Even without a court battle to see your children, how do you foster a relationship with them when you only see them once a week? Psychologist Alan Bradley tells Lindsay Jennings how to help children and adults survive divorce.

IT is a familiar scene in fast food restaurants across the country every week. Thousands of dads are making the most of the precious few hours they have with their children, watching as the kids devour their burgers and suck up their thick milkshakes through bendy straws.

But behind the happy scene may lie a different story.

There are more than four million children in the UK whose parents are either separated or divorced. Whether the split is amicable or acrimonious, usually both parents will have one thing in common - the need to help their children survive the process in as pain free a way as possible.

Alan Bradley, a Stockton-based consultant clinical psychologist who specialises in improving relationships between parents and their children, says: "Every divorce is different and everybody comes out of the divorce with their own set of thoughts about what has gone on. What parents are wanting ultimately is for their children to develop as normally as possible."

Dr Bradley, 57, is fully aware of the pain of divorce, having watched his parents break-up during the 1950s and the collapse of his own marriage.

According to Dr Bradley, when a couple split up, the death of the relationship can signal a complex grieving process and, just like a bereavement, there are stages a divorcee will go through. They include accepting the reality of the loss; feeling the pain of the situation; beginning to move on and reinvesting in new relationships.

"The child, however, is going through a very different process because, in effect, they haven't lost the other parent," says Dr Bradley. "While the mums and dads are going through a process of disengaging from one another, the child isn't, instead they're recreating an alternative relationship."

But when severe acrimony and lengthy court battles are added to the equation, it is no surprise that any contact time with children can become a tense affair. The kids may well be demolishing their chicken nuggets and chips, but underneath they may be agonising over split loyalties and feeling guilty about enjoying themselves with one parent over the other. There could also be guilt over the separation itself, says Dr Bradley. Children may feel, for instance, if they had acted better at school it would have never happened.

"They find themselves in these impossible situations," says Dr Bradley.

"You see dads sitting in McDonalds opposite their children who have been scrubbed for the occasion and it's full of awkwardness because what do you talk about? Do you say, how's your mum? But that can be awkward because the child might feel that dad's prying, but if you never mention the other parent then that can be an odd situation, so getting it right can be a nightmare."

Children will always react to divorce but the question is how strongly and for how long? A child who does not show any reactions may be harbouring feelings of resentment, anger and guilt and may need help to express his emotions. Pre-school children tend to see the world revolving around them and may show signs of regressive behaviour, such as bed-wetting and unwillingness to attend nursery.

Older children aged under 10 are still not mature enough to understand what is happening around them, but they will pick up on unpleasant effects. They can react with outbursts of anger, or by not making progress at school.

Dr Bradley says: "If you don't anticipate their anger then they can start internalising it instead of expressing it or they can have unpredictable outbursts of anger. It's about helping the child verbalise what is happening by talking about their problems and feelings, and it needn't be a parent who does that, it might be a grandparent or an aunt or even a teacher."

Someone outside the family may also make a good sounding board for older children, particularly teenagers who can be highly uncommunicative at the best of times.

But there are steps which can be taken to ease the trauma of divorce, says Dr Bradley. Both parents need to give positive assurance to the youngster that, even though mummy and daddy do not love each other any more, they both still love the child. It is also imperative for the parent to discourage the child from taking sides.

Dr Bradley says: "At times, parents have to put to one side their own, perhaps, very negative feelings towards the other parent and help the children work through their own feelings so that they can maintain as reasonable and as positive a relationship as possible.

"Both parents have a role to play in how contact works. What parents need to do is to give complete permission to the child to enjoy being with the absent parent, in both word and deed, because some parents give mixed messages. Instead of saying, "yes, I'm happy for you to go off' but doing it through gritted teeth, give them proper permission to discuss what's happened and why they've enjoyed being with dad for the day."

Other factors for making contact time run smoothly includes practical advice, such as turning up on time to pick the children up and returning them at the pre-arranged time. Children may also be desperate to see their extended family.

"If contact doesn't happen then the child can suddenly find they've lost half their family," says Dr Bradley. "The grandparents, aunties and uncles are very important and influential people for the children to see."

But for a small number of families, seeking professional help in the form of mediation may be the only way forward. Meeting in private, on neutral territory in front of someone who is outside the relationship, can be a way for all parties to work through their issues.

Dr Bradley, who will be giving advice and support to several families as part of a BBC documentary series, says: "There is no quick fix. It really is about working at a practical level and trying to help people solve complex problems.

"Part of my job is to empower people. It's about them taking control of their own lives again."

* Are you a Weekend Dad? Would you like to improve the time you spend with your children? The BBC is looking for families to take part in a new TV series on parenting. If you would like to benefit from Dr Bradley's services free of charge, contact Fiona on 0870 010 8306 or email the BBC at contact@bbc.co.uk