When Co Parenting Is Impossible
- Details
- January 2, 2017

Coparenting isn’t always the best choice for raising happy, healthy kids after divorce.
As idyllic as many divorce professionals make coparenting sound for parents who don’t live together, sometimes it’s just impossible to do.
Some reasons co parenting is impossible include:
- A parent is actively abusing alcohol, drugs or another substance
- A parent is incarcerated
- A parent is violent or has threatened violence against an adult, child, pet or property
- One parent has active restraining orders against the other parent
- A parent has an inappropriate sexual behavior or other acting out behavior
- A parent neglects or has abandoned their child (children)
- A parent has a history of frequent, unexpected moves or plans to move out of the area
- A parent is actively alienating their child/children from the other parent
- There’s simply too much friction between the parents to communicate at the level necessary for coparenting.
But just because you can’t enter into a coparenting relationship with your child or children’s other parent, that doesn’t mean that your divorce will destroy your children. What’s most important for your children to adjust well to your divorce is that you adjust well to it because your emotions are contagious.
When coparenting is impossible, you do have other options. You…