Two years ago, when Kyra learnt that her parents were getting divorced, her world came shattering down. She was confused, scared, lost and even angry. She loved both her parents, and the thought of not being a family any more was too difficult to digest. She withdrew into a shell, started clinging to both her parents, and would burst into tears at the drop of a hat.

Luckily, both Neil and Kruti, Kyra’s parents, were able to see what was happening to her. They made an attempt to put their differences aside for the sake of their daughter and, while reconciliation was out of question, they worked together to create a cohesive parenting structure for Kyra. It was difficult for sure, with emotional, financial, and logistical hurdles to overcome. But despite their differences, they were unified in their desire to do their best for their child, and their efforts at harmonious co-parenting soon started paying rich dividends. Kyra relaxed, slowly became herself again, and over a period of time, came to terms with the fact that her parents were not together. Because she had access to both of them and because she did not have to navigate emotional minefields between her parents, she settled down into her new routine and arrangement.

What is co-parenting

Separation and divorce have become a glaring reality in the fabric of human relationships, and more often than not, children become a scapegoat. As the marriage breakdowns, partners spew venom at each other, with little vulnerable eyes watching and absorbing, and getting scorched in the process. The realisation that their conflict and separation could impact their children negatively has led many couples to cast aside their differences and think how best they can work together to raise their children. This is what co-parenting is all about.

Conventionally, the word parenting implies both mother and father playing a role in child-rearing. The very word conjures up images of a happy child, along with two happy, smiling faces, creating a glow of warmth and love. However, as human relationships tear down the curtains of convention and explore new bastions of connecting and bonding, parenting could imply: single parenting, same sex parenting, long distance parenting, foster parenting, and so on. Hence, the need for the term “co-parenting”.

When should a couple consider co-parenting

When a marital relationship breaks down to the point of no return, when partners decide to go their separate ways, decisions around child rearing become crucial. Gone are the days when couples believed in burying their differences for the sake of the children. Individual happiness is an important goal for every person, as indeed it should be! Further, now research has established that living in a conflicted home environment is far more traumatic for children than the divorce of their parents. What is important is for parents to consistently offer security, stability, love and reassurance to their children—whether they are living together or apart.

So, if as a couple you have decided to part ways, yet be connected as parents for the sake of your children, co-parenting could be the best option for you and your children. Co-parenting means continuing to play your role as a parent even though the marriage has fallen apart, and taking joint decisions on all important matters.

Guide to help you make a win-win co-parenting plan

Here are a few things both parents need to consider when deciding to co-parent their child.

1. Keep the child’s well-being as the goal

Of course, there are differences between the two of you, many of them intense and irrevocable—which is why you have decided to end the marriage. Yet, when you sit down to make arrangements regarding parenting your child, you will need to work through your own differences. This is not about one-upmanship, or about proving who is the better parent. It is about providing the best possible arrangement for your child. As a parent, it can, at times, be hard to take yourself out of the equation, but it is worth the effort to do so. Every time you get stuck on a point, ask yourself, what would be best for the child in these circumstances, and the answer would readily come to you.

2. Rebuild communication

Usually, by the time a couple heads toward divorce, there is a complete communication breakdown between the partners. For the sake of the child, you will have to cross over barriers. Get talking about what is important for the child. Share your views clearly and logically, without hurling accusations at each other. It will be easier if you keep your discussions focussed on matters related to the child only.

3. Respect each other’s views

You may no longer get along with each other, but you share a history, and most importantly, you have created a child or children between the two of you. As such, respect the other’s feelings and opinions regarding the child and child rearing. Navigate differences respectfully.

4. Focus on the key issues

Splitting hair over trivial matters will get you nowhere. Decide on what are the main issues for you. You have a choice to climb this mountain together, or keep haggling over every little speed breaker; make the right choice!

Common mistakes while co-parenting

It is also important to make sure you don’t engage in any actions, words or behaviours that could hijack your co-parenting plan. Mentioned below are a few definite things that you would do well to restrain from:

1. Using the child to get back at your spouse

This little human being is not a device to be used to take revenge, insult, or humiliate your spouse. If your anger and resentment is so huge, find other ways to work through these feelings; but leave the child out of it. This not only further erodes your relationship with your partner as a co-parent, it also causes lasting damage to the child’s sense of self.

2. Burdening the child with your issues

While it is advisable to be transparent with the child about the divorce and maybe even reasons for the divorce, do not make the child your emotional crutch. Remember, s/he is still a child and you are the adult. Don’t keep plying your emotions on the child, and especially don’t bad-mouth the spouse in front of the child.

3. Give up on creating guilt

The child has a right to love both parents, despite what is happening between the two of you. Never make the child take sides, or make the child feel guilty about loving, missing or wanting the other parent. Making your child feel guilty about caring for the other parent will leave a deep and lasting impact on the child, so do your best to avoid it.

At times, the relationship between the partners can be so bitter, that it may require a mediator to create a co-parenting plan. A mediator could be a lawyer, a couple’s counsellor, a respected adult in the family, a common friend whom both parents trust or a senior community member.

Decide on these crucial issues of co-parenting

With or without a mediator, make sure you and your spouse come to an agreement regarding the following key matters:

1. Living arrangements

This is usually the first and the biggest hurdle, and a big bone of contention between parents. This is more than simply a matter of custody. Keep the child’s age, gender, his or her comfort level with each parent, schedules of each parent, childcare options and other details in mind before you arrive at living arrangements that are best suited for the child’s well-being.

Of course, you both want the child with you, but your child is a living and breathing person; keep his or her needs in mind and arrive at these decisions. Many parents of late agree to very flexible living arrangements, where the child has free access to both homes and can stay wherever they want, whenever they want. This is possible if both parents continue to live in the same vicinity and with easy access to the child’s school. If not, usually one parent takes responsibility for the week, and weekends are split between the parents. Go by what would work best for your family without creating resentment for either of you or for the child.

2. Education

Major educational decisions need to be taken jointly, and it is easier if you have kept communication channels open. Keep each other updated about picnics, exams, half days and holidays, daily school schedule, and pickup-and-drop arrangements. It’s important to inform the school about the change in status too.

3. Health

This not only involves major health issues, but also everyday matters, such as nutrition, food habits, eating schedules, sleep schedules, health check-ups, vaccines and so forth.

4. Finances

As part of your divorce settlement, you would undoubtedly discuss the finances. Take the child’s long-term financial requirements also into account.

5. Involvement of extended family

If grandparents, uncles and aunts have been closely involved in child-rearing, you will also need to discuss about their continued role in the child’s life. Ideally, it is best to allow all people who are close to the child to continue to remain in the child’s life; it goes a long way in creating a sense of stability for the child at a time when his or her very foundation is being shaken by the divorce. However, it is important to have these significant others on the same page with respect to maintaining mutual respect and not taking sides in front of the child. If a family member is unable or unwilling to remain neutral or supportive about the situation, the child may require some time off from such a family member.

4 key advantages of successful co-parenting

When you co-parent successfully, your child will benefit in many ways. Here are a few significant ways:

1. Healthy self-esteem

You preserve the child’s self-esteem, which can get seriously challenged during parental conflict, separation or divorce.

2. Modeling relationships

Seeing parents being a parenting unit despite their differences goes a long way in giving children insights into how adult relationships work and how, despite differences, couples can work toward mutual goals. You also become examples of good communication and mutual respect.

3. Sense of security

Children grow up feeling secure and stable because they know both parents are available to them at any point in time, and they don’t have to feel guilty about accessing either parent.

4. Emotional wellbeing

Children who are co-parented positively show fewer psychological or emotional problems.

A Word of Caution

For all your planning, scheduling and negotiating, remember that parenting is dynamic and unpredictable at the best of times, and a roller-coaster ride at the worst of times. Hence, being flexible is key.

You may decide on things which you realise don’t work for the child down the line, and being able to course correct is important. How you navigate the twists and turns on this adventurous joy-ride called parenting will decide how successfully you are able to co-parent your children.

Your efforts at co-parenting will go a long way in helping your child grow up into a well-adjusted adult.

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It’s a myth that everything should stay blissful in a relationship, and it’s normal to go through ups and downs. Nevertheless, sometimes we regain happiness by working on our relationship, and sometimes we need to leave it in order to be happy again. There are relationships where the partners are not compatible, one person’s needs are not being met or one person has to compromise much more to meet the other person’s needs. Although I have seen many couples work out their problems in couple’s therapy, some relationships are just not a good fit, and some are too toxic due to addictions, verbal or physical abuse, an unhealthy lifestyle, a lack of understanding and blaming. Relationship issues can be solved as long as the partner recognises and admits to having a problem, is willing to work on it, and takes actions toward positive change. Otherwise, it will stay the same or possibly even get worse.

Why do we stay?

Although, looking at a relationship from the outside, we might think it would be easy to leave if we were in a bad relationship, unfortunately this is not so. Some people are afraid to be alone, others worry about what society might think if they are single or divorced, and some are financially dependent on their partners. Another reason why it a breakup might be hard is the fear that everyone will think there must be something wrong with you because your partner behaves normally in public and only acts out privately.

We also tend to see our partner’s potential and yearn to help the other person become who he or she could be. Or we still have hopes of returning to happier times in the relationship. We have heard that even healthy relationships can be hard, so we don’t want to give up if the relationship can still be saved; on the other hand, we don’t know when to stop.

Angela [name changed] was in a verbally abusive relationship in which she was constantly yelled at. Her husband persistently belittled her and didn’t listen to her. When I asked her why she didn’t leave, she explained, “I’m like a frog in warm water. A frog jumps out as soon as it learns it has jumped into hot water, but if the water gets gradually hotter, it gets used to it and won’t jump out—and it dies.”

Sometimes we don’t realise how bad our relationship is until we read about a similar relationship, or we are already out of the situation, or someone tells us from an outsider’s perspective what’s really going on. That was the case for Angela. Once she read Patricia Evans’s book titled The Verbally Abusive Relationship and talked to her on the phone, she understood the dynamic of her marriage and came to therapy to find the strength and self-esteem to leave. Usually, as a bad relationship goes on, our self-esteem declines to the point where we might need to seek some help to rebuild it.

Why breakup becomes necessary

An environment that is too stressful and not nurturing or loving enough can cause depression and anxiety, as well as illness and chronic pain. In his book The Honeymoon Effect: The Science of Creating Heaven on Earth, Bruce Lipton mentions that cells are shaped by their environment. He points out scientific experiments have shown that cells grow when love hormones such as oxytocin and dopamine enter the bloodstream. But when we produce stress hormones, the cells stop growing. Therefore, we need to make sure that we create the best environment possible for our self-care.

How to regain happiness

Happiness is about choosing to take a different direction when you find that you are on the wrong path. After Angela left her husband, she expressed, “Eventually I broke out of it, because it wasn’t a place where I could spend my life and I couldn’t fix it. Nor could I get him to fix it.” She continued, “I’m happier right now than I ever was.” Seeking out the right support system from friends, family, or a therapist helps you with your journey.

Our subconscious beliefs create a large part of how we live our lives, so when you change your subconscious beliefs, you change your life too. Many methods are available to help you to change your subconscious beliefs, including Emotional Freedom Technique [EFT], PSYCH-K [Psychological Kinesiology] and Instant Emotional Healing. You have the power to be happy again, even if you can’t see that right now. When you shift your thinking and believe that you can be happy, when you focus on loving relationships and what you want, you’ll begin to attract what you want.

This was first published in the January 2015 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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“Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” goes a popular saying, though I think it’s applies equally to men as well. Few things get to a person’s soul more than the hurt, betrayal or ending of an intimate relationship. And few things are more damaging than the subsequent spin out and fury done in front of, or to, the children of the men and women scorned.

How bad-mouthing your spouse affects your kids

• Karen is 43 years old and still talks about the pain she went through when her parents divorced. Her father left her mother for another woman. For decades afterwards, Karen’s mother repeatedly told Karen what a cheater her father was. She made visitations a constant fight and she spent many years trying to turn Karen against her father. To say that Karen was put into a loyalty bind would be a gross understatement. She was not allowed to have any positive feelings for her father without her mother taking it as a personal affront to her. The divorce altered Karen’s life; the constant fighting between her parents damaged Karen’s wellbeing.
• Sally and Ken are divorced. During the marriage, Ken was emotionally abusive to Sally and their two children. After the divorce, Ken continues to be emotionally abusive. He tells the children how incompetent their mother is, he makes fun of her, he bullies his way into her home and dismisses Sally’s attempts to set limits. Sally’s children are growing to hate their father and learning to dismiss their mother.
• Mary struggled for years to save her marriage. When she was finally done and filed for divorce, Frank was shocked. He alternated between crying, saying he couldn’t live without her, and getting angry, making threats about how hard he would make this divorce. The entire divorce was rife with conflict. Frank would cry to the kids then angrily tell them that their mother “did this”. “She’s the one responsible for breaking up our family!” Their two kids wanted to love their mom and dad, but found it more and more difficult to be around dad. They cried when they had to see him. They begged to not go to his house, and over time, they just refused to go.

The consequences of trash-talking

Disrespecting your ex-partner hurts not only your children and your family, but also yourself. Listed below are just a few of the many repercussions of bad-mouthing your spouse—regardless of how bad a person you think s/he is.

• Carbon copies: Your children are made up of 50 per cent of your genes and 50 per cent of your ex’s genes. When you tell your children what a loser or cheat their mother/father is, they take that in. If you tell them that their parent is that terrible, then they think they must be too. Don’t put that on them.
• Loyalty bind: When you constantly bad-mouth the other parent, you put your children into a loyalty bind. They will feel as though they can’t love both of you without one of you being hurt. Not being able to love one parent because the other parent would be upset is a huge stressor for them.
• Boomerang effect: It is not your job to ‘show’ your children how awful their mother or father is—that’s unhealthy thinking. And it often has an uncanny way of backfiring. Children can get tired of constantly hearing how terrible their father or mother is and begin to hate the parent who’s doing the bad-mouthing—even if the other parent caused the original hurt to the family. Children are keenly insightful; they will see the true colours of both of you. Be sure you’re showing them the colours you want to be known for.
• Creating a template: Children live what they know, they know what they live. When they see two parents attacking one another verbally, emotionally and physically, they take that in as a template of the way to fight. They will internalise the idea that if they’re hurt, upset or mad at someone, they have the right to annihilate that person just as they see you doing to your ex-spouse. This behaviour will wreak havoc in their lives and relationships for years to come. Don’t set them up to internalise this dysfunctional template.
• From difficult to damaging: Divorce is difficult for children under the best of circumstances. However, when done with integrity they will be okay. When you go through divorce in a toxic and bitter way, you make a difficult situation a damaging one. Your children deserve much more from both parents.

The heartbreak and sadness of losing someone you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with can be intense, to say the least. Many, if not most, people who experience divorce go through moments of feeling these intense emotions and, of course, no one goes through the process of divorce perfectly. However, one of the roles of being a parent is to always keep the best interest of your children at the forefront of your mind and at the heart of your choices. As a parent, you don’t have the luxury of letting your anger get the best of you—even in the most difficult of times—and certainly not over and over again for years.

Rise to the occasion. If your ex will not allow that to happen, then have your home be a safe haven from the strife of a bitter, vengeful parent. It will be the greatest gift you could give yourself and your child. Take the high road. Be the parent you would like to have if you were a child in this situation. The biggest gift you can give your children is the gift of an amicable divorce.

This was first published in the January 2015 issue of Complete Wellbeing.

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4 Big Myths About Divorce That Will Surprise You

Myth #1 Once you are divorced, you will get along with your partner

Many people expect that their ex will suddenly understand them or respond to them the way they always wanted them to. That is far from true. The fact is that you got divorced because you couldn’t get along and make it work in the first place. Ending your marriage or your relationship won’t change that. The reality is that the anger that led to your divorce can get more intense during the process, making your interactions even more heated. In fact, taking the steps towards ending your union can turn into a continuation of sharing exactly the same feelings you did in your marriage, but you are now attached to different and often more difficult issues. Try to keep in mind that your relationship status has changed but the person you were with in that relationship hasn’t. They will continue to act in the way they always did.

Now that you are out of the relationship, try to do the opposite of what I would tell you if you were still in one: move from the ‘we’ to the ‘me.’ Of course, your goal is not to become your ex’s enemy, but now that you have pulled away from each other, you have to begin to accept that and stop wishing you can change the relationship for the better. Remember that it is no longer necessary for your ex to understand or agree with your needs or your way of thinking. And it is no longer reasonable that you want your ex to give you the emotional support he or she once did.

To get through your divorce and move to higher ground really means letting go of the hope that you and your partner will finally be able to relate to each other in a positive and thoughtful way. If you couldn’t do that when you were married, there is no reason to think you will be able to do that now.

Myth #2 Once you’ve made the decision to end things it will truly be over

Breaking up is a long road full of ups and downs and second guesses. Oftentimes, it means letting go of the vision of your life that you once had with your spouse and, if you have children, as a family unit. That is very hard to do; so people often remain in contact, even keeping up some of the old habits like turning to an ex for support when they have a leaky roof or need help with a sick kid. Try to fight against that urge and instead put new support systems in place separate from your ex so you have someone else to go to right away if you need help.

What I always say is that divorce often ends legally well before it ends emotionally. So when we start a life together, and believe that the connection will last forever, sometimes we aren’t that far off. Unfortunately, in this case, it can end up holding you back from moving forward. In order to stop that from happening, try to define your world the way it is now, single and separate. That takes time, work and effort. To really be able to do that you have to work to tie up loose ends and eventually let go. Divorce is all about giving up your past as you have known it in order to create a new future. Adding to how daunting that can be is the fact that you are now doing it alone.

Myth #3 Now that you are divorced you will no longer be sexually attracted to each other

In fact, sometimes people are quite surprised that right after a break-up becomes official, the sexual attraction they used to have not only does not go away but becomes rekindled. They might even find themselves being sexually intimate with each other. The likelihood of this is greater if the separation happened suddenly—either through a discovered infidelity or betrayal. In that case the sexual energy can become dormant because of the anger between you. Once things are clearly over and settled, that sexual energy, which was never extinguished but had just been buried, can come to the surface and reignite.

Myth #4 That your ex’s new partner is getting the better deal, walking away with your ex after you’ve done all the hard work to make him or her a better person

This is a common fallacy—the idea that your former partner is now thriving and doing well in the new union. While that might be how it looks, the truth is you ended your relationship with that person for a reason. You had irreconcilable differences and had to deal with behavior that made it impossible for you to stay together. Just because you are no longer with that person does not mean he or she doesn’t still have that problematic behavior. The only difference most of the time is that someone else is dealing with it. It is likely that those issues that came up when you were together still rise to the surface and continue to cause conflict in the next relationship. Unless your ex has done some real soul searching and changed his or her ways, those things don’t easily go away. Their new connection might look perfect, but if you had a chance to really see inside you would discover that it is not any better than what you shared together. Knowing this can help you feel relief and be glad that you are no longer dealing with it all.

Summing Up

There are no hard and fast rules about ending a relationship, each one is different. No wonder there are so many myths intertwined with the process. If you are able to recognize these four expectations around divorce as myths, and know before you are faced with them that the process of breaking up will most likely not be smooth sailing, your journey just might be easier.

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