Principaux points à retenir
Figuring out how to parent your children together in a way that minimizes conflict while maintaining as much consistency as possible will help your children adjust. It’s not easy!
Your relationship with the other parent hasn’t ended, it’s only changed. There are different parenting after separation styles. Some might work better for you than others. We are going to talk about co-parenting and parallel parenting.
Co-Parenting
- You and you ex work together to raise your kids
- Best for when you are able to set personal issues aside when making decisions about the kids
- Kids have consistent rules and low conflict
- Parents model problem solving and respectful disagreement
- Requires compromise, coordination, and communication, creative problem solving and mutual respect
Parallel Parenting
- Each parent does their own thing for most day to day parenting issues when the kids are in their care
- Often used when tensions are high and trying to coordinate leads to more conflict
- Little communication or consistency between households
- Protects kids from damaging impacts of their parent’s conflict
- Requires agreement and communication on major parenting issues and in cases of emergency
Perhaps you start off parallel parenting while the separation is fresh and conflict is high, but eventually you are able to shift into co-parenting. Or perhaps there are some issues that you can work on together, and others you feel are just better if each handled things in their own way. This is okay! Do what you need to do to look after the physical, emotional and mental health of your kids.