What if your co-parent is intentionally being difficult?

Co-parenting can sometimes be challenging. In most cases, co-parents eventually reach a workable way of raising their children together. Yet sometimes, one parent has no intention of ever letting the relationship become easier. They aim to continue making their co-parent’s life as difficult as possible.

What can you do if your co-parent is like this? Here are some ideas:

Restrict contact

One thing you can do is to restrict contact with them. Obviously, some contact will be needed because you still have to raise your child together, but don’t give your co-parent more access to you than is necessary. The idea is to reduce their opportunities to cause you harm.

You can say no to face-to-face meetings or phone calls and tell them to contact you by email only. Parenting apps are another option, as they allow you each to input many of the things you both need to know on the shared calendar. They also allow you to send messages, which will be stored, giving you a record of any inappropriate ones.

Set rules for handovers

Handovers can be a great opportunity for a difficult co-parent to cause disruption. There are all sorts of things they can do, from turning up late to make the other parent late for work, to picking an argument in front of the kids.

Think about how you can reduce their chances of affecting you. For example, scheduling them to drop off while you are happily drinking coffee with a friend and a delay is not a problem. Or scheduling them in a public place to reduce the chance that they try to pick a fight. You could even have someone else do the handover for you.

If you suspect your co-parent is going to be purposefully difficult, you can get some solid rules in your parenting plan. Then, if they keep trying to break them, you may want to approach the court to intervene.