Millions of children around the world grow up every day without one or both parents because they are serving prison sentence. According to the estimates of the Children of Prisoners Europe organization, 800 000 children are separated from their parents every day in Europe. The departure of a parent from the family due to serving a prison sentence leaves numerous short-term and long-term consequences for the child's life. Their needs and rights were neglected and unrecognized for years, which is why they were called "orphans of justice" and "collateral victims" in the literature. Only in the last fifteen years has been noticed a greater interest of the public and experts in this group of children. Despite this, the few existing studies have not been able to fully explain the impact and consequences of parental imprisonment on the child and family. There is a lack of scientific research in the literature that focuses on the child's perspective. In Croatia, there are no studies on this topic in which children participated. The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of the lifestyle of children of ex-prisoners. The paper is based on an overview of existing theoretical knowledge and conducted qualitative research through a semi-structured interview. The research participants are adults who have had the experience that their parent was serving a prison sentence during their childhood. An appropriate sample was formed using the snowball method. The goal of the research was to gain insight into the growing up experiences of children whose parents were serving a prison sentence during their childhood. The effects of a parent's stay in prison on family life and the life of the child, the child's relationship with the imprisoned parent and available sources of support were examined. The results of the research showed that the participants evaluated the experience of their parents' stay in prison as negative. The negative impact of the experience on everyday family life and health was determined. Numerous social, economic and emotional deprivations caused by the parent's stay in prison have been identified. The fact that this is the first research in the Republic of Croatia that deals with this issue from a child's perspective speaks of the social and scientific significance of this work, but also the need to protect children's rights and pay much more attention to this problem in the future. Based on the literature review and the conducted research, at the end of the paper, recommendations for improving the social response to the needs of children of prisoners from a sociopedagogical point of view were formulated.