5 Ways To Co-Parent Successfully With Your Ex

During and after your divorce, put your kids first. Here are 5 ways to co-parent successfully with your ex.

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Once our family had adjusted to the fact that we would be divorcing, my ex-husband and I made a pact that although we would no longer be a couple, we were still going to be a parenting team. This was extremely important to both of us and although we had to navigate the emotionally draining journey of divorce, our motto was “kids first.” This included co-parenting.

The first step in a successful co-parenting journey is committing to your children, assuring you that you will learn how to co-parent, are open to change, be receptive to feedback, and do everything possible to make this work.

Here are five important considerations to keep in mind when you co-parent with your ex:

1. Educate Yourself About Co-Parenting Options
2. Support the Other Parent’s Role and Relationships
3. Ask Your Kids What They Need
4. Try Co-Parenting Apps
5. Respect One Another

Tip 1:  Educate Yourself About Co-Parenting Options

When we divorced ten years ago, there was a wonderful website and organization called co-parenting.org. We found a definition of co-parenting that we both loved: 

“Co-parenting is when parents set their differences aside and work together as a team to raise a child after their divorce or separation. It includes sharing parental responsibilities and making joint decisions that affect the emotional and developmental needs of a child in everyday life.”

Co-parenting.org

This definition became the foundation of our co-parenting partnership.

In addition, we began to look for online articles, books, other resources, podcasts, and community-based educational programs and support networks that we could learn from. 

Just as important was our decision to avoid negative sources and people who were in complete doom and gloom about divorce. Everyone’s divorce is different, and although ours was overall very amicable, we still had our fair share of rough patches to work through.

Some of my favorite co-parenting resources are:

Two Homes by Claire Masurel (Great for younger children)

Co-Parenting Works!: Helping Your Children Thrive after Divorce by Tammy G Daughtry

The Co-Parents’ Handbook: Raising Well-Adjusted, Resilient, and Resourceful Kids in a Two-Home Family from Little Ones to Young Adults by Karen Bonnell 

Tip 2: Support the Other Parent’s Role and Relationships

I think this is one of the most crucial factors in co-parenting—supporting your ex’s role in your kids’ lives. The idea is to create a fair and balanced arrangement to maximize your children’s time with each of you.

Darlene Weyburne, CSW, writes about the importance of supporting your ex’s parenting role on the website Divorcemagazine.com.

“Support your children in loving and building a relationship with the other parent. Never start a sentence with “If your father/mother really loved you…” Don’t allow your feelings of being betrayed to interfere with your support of your children’s need to love and be loved by your former partner.”

Darlene Weyburne, CSW

Because my ex-husband travels quite a bit for work, we agreed not to have a set visitation schedule because he would miss out on too much time with them. Because of this, our situation is a bit more laid back than most divorces. My ex sends me his work/travel schedule every Sunday for the upcoming week to ten days, and we use this to plug in quality time for him and the kids. 

Peaceful co-parenting allows both parents to have quality time with their kids.

This flexibility allows me to plan downtime for myself as well. Make sure you do the same for yourself.

In addition, we still try to have dinner together as a family several times a month. Despite the divorce, this keeps some semblance of tradition alive for all of us. 

Tip 3:  Ask Your Kids What They Need

In one article, the authors recommended that you remember to see the situation from your child’s perspective. Here are the tips they urge you to consider:

• “I need both of you to stay involved in my life. Please write letters, make phone calls, and ask me lots of questions. When you don’t stay involved, I feel like I’m not important and that you don’t really love me.”
• “Please stop fighting and work hard to get along with each other. Try to agree on matters related to me. When you fight about me, I think I did something wrong and feel guilty.”
• “I want to love you both and enjoy the time I spend with each of you. Please support me and the time that I spend with each of you. If you act jealous or upset, I feel like I need to take sides and love one parent more than the other.”
• “Please communicate directly with my other parent so I don’t have to send messages back and forth.”
• “When talking about my other parent, please say only nice things or don’t say anything at all. When you say mean, unkind things about my other parent, I feel like you expect me to take your side.”
• “Please remember that I want both of you to be a part of my life. I count on my mom and dad to raise me, to teach me what is important, and to help me when I have problems.”

We encourage our kids to communicate what they need from both of us, which in turn helps us stay united on the co-parenting front.

Tip 4:  Try Co-Parenting Apps

However, our situation was still raw and new at the beginning of our post-divorce life, so communicating could often be strained. With such a large family, the logistics of co-parenting without any consternation was not easy. 

For couples who struggle with building an amicable relationship, there are some smartphone apps that can ease their burden. Text messages can replace intense phone calls, shared calendars create clarity around schedules, and a series of easy-to-use apps offer useful tools for everything from sharing custody to tracking expenses.

Our Family Wizard provides parents with a new way to manage all the details of shared parenting. It is a unique website designated to facilitate communications between divorced or separated parents.

Split Wise is an extremely helpful app that helps ex-spouses keep track of all the financial ditties that go along with parenting. The first year after my divorce, I was quite hyper about storing all my receipts for everything from their haircuts to their orthodontic appointments. During a good month, I had my bookkeeping in decent order; during a crazy month, I’d be lucky to find many receipts crumpled at the bottom of my pocketbook. This app keeps financial records neatly intact and organized.

Tip 5:  Respect One Another

In an article written on Divorcemag.com, “The Co-Parenting Relationship,” Darlene Weyburne,  CSW, writes, “Developing mutual respect for each other will help make you effective co-parents. Follow the golden rule of co-parenting: treat the other parent like you want to be treated. This can be difficult if he or she doesn’t treat you with respect, but keep in mind that you’re doing this for your children’s survival and happiness—not for the other parent’s benefit.”

My ex and I will not always agree on everything as we continue to work together to raise our eight kids. Through our mutual decision to put “kids first,” we are better able to save our differences to discuss just between the two of us. 

Our children feel secure and happy, and they have no worries that my ex-husband and I will be nasty or disrespectful, which gives us peace of mind.  

If you have any thoughts or comments about the delicate matter of divorce and the successes or challenges you’ve had with co-parenting, please share your thoughts in the comments section below.