To think co-parenting is often just damage control for a bad decision?

[ThisSharpJadeDreamer]

“We’re putting the child first” usually means “we’re trying to minimise the fallout.”

I really don’t get your point OP. Unless it’s that a relationship breakdown is shameful, so therefore people shouldn’t be praised for doing their best and trying to make co-parenting work?

Healthy co parenting is a win though. The alternative is unhealthy (or no) co parenting. The unwanted thing has already happened. Post a break up, co parenting is a win and a good thing. I don’t get what you are trying to say.

I think you have confused "co-parenting" with "co-parenting well".

It’s not code. It’s not Plan A . It’s making the best of a situation that has happened. It is good parenting.
Anyone co parenting well after a break up should be applauded as many fail to co parent well. This is not romanticising.
We are all glad this has occurred to you. Maybe stay out of the sun.

No, I’m not saying people should stay together at all costs or that co-parenting isn’t worth doing. What I am saying is that when we praise ‘great co-parenting’, we often skip over the fact that it’s still damage control after a breakdown. It’s not about blaming people for separating, it’s about being honest that even the healthiest co-parenting setups are responses to something that didn't work out as intended. That context matters, especially when we start idealising it as a gold standard.

It was obvious what you meant. Irritating when people are smartarses.

I think it can work well but not often, honestly.

Sure but we don’t usually romanticise drinking water or present it as a triumph. My point is that some portrayals of co-parenting gloss over the fact that it’s a repair job after something went wrong. Naming that doesn’t diminish the effort- it just keeps it honest.

But co-parenting by definition follows a relationship breakdown. So no one feels the need to precede comments on co-parenting with the caveat that ‘obviously this wasn’t our plan A’.

Having read a lot of posts on here from married mothers, co-parenting is the same regardless of whether you all live in the same house or not.

Negotiation over drop offs, pickups, bathtime, food, access to devices, commitment to education, opinions on holidays......

Being separated or not doesn't come in to it. If anything, being separated is better because at least the child gets to live in a peaceful house, not constantly in a state of war, at least part of the time.

@Acommonreader I’m really not getting what point or question you have?

Is it the label Co-parenting or the act of Co-parenting that you have an issue with? Or is it the fact that co-parenting exists in the first place?

Co-parenting is what is. It’s not a magical brand and nobody, in my experience, thinks it’s anything but a descriptor.

Do you honestly believe people are saying it's the gold standard like it's better than a happy couple staying together?! Cos I promise you they're not!

I object to the poster suggesting I and others are being smart arses. We're not. I am genuinely struggling with what the op is getting at..

People are praised for co parenting well because it's widely acknowledged how fucking hard it is to maintain a healthy relationship with someone post split. That's all.

Exactly. What's the alternative if you've split up? NOT co parenting??

Firstly, divorce isn’t necessarily a ‘bad decision’, @ThisSharpJadeDreamer. If a marriage isn’t working, if there is abuse, infidelity, misery, discord, fighting - then surely leaving the marriage is a good decision?

Secondly, it is the mature, adult, caring thing to do, for the children, to try to co-parent as well as possible. I don’t think this is ‘romanticising’ anything - I think it is how parents who are divorced should act. Sadly too many parents don’t manage to co-parent well (or at all) - I have seen too many stories on here and elsewhere from women whose ex-husbands are being as difficult as possible over parenting, or who are using their kids to try to hurt their ex, with no regard for how this is hurting their children.

Surely ‘putting the child first’ is how things should be done, not something to be criticised?

Exactly! No one asks separated parents- was co parenting after divorce in fact your plan all along or is this all code for a break up? One thing leads to the other. Odd thread.

But no one is idelasing it as the gold standard. The gold standard is a happy, healthy, secure relationship of you've chosen to have children with your partner. No one thinks or pretends the ideal thing is to break up. This is definitely a you thing I think. And it's so obvious that "we co-parent well" means since we split up that it doesn't need stating. Do you think "so we've divorced" should proceed every sentence as a mark of shame?

Not at all - I don’t think breakups are shameful and I genuinely respect people who co-parent well. What I’m questioning is how often co-parenting gets presented as inherently ideal or aspirational rather than what it often is: a thoughtful and necessary response to a painful shift. It’s not about blaming people for trying - it’s about being honest about the context.

Putting aside that I entirely disagree that co-parenting is romanticised at all (everyone knows it's as a result of a failed relationship), how exactly would you like people to acknowledge that it wasn't their first choice any time that it comes up?

"We're co-parenting because our relationship didn't work out, it wasn't our plan". What a weird thing to say.

I need to go back to work now, because my plan to win the lottery didn't work out. Just to acknowledge that working is the result of not being absolutely minted, which is what I wanted...

I don't think I have ever seen this suggested anywhere. Can you give some examples?

This post is bizarre op and nobody seems to understand your point. Of course it’s not ideal to have a relationship breakdown when there are dc involved. Or to get pregnant from a one night stand or causal relationship or whatever. But it happens and people deal with it the best they can. Nothing romantic about it, you just have to crack on and try and do best by the kids. It’s very hard especially when values and parenting styles differ or the separation was acrimonious. So when people ‘do it well’ I think that’s positive. Obviously.

I would say it's fact that good co-parenting is minimising fall out, almost by definition. If good co-parenting is romanticised at all its in relation to poor co-parenting...not in comparison to 'normal' parenting. Many people co-parent incredibly poorly so I don't mind giving kudos to people who do it well.

Slightly different, but I do think there is something around people justifying break ups with comments about children being happier after the break up (better atmosphere, happy parents means happy kids etc). This may be true, but there is never any acknowledgement that actually these children would be happiest with both parents being together in a successful and loving relationship. Is that what you mean? I think it goes without saying though.

It's a completely pointless point, though.

Yes, co-parenting generally refers to the parenting done by both parents following separation or divorce.

What's the alternative? One person is excluded from parenting permanently?

My exh and I co-parented well. The relationship had completely broken down. He was hiding debt by the end, my dad was 'terminally' ill for the duration of our 12 year relationship, which was stressful, we had to go nc with my mother due to serious safeguarding concerns (police and SS involvement), his parents became alcoholics. We both had stressful professional careers and the relationship wasn't anywhere either of us wanted to be anymore and to top it all.of, we grew apart rather than together through our 30s. Home was a horrible place for us all.

Our children say themselves that they were happier after we separated. Of course, they'd have rather had two together happy parents but, sadly, that was far from being an option by then.

But we we both fundamentally love our children and so we put aside our personal feelings and co-parented well, were supportive of each other, never ran each other down to the children and presented a united front.

Like I say, what was the alternative?

Maybe it is presented as aspirational because there are too many people out there who aren’t making the effort to co-parent well (or indeed, at all) after the break-up of a relationship, @ThisSharpJadeDreamer?

If everyone whose relationship had split up was co-parenting well, it would be the norm - sadly my impression is that, all to often, it isn’t.

So like
"Yeah we're co parenting well thanks, kids have adjusted and seemed settled again. But every day I look myself in the mirror and recite out loud the lost of my sins. Failing to be a wife who sticks to her marriage. Failing to be a mother who keeps the family together. Failing to be a woman who put themselves last for decades in order to do the former. I remind myself that this settled situation now is only because I fucked up the lives of myself and my children. I let them down, I let our families down, I let the world down. I'm a fuck up and my children will be er know true happiness. So yes, the co-parenting is going well now I've solidified the expected selves hatred I shall carry as my burden every day.

What's the point of this thread?? Really??

Ffs this is making me want to scream 😂

What I’m questioning is how often co-parenting gets presented as inherently ideal or aspirational?

It doesn't!!!!!! Literally NOBODY thinks this!!!! Argggghhh!!! 😭