Portsmouth author working on followup to ‘Daughters of Divorce’

It takes two people to get a divorce. Parents need to be honest and forthright as they can and that wasn’t always the case with my family.”

Terry Gaspard

PORTSMOUTH — Terry Gaspard was 7 when her parents divorced, and she could barely comprehend what had even happened.

“I dealt with it by becoming really shy, withdrawn and sort of confused about what was going on,” said Ms. Gaspard, a licensed therapist and author who’s taught psychology at Bristol Community College (BBC) in Fall River for more than 25 years.

“I did what I think a lot of girls do; I basically repressed or didn’t acknowledge upset feelings about it. I wasn’t aware until I was much older that I was so confused and frightened about it because I didn’t think it was OK to talk about it, because there was a lot of conflict in my family.”

Ms. Gaspard said she was always curious about the long-term effects of divorce “because it does run in my family.” Besides her parents, her first marriage ended in divorce in 1995. (She’s been happily married to her current husband, Craig Gaspard, for 20 years.) Several other members of her family have also gone through divorces.

She started talking with her 30-year-old daughter from her first marriage, Tracy Clifford, about writing a book on the topic. 

“We wanted to figure out whether or not (divorce) had to become a legacy — whether it had to necessarily follow in your parents’ footsteps, or could you carve out another marriage for yourself?” she said. 

Tracy, she said, was also curious about whether there were any emotional differences between her and Catherine, her sister from their mom’s current marriage. (Catherine is a freshman at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Ms. Gaspard also has a son from her first marriage, Sean Clifford, 32.)

The result was “Daughters of Divorce: Overcome the Legacy of Your Parents’ Breakup and Enjoy a Happy, Long-Lasting Relationship,” published in January 2016 by Sourcebooks. The book, available at local bookstores and on Amazon, was the result of four years of research and interviews with more than 320 woman, many of whom were students of Ms. Gaspard’s at BCC, where Tracy works in the finance department.

The book focuses primarily on women because they are more vulnerable if there’s a history of divorce in the family, she said. More than 40 percent of Americans ages 18 to 40 are children of divorce, according to her book, yet the women with divorced parents are more than twice as likely than men to get divorced themselves and struggle in romantic relationships.

Daughters of divorce like herself, she said, often fear that their own relationships are going to end up like their parents’. This can lead to poor or rushed decisions when choosing a partner, she said. While she eventually got through her parents’ divorce “pretty healthy,” she said she rushed into her first marriage at age 23 with someone who was not compatible with her. 

“I didn’t realize when I was young that I should have take my time,” said Ms. Gaspard, who supports the recent trend of people waiting until their late 20s to get married.

Stay positive

One of the messages Ms. Gaspard shares in her book and workshops is for divorced people to focus on the positive, even during difficult circumstances, for the sake of their children and themselves. Her parents, she pointed out, had completely different views of their marriage and why they got divorced.

“My mother’s version was really more negative toward my dad than it needed to be,” she said. “One of the reasons I have such a big following among divorced men is I veer more toward strengthening the relationship between the father and the kids — especially the father/daughter — because I believe that too many divorced moms present a very negative view of the husbands. It takes two people to get a divorce. Parents need to be honest and forthright as they can and that wasn’t always the case with my family.”

Her website (movingpastdivorce.com) features blogs and posts from visitors. “I always focus on the positive; if they start writing negative things about their ex, I don’t post them because that’s not the purpose of my website,” she said.

Ms. Gaspard said she is heartened by the reception “Daughters of Divorce” has received. 

“It’s doing well; it’s not a best-seller. It’s a niche kind of thing. It’s won two awards: the Independent Publishers Silver Medal Award for Self-Help and it won the Best Book Award for Self-Help. It’s the kind of book my agent tells me is going to do well over a decade.” 

Pitching new book

Now she’s working on a proposal for a followup on another subject of which she’s familiar: remarriage.

“I’m optimistic about it because there’s about 42 million re-married people. There’s a big audience there. Most people who get divorced get remarried within four years,” she said.

This book would have a decidedly different focus than others about remarriage, she said. 

“The difference between my book and a lot of others you see out there is I’m not focusing on the blended or remarried family,” she said. “There’s a chapter on that, but I’m interviewing people who are remarried, either through divorce or death. I’m talking about communication, resolving conflicts, how to deal with finances … It’s going to be the 10 rules for remarried couples in order to have a successful, long-lasting remarriage.”

Ms. Gaspard said her mother remarried and divorced only a few years later, which is not uncommon since the divorce rate for second marriages is about 60 percent compared to 50 percent for first-time marriages. She nearly became part of that statistic not long after marrying Craig.

“I hit a rough spot in my remarriage and there were some family issues going on — health issues, job changes. And I woke up one day and said, ‘Oh my God, here I am. I followed in my mom’s footsteps the first time and got divorced. I’m thinking about it again.’”

That’s when she started taking more time to work on the relationship with her husband. 

“If you have a solid foundation as a couple, your chances of staying together are so much greater. Issues with blended families are very complicated and people tend to bring in a lot of other baggage,” she said. “I focused so much on my kids that I really forgot about my marriage. And that can happen. We had literally drifted apart. Yes, the kids are important, but don’t lose track of (the relationship with your spouse). 

“You got married for a reason.” 

For more information visit Terry Gaspard’s website, movingpastdivorce.com.