Parenting after divorce requires serious adjustment, trust, and confidence. Whether you resolve your divorce through a peaceful resolution process or through a divorce battle, the way you and your ex “co-parent” will have an impact, good or bad, on your children.
Many mothers feel that they are better equipped to care for the child than the father for a variety of reasons. “He’s never taken care of a four year old before.” “He doesn’t even know who Susie’s doctors are.” Some of these reasons may, in fact, be true. Why? Because mom always took those responsibilities. So what happens when little Susie is on her weekend visit with Dad? Unless Mom and Dad have a good co-parenting relationship (doesn’t happen over-night), Mom will probably be frantic all weekend, Susie will feel Mom’s anxiety before she leaves to spend time with Dad, Susie will likely be worried all weekend about Mom, Dad will feel that Mom is judging him and trying to interfere with his relationship with Susie, and there will likely be more court hearings to modify visitation because Susie is uncomfortable visiting with Dad, Dad is not taking proper care of Susie, Mom is “brain-washing” Susie against Dad, etc. All of these are understandable “perspectives”. Children pick up on emotion even when nothing is said to them. Regardless of what Dad says or does, you have the ability to create a positive relationship with your child. Here are a few tips for divorced Mothers wanting to improve their relationships with their children:
- Never bad mouth your child’s father in the child’s presence or within his/her range of hearing;
- Never ask your child about his/her time with Dad - let your child tell you about it without any pressure from you;
- When your child shares something negative about Dad (“Dad said you don’t want me to spend time with him”), don’t attack Dad. The best response is to tell your child that you’re sorry s/he had to hear that and that Mom and Dad are working on this very hard and “we both love you very much.”
- Don’t try to control Dad - it didn’t work when you were married, it will work even less now. Telling him to do homework with your child or not feed them cake for dinner will not work.
- Allow Dad to be the Dad you want him to be. When Dad has the kids and calls you to find out if, for example, he should give Susie a certain medication, give Dad the information to make the decision himself (Susie was allergic when she was first born. If you are going to give it to her, watch her breathing for the next 30 minutes and be ready to get her to the hospital if she starts wheezing, etc). Resist taking control but make sure your child is safe.
- Keep Dad informed about your child’s schedule. There are online services such as Our Family Wizard that can help you do this without having to directly communicate with Dad;
- Keep a regular routine that your child can take with her when she is with Dad. For example, make it your child’s job to always lock the doors and windows at your house. When she’s at Dad’s, guess what she’ll do every night;
- If you happen to be the disciplinarian or the homework enforcer, make sure you also make time for fun - your regular routine should include game nights, bed time stories, evening walks, etc;
- Have a support network and a stress outlet - yoga, a book club, etc. This will also help keep your mind off your child when s/he is with Dad.
- Try not to be alone on holidays when your child is with Dad. The last thing you need is to be so depressed that your child starts to feel guilty for being away from you at that time of year, every year. Create new traditions that you can look forward to.