23. Let's talk about parallel parenting

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hi everyone, thanks for joining me on another episode of the post-separation abuse podcast. My name is Danielle Black and I'm your host. I'm a strategic separation and divorce specialist coach. I'm the coach that Aussie women turn to when they are navigating separation, divorce and co-parenting from a controlling partner, from a partner who has been abusive in other ways in addition to being controlling, and this might include separation, divorce and co-parenting with an ex-partner who has personality traits consistent with one or more personality disorders, and this might include narcissistic personality disorder. In today's episode, we're going to chat about parallel parenting. Parallel parenting is a style of parenting that all of my clients are needing to employ in some way, shape or form, because of the controlling nature of their ex-partner, because of the conflictual personality traits of their ex partner. Before I expand on what parallel parenting is, I'll touch briefly on what the opposite of parallel parenting is, and that is collaborative and cooperative co-parenting.

Speaker 1: 1:17

I know there are people who don't like using the term co-parenting, even when they're referring to things like parallel parenting. The prefix co-co means with together, joint or jointly, and I think this is why people who are in a parallel parenting situation will sometimes say that I will wear parallel parenting. We're not co-parenting because they're not doing it jointly or together. I have a slightly different viewpoint. When you're separated and the other parent is spending any time with the kids and your children are spending time with the other parent and the other parent is engaging in some form of parenting, I view that to be a co-parenting situation, simply because you are not the only parent that is parenting your children. There are two parents and you are each performing parenting duties of various types, so there is some kind of joint parenting going on, albeit from a distance. We can have a situation where both people are parenting, co-parenting, and for that co-parenting to be parallel, so there can be both of you parenting, but you're not doing so in a way that's collaborative or cooperative. Understandably. Collaborative co-parenting is the ideal for separated parents and their children. However, collaborative and co-parenting is just simply not possible when the other parent has high conflict personality traits, when they may have a personality disorder, when they have a desire to maintain the balance of power and control.

Speaker 1: 3:06

You may have already listened to episode number 11 of this podcast, dispelling the myth of shared blame in high conflict separation and divorce. If you haven't, you might like to give that episode a listen, because some of the themes are similar to what I'm about to talk about now, and that is that you can want a collaborative and cooperative co-parenting relationship, a relationship that's amicable, a relationship in which your children's best interests are kept firmly the focus of decision making, and that your children are at the centre of the decision making rather than being stuck in the middle of the conflict. But unfortunately, establishing a cooperative and collaborative co-parenting relationship is something that both parents need to have as a goal. It's something that both you and your ex-partner need to be committed to, not just with fancy words, but also following up with the behaviours. So your ex-partner might say on a surface level that they want to have a collaborative or cooperative co-parenting relationship with you.

Speaker 1: 4:18

However, if they're a controlling person and if they don't acknowledge that about themselves, if they've been abusive in other ways in addition to coercive control, and if they have a number of traits consistent with one or more personality disorders, the likelihood is that their words and their actions are not going to match. They might say that they want to have an amicable relationship with you. They might say that they want a collaborative or cooperative co-parenting relationship with you, but their behaviour is likely to be very different. They are likely to make demands of you and expect you to give in. They likely have particular rules around what a collaborative co-parenting relationship looks like. Yet you will be the only one expected to follow those rules. You will be the one expected to be flexible. You will be the one who is expected to acquiesce to all of the demands.

Speaker 1: 5:16

So it's important that you look past the words of your former partner and actually look to their actions and their behaviour, and if they're not someone who has any insight into how controlling they are, into how harmful, demanding and destructive their behaviour is, then I'm sorry to say, but a collaborative and cooperative co-parenting relationship is just simply not going to be possible. For you To establish a collaborative and cooperative co-parenting relationship, both parents need to be genuinely committed to that, and that means being able to put adult needs to one side, and unfortunately, that's something that controlling people are not good at. That's something that emotionally immature people are not good at, and it's absolutely something that personality disordered people are not good at. I know it's really hard when you first realise that amicable separation and co-parenting, collaborative co-parenting, cooperative co-parenting is not going to be possible for you. I remember that all too well.

Speaker 1: 6:25

In my own situation, I remember how much I really pushed against that reality. To be honest, I really felt that if I just did the right thing, said the right thing, just found the right magic combination of words or the right way to manage my ex, that I could somehow magically smooth everything over and that things would be okay and it's all a fantasy. It's all a fantasy. You have no control over the thoughts, emotions and behaviours of your ex-partner. If anyone tries to sell you that, please run a mile. There are things that you can do on this journey strategically, but as for actually being able to significantly influence, control, manipulate the behaviour of another person, absolutely not.

Speaker 1: 7:17

Unfortunately, when we've been in a relationship with a controlling person, we are encouraged to believe that the situation that we're in is somehow our fault. There's often a lot of gaslighting, and when we behave in a way that the controlling person finds acceptable, they can be nice. This reinforces this idea that we somehow have control of the outcome, but ultimately, what it really means is that the way to ensure we have peace for ourselves and our kids is just to repeatedly give in to the demands of the other parents. That's the only thing that you really have up your sleeve in terms of your own behavior significantly impacting the behavior of the other parent, and I'm here to tell you now that, if that's been your strategy, it's not a good one. Giving in to the demands of your ex just to buy yourself a short amount of peace for however long that lasts. It is not going to secure a long term peace and happiness for you or for your kids and, unfortunately, it can actually ultimately lead to you compromising the outcome for you and for your kids. It can really often result in our kids being put in pretty intolerable situations and circumstances.

Speaker 1: 8:37

A few episodes ago, the topic that I covered was radical acceptance and how important that is on this journey. If you haven't already listened to that episode, I highly recommend it, because accepting that you are not likely to ever have a cooperative or a collaborative co-parenting relationship with your ex-partner is something that you will need to radically accept if they are a controlling person, if they have other personality traits that are conflictual and if you suspect that they have traits consistent with one or more personality disorders. And radical acceptance is not about liking the situation or being okay with it. It's simply about acknowledging reality, acknowledging what is If your ex-partner is really talking themselves up as a co-parent and maybe says all the right things but really behaves in a very opposite way. This is something for you to radically accept as hard as what it is. So if your co-parenting situation is not cooperative or collaborative, what is it?

Speaker 1: 9:44

For most of my clients, the situation that they have in terms of co-parenting is what we would call a parallel approach. Now, this means that the communication is kept to a minimum. Now, this can be challenging and upsetting to wrap your head around when you are a normal, reasonable human being. If you're listening to this, I'm sure that you are someone who wants to be able to maintain an amicable relationship with your former partner. You want to be able to discuss your children with them in a calm manner, to be able to share information about your kids, for example, things like routines for each home, having conversations to ensure that those routines are similar, to ensure stability and predictability all of those things. Unfortunately, none of this is possible with a controlling or high conflict ex-partner. In fact, attempting to communicate collaboratively with someone who is controlling or high conflict is really only likely to increase the conflict.

Speaker 1: 10:51

Adopting a parallel approach is actually in the best interests of your kids when your ex is controlling or high conflict, because it will ultimately serve to reduce the conflict over time. It's going to minimise the conflict and the main reason for that is because the communication between you and your ex will be reduced and minimised. Now again, this is hard. It means that you are not going to be sharing routines that happen in your home and expecting that they will be welcome by the other parent. That's not going to happen. Your ex is not going to receive that well. Your ex is not going to put those things in place in their own home.

Speaker 1: 11:36

Similarly, if we're talking about the amount of time that's on technology, bedtimes, all of those sorts of things controlling people, high conflict people can see any sharing of information like that. They can actually take that as being critical of their own parenting. These people can be so hypersensitive to criticism. Mind you, they will happily criticise you and this is a really frustrating part of dealing with these people. They will happily criticise and undermine you, make snide comments about you and about your parenting, but will maintain a lot of the time that they are a perfect parent, that their way is the right way.

Speaker 1: 12:20

They can be very difficult to deal with and this is where, again, radical acceptance comes into play that the best thing for you and for your children in this situation is to not be sharing a whole lot of information with your ex-partner. I guarantee that it is only going to increase the conflict. Your ex-partner is likely going to be maintaining that they are the perfect parent. They will likely criticise you and they will also potentially use information that you give them against you. I know that all of this is really difficult to make space for. I also struggled to radically accept the reality of this situation when I was navigating something similar.

Speaker 1: 13:01

As hard as it is to accept, as challenging as what it is to accept, the reality is that a controlling ex-partner does not care about your thoughts on parenting, on what's best for the kids, on what sorts of foods that they should be eating or not eating, even if there are diagnosed allergies, even if you've got other health concerns for your kids. Controlling ex-partners will often take kids to completely different care providers, to their own doctor, for example. They'll do that to get second opinions. They'll do that to undermine your parenting, to undermine the relationship that the kids have with other care providers. They just simply do not care about the best interests of the children, they are solely focused on maintaining power and control. They are focused on thwarting you at every turn and they often don't have any insight into how this is negatively impacting the children or the potential for this to negatively impact the children.

Speaker 1: 14:06

And this is the really frustrating thing to try and accept, because, on one hand, these can often be people who will position themselves as being the superior parent in many ways and will criticise you, and yet they can be behaving in ways, parenting in ways that are not in the best interests of the children, to the point that you could refer to their parenting not just as parallel parenting, so just completely separate to you, but it could also be referred to as counter parenting, and I know this is a term that Tina Swithin uses a lot, and I've worked with Tina in the past. You may or may not have heard of Tina. She's known most commonly for her one-moms battle website and the work that she does in supporting women who are navigating narcissistic abuse, but the term counter parenting is something that Tina has often spoken about in her work, and it refers not just to a parent who is sort of marching to the bed of their own drum, but a parent who actively undermines the parenting of the healthy, protective parent. Counter parenting is when your ex-partner is deliberately trying to undermine and thwart you and really the kids are weaponised. In that situation the kids are just pawns to the other parent. In this situation and unfortunately I've got a number of clients who are dealing with that very situation and it can be very covert and it can be difficult to prove if you're not working with someone who is able to support you strategically. It's important to note that when you are not accepting the reality of the situation and when you're persisting with what you might consider cooperative or collaborative co-parenting, sharing information about the children, sharing information about bedtime routines, the concern is that you will inadvertently play right into the narrative that your ex-partner likely has about you, and by that what I mean is that Controlling and abusive ex partners often have a narrative about you that says that you are controlling, that you are manipulative, and so when you're sending messages, trying to pass them information, you know you're trying to give them Tips and some guidance on. Look, this is what works for the kids, this is. You know, have you considered XYZ from the outside?

Speaker 1: 16:37

Sometimes that can make you appear to be controlling, because you're persistently trying to put your own parenting style, your own views and wishes Onto the other parent, and this is where you need to be very careful. The same can go with communicating with your kids when they're in the care of the other parent. You may really want to still be in touch with your kids when they're spending time with the other parent and they may really want to be in touch with you. The problem is that is going to create a lot of conflict and it's going to keep your kids stuck in the middle of the conflict. If you insist on that communication, insist on face time calls, that can create a lot of stress for your children when they're in the care of the other parent. It's not uncommon for kids to be made to put the phone on speaker while the other parents some, you know, somewhere else in the house, but within earshot, for example, children often feel that they can't say what it is that they may really want to share with you. The whole thing is just very stressful.

Speaker 1: 17:39

This is something else that needs to be a consideration when collaborative and cooperative parenting is not an option. And again, you wanting collaborative and cooperative parenting is not enough. You wanting it and you just continually pushing for it and trying to do what you think is cooperative is never going to create the environment that you want. If you've got a controlling or abusive or high conflict ex partner, collaborative and cooperative co parenting is never going to happen in your situation. That's very sad and it's something that you need to radically accept, because the sooner you accept it, the better you are going to be able to move forward with the reality of your situation and the better you will be able to support your children in what they're dealing with as well.

Speaker 1: 18:27

And to expand on this, it's partly for this reason that equal shared care arrangements so 5050 care are really not in the best interests at all for kids. When one parent is controlling or high conflict, the more time that the kids are in the care of that controlling parent, the more communication that is going to be necessary between parents over time and that's ultimately only going to lead to more conflict and persistent issues Of parent control. Similarly, equal shared parental responsibility. So this is different than care arrangements. Here we're talking about the decision making aspect of parenting. Equal shared parental responsibility is also not in the best interests of children where one parent is highly controlling or has other high conflict personality traits.

Speaker 1: 19:20

For this reason, the vast majority of my clients ultimately seek sole parental responsibility as a means to ensure that they can meet the needs of their children and make appropriate decisions for their children without having to continually engage in conflictual communication with the other parent. If this is something that resonates with you and that you would like some support with, please don't hesitate to reach out. This is the sort of things that I'm helping clients navigate on a daily basis. I'm a specialist coach in this area. I work on situations where one person is controlling and has high conflict personality traits, potentially an undiagnosed personality disorder or other mental health concern that is impacting their behavior and their relationships in a negative way. So if that sounds like your ex partner and you're struggling to navigate co-parenting with them, please do reach out. Thanks so much for your time. See you soon.