Parents Sleeping Apart - Impact On Kids?

We all (had) debriefed kids when they come home from preschool or elementary. Older children resist, and yield scant information, unless they think mom/dad would really go for that news/gossip.
All manner of private information get from one house to another -- overflowing toilet, parental squabbles, the lot. Sleeping-apart is part of that menu that children may reveal to their preschool or elementary friends, and that may get interpreted by their parents, who may even dispense pop-remedies to our kids (if they happen to be after-school sitters). Life can get too complex to unmuddle.

I can understand why your 37 year old she wasn't amused, and thought you might not understand.

Western country resident desis do not show sufficient DA (display of affection) at home. Children get to school, and learn much from classmates about the other parents -- quarrels, arguments, domestic abuse etc. Sleeping apart news is an episode of the serial reality show-drama's they may already know. Desi parents who sleep apart [too much dhokla in diet may even be the cause of that !!] for whatever reason, ought to compensate for that by more DA at home. Rub noses like eskimo's when they come out of that home-office during their breaks. Let watching kids go "eewww" at the affectionate sharing of the aura's which may contain the covid virus.

 

Exactly how I find it too ....

IMO, 6-8 years is too young to be impacted by the fact that the parents are sleeping separately. I doubt if they can read anything out of it. I have no idea if it is any different for desis abroad.

Togetherness and oneness of the parents is understood by children through many other gestures, actions and instances and not just by the sleeping arrangements. How the parents put up a unified front when disciplining children, how they attend to each others needs without being asked, extra love that each shower at the dining table by sharing that scant favourite food, how they stand up for each other during the interactions with everybody outside family, volunteering to share each others load of work so on and so forth are all the many instances where children read love, affection and over-all health of the relationship between parents.

Sleeping arrangement is not the only indicator of love and IMO, potential emotional damage due to absence of one ideal arrangement temporarily, is a remote possibility.. that too for children of that age.

 

My childhood memories : me and my sister sleeping on either side of mom in the bedroom. And dad sleeping in hall Alone.
No it didn't cause any sort of emotional damage on us.

I'm with you on this. Yes a bit silly. Sometimes young parents worry for something which is not a matter of concern.

Her mind voice : why did I even share this with her.

Edited to add :6 and 8 years old are too young to understand why aren't parents sleeping together.

 

Such a lot of gobbledy gook exists in psychology/parenting magazines in the west about the co-sleeping and parents-sleeping-apart. In indian middle class families, there is no such problems, because the whole world they know is doing the same things.
Children interpret what they had observed and heard, then synthesize with the world view they have got. I remember from years and years ago, the question: "if you two got divorced, who would I go with?". In India that would be unthinkable for a 7 year old in 2nd grade, even today.