but my friend had to explain to my 5 year old goddaughter why her Uncle Chris was no longer going to be a part of their lives, and why Aunt Jamie was pregnant with a new man's baby... she handled it really well, IMO. They felt it was too soon for the kids to see their Aunt Jamie living with this new guy (even though she was pregnant by him), so they asked them to stay in a hotel while visiting together, and they told my goddaughter that sometimes people fall out of love, and that it's ok and didn't mean mommy and daddy would ever fall out of love. It was hard, and the infidelity didn't even have to be talked about really because of her age- though I'm sure when my goddaughter is old enough to do the math, she'll figure out that her Aunt was still married when she got pregnant.

in the 90's, we've been through this before.  During that time, I talked a lot to my kids about not making heroes out of politicians and others in prominent positions.  We can admire them, but we need to always remember that they are also human, just like the rest of us, and therefore experience many of the same problems that we see all around every day.  I think when these cases explode in the media, its a good time to remind children of the role of compassion, forgiveness and understanding.  We don't want our children to grow up to become gleeful accusers.  This attitude also helps, I think, reassure our children.  Its lets them understand that we offer this same compassion and understanding to our friends and family....we aren't going to disown a friend or family member because there might be a fall from grace.

I used to listen to "Lovelines" on the radio when I had a late-night job, and it always struck me that these girls would call in with problems and Dr. Drew would always ask over & over: "Where's your father?"  The girls would brush off the question, saying it didn't matter, that isn't what they were talking about, but he'd keep asking.  Inevitably it would turn out the girls had some problems with their relationships with their fathers.

I thought about women I knew who had low self-esteem, were always attracted to the wrong man, always had some horrible drama in their romantic lives, and it seems even when their father was present and attentive, you could trace some of the situation back to some sort of father/daughter conflict.  So when I think of men like Clinton and Spitzer, the fathers of daughters, I wonder how on earth they explain their behavior to their girls.  How do they convince them that they deserve better and they shouldn't let a man treat them that way.  And for Spitzer, I just want to say, even if that woman was a prostitute, she's someones daughter.  With daughters of your own, how could you?

You always hear you shouldn't talk bad about the other parent, but explaining infidelity it's hard to find something good to say.  I think my daughter still has problems with me staying.

but it really, really bugs me that the woman Spitzer was with is only a few years older than his daughters.    I mean, it's bad enough to find out your dad is cheating on your mom, but then to see this 20something all over the papers...someone who you could have gone to HS with....that's seems extra creepy.