Sometimes it takes less than a second to fall in love. It takes the same amount of time to cause dramatic consequences to a child’s mind

Sadly, in 2011 my wife and I started the process of separation, when our daughter was just 4 years old. I wasn’t ready for this and yes, it hurts. One day you are a family pack and the next day you become a lone stranger with broken dreams…

One positive element during this time was that my wife and I were both determined to protect our daughter from the negatives consequences of the separation.

We did everything we could — we sought advice, read books and went online, but we never found what we were looking for.

In response to our frustrations, I decided to create a personalised book for our daughter. It took me three weeks to craft the final version, which was made up of pictures and cartoons, as she could not read. Waiting for the right moment to present the book to her was quite tense.

It was a Sunday afternoon. She was sitting between us. I opened the book and begun to tell her our story, her story: a love story.

In the first chapter she discovered where Mum and Dad come from, how we met, fell in love and got married. The second chapter showed her arrival and the lovely time we had all together.

The third chapter illustrated that, as life went on, Mum and Dad realised that there were some differences between them and decided to go their own ways. But how no matter what happened between us all: “we love you!” (we love her).

And it doesn’t stop there. There is a the future, in the fourth chapter ‘You will have two houses, two bedrooms, go to school with Mum or Dad, see your friends, meet new ones and still have lots of fun. But most important of all: ‘No matter what: We love you!”

And the key message here is: ‘ We might not be a loving couple anymore but we are still loving parents and for ever.’

We shut the book and after a little silence she said — and I quote her here: ‘Thank you for my book!‘ It was quite an emotional moment.

I will never forget that. The next day, we had some friends visited with their children. The very first thing our daughter did was to grab the book, show it the kids and said: ’Look, look how much my parents love me!’ That was amazing. Beautiful.

It was such a pure moment it did provide us valuable healing.

Whenever I visit my wife’s house these days, to pick up our daughter, the book is always somewhere around her in the house.

Tedx Talk: http://bit.ly/2rxW9Aw