellbeing. Listeners will come away with actionable co-parenting tips, guidance on setting boundaries around what’s shared, and reassurance that doing this imperfectly is still doing it lovingly. The conversation also draws from Oona’s book, Unhitched: The Essential Divorce Guide for Women, which centers the emotional realities of divorce rather than the legal ones. If you’re navigating divorce recovery, single mom life, or co-parenting without collaboration, this episode offers clarity, validation, and hope: your presence matters more than perfection.

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