Walking away from your children’s other parent isn’t an easy task. Once you do this, you might decide that you’re completely done with them and never want to speak to them again. While that might sound like a good idea on the surface, you’ll still need to communicate with them about parenting issues as long as your children are minors.
Communication is critical when you have a child custody situation. It can be stressful trying to make things work, but it’s always best for your children if both parents are able to get along. One thing that you should always do is communicate directly with your ex about the children — because sending your messages through the kids is never a good idea.
Why shouldn’t you send messages to your co-parent through your children?
Trying to communicate with your ex by passing messages through the children isn’t a good idea for several reasons:
- Messages can be relayed incorrectly when you’re trying to have the kids act as a go-between.
- The children may be subjected to raw reactions that they didn’t need to see.
- Emotional trauma can occur if children are asked to provide information about one parent to another parent.
- It puts the emotional weight of your relationship with your ex-spouse on your children’s shoulders.
When you split up with your child’s other parent, you need to get a parenting plan together quickly. Having communication methods and dispute resolution options built into the plan can help everyone to know what to expect. You can even put an agreement to communicate via written messages built into the plan if that will help ease tensions. Experienced legal guidance can help.