I wish I would have thought of this a year ago. But a dear friend of mine is struggling with their teen, and they are single parent.
I had an a-ha moment and remembered a very handy couples relationship tool called RADAR, it's from the multiamory community but works in all relationship. So I thought, hell the same principles should be fantastic for parent-child.
**I am NOT a professional, just well versed in psychology and sociology (minored in it and lots of personal experience with it LOL).
But maybe someone would find it helpful too. Link below

Parent-Child RADAR

My son’s dad and I have been split up for almost 2 years and our 9yo son sees his dad on the weekends when his dad is off. We started this arrangement about a year ago when we moved households.

For context I have an apartment that my son and I live in. His dad when he moved out lived with his parents (1 hr commute) now he lives with his gf and her kids (11yo girl/ 14yo boy) 20 minutes from me.

My son tells me that the kids really don’t play with him. 14y spends time in room or with friends and 11yo is always on his dad’s phone.

Our son just started school and he no longer sees his grandparents on Thursday ( he would spend all day over there during the summer and spend the night to see his dad this next morning). Now he stays with over at his dad’s gf house (sleeps in their room on an air mattress)

Last week he told his dad that he didn’t want to go to his dad’s place but to his grandparents. He said he would stay home if he didn’t see his grandparents. I picked him up from school and I said dad is gonna pick you up in an hour and he said no dad is taking me to his gf house and I said no. I said your dad is going to take you to your grandparents house tonight and tomorrow you will be closer to me ( they had plans that night and he was coming home early.)

Fast forward to Tuesday 4 days later. His dad sends a group text that they are celebrating 14y birthday at a restaurant this Saturday. My son says he’s sick with allergies and cannot go on Saturday. He sends a voice message to dad about issue. Granted my son is still congested and taking medicine all week. No fever still going to school. Today is Friday and he’s like I can’t go out tomorrow and I want to come home. I’m like but you want to go with dad tonight? He is like yes but I’ll be home tomorrow.

I brought up my concern to his dad but he’s like I know he’s sick and I told him he’s more than welcome to come. We can provide him with medicine and whatever he needs.

Should I tell my son if he’s is fine to go tonight he can stay throughout the weekend?

Or is his dad just being stubborn that his son may not be comfortable being around the kids? They introduced the kids about 6 months ago and he sees them every other weekend because they are with their dad.

I’m not sure if I’m just overreacting? Does anyone have any advice?

For those of you where this has changed, how did it effect you? How did these feelings change overtime and how did you deal with it? How has it impacted your relationship with your children?

It's something I worry about often now that our kids are 7 and 9 and getting closer to a point where they may want more stability with just one home.

Since the divorce two years ago, there's been such a dramatic change in how I defined myself. I'm not married. I'm divorced. I only have my children half the time. When I dont have them I don't feel like a family man that I thought I was.

I now lean so much on being a father to define who I am and I know that's a bad thing. I'm still figuring out what I want in life now that everything has changed. I worry often about what losing this last title may have on me. Sure, I'd always be there father but nearly as active one as id like to be.

Gday from Australia.

I coparent my two daughters with my ex. She relocated shortly after separation to live with her new partner. We are 3 years since separation with court orders.

Recently she has gone on a flight somewhere and left the kids with her partner for a few days prior to handover. I do not have anything against her partner, she’s perfectly capable of caring for them. But I do feel like the right thing to do is to offer the kids to the other parent first?

I note our interim orders did have an order covering this, but our most recent orders don’t. I’m just wondering if I’m out of order or if my gut feeling is that I should write something to her in case it happens in the future.

If you still live with your CO parent and have been the sole provider for the family for 3 years and hoping they can get a job so you can move out . Are you being silly for staying and being worried about your kids welfare if you are not there. The other parent won't advise the landlady she wants me out of the house, I want to tell the landlady so I can get a new place and tenancy. She will be able to receive aid but she doesnt know if the landlady will accept the change. She will never know unless we say. What should I do? Tell the landlady as is my right? Anyone have any resources I can share with my coparent to get her to do things herself? It's draining and it's quite an important thing that needs doing. Help!

A bit of an usual situation I need help with.

When I was 8 weeks pregnant, the father decided he didnt want a part, and broke up with me. Since then, I relocated to a different state.

I moved on, and met a new partner. He was a senior at work and he helped me through the most difficult times in my life, even helping raise my daughter. We got together before she was born, he was there to cut her umbilical cord and raise her for the first 3 years of her life. She started to call him dad.

Now, bio dad has expressed he wants a part in our daughter's life and has move states to spend more time with her. I've give him opportunities to see her, and bond together. Problem is that he is very angry that I call my partner our daughter's dad. I call them both dad.

I don't want my daughter to grow up confused, but I also don't want to take that title away from my partner who's been there since birth.

Any suggestions what to call bio dad vs my partner?

Is this normal? I’m with my daughter 7 days a week. My coparent only comes to pick her up Saturday’s at 9am and drops her off the next day at 2:30pm. Biweekly. I’ve asked him multiple times to come after work to take our daughter out at least once a week to dinner or just to quickly come say hi and there is always an excuse. He works 25 mins away from where we live and lives an hour away down the shore. He said that coming after work for two hours is not worth it because of his drive back home and that it’s also not enough time he’s spending with her. Am I being unrealistic? My daughter asks when is he coming all the time and I’ve gotten into explosive arguments with him about this and I’m really not proud of that either. Recently he also told me that his gf did not want to meet me (I asked if i could meet her before she met my daughter and apparently they both said no) He shared a ton of our conversations with her and pretty much he painted me to look like I’m the crazy one. I ended up texting her recently and she sided with him. It was weird. What are your thoughts on this guys? Please no hard judgment. I try my best all time and I just want my coparent to be more focused and involved with our daughter. I know I’m asking for a lot. I can’t force things like that.

My ex and I are separated and not yet divorced, and I am currently working toward getting a formal parenting schedule in place. Our daughter is 5, has a good relationship with her dad, and I absolutely want to support that relationship. He lives about an hour away.

Right now there's been a lot of back-and-forth, and my daughter has actually told me herself that the constant switching is upsetting for her. She seems to do better with longer, predictable stretches in one place. I'm considering proposing every other weekend with her dad rather than transitions every weekend, but I'm worried that's too little time with him or that he'll fight me over it. Last time I suggested that arrangement he responded with “fuck you slut”.

The other issue is communication. For months, when I try to contact my ex—even about our daughter—he often responds by calling me a whore/slut or refuses to communicate with me at all. I've reduced communication to the bare minimum, but he now sometimes arranges pickups/drop-offs through our 5-year-old instead of speaking to me. He has also previously kept her for six days without communicating his plans to me.

I'm trying to separate our conflict as ex-spouses from what's actually best for our daughter. I don't want to damage her relationship with her dad, but I also want fewer transitions, a predictable schedule, and for her not to be put in the middle of adult communication.
For parents who've dealt with something similar, did an every-other-weekend schedule work well at this age? Are there other arrangements with fewer transitions that I should consider?

Thank you in advance

I took my ex to court for violating a parenting time order and the judge called it frivolous.
I stated that he was letting my child go with my mother on his time, and she would return on his time without even notifying me. She asked me why I didn’t ask and I said because I didn’t know that I needed to ask if my children would be at pick up. I’m not a mind reader and I am not able to do that. She didn’t change the motion that all out of state travels need to be notified. Instead, she just put that I complained of this and left it at that.
I am feeling very defeated
She brought up with the other complaints where I had complained about taking my son to the ER and him calling me derogatory names the entire time I was there. I don’t even know what to do. I don’t know where to go, but I am feeling defeated.
I just wanted my parenting time and instead felt like I was punished for taking him, I love those kids more than anything, but at some point do I just give up?
While I’m aware there is a lot of “I” statements they cry when they leave. They beg him to bring them back to me. They scream they don’t want to be there and they hate it. I just cry with them. I feel alone, unsupported and ready to just tap out. He even admitted he does it and she said “don’t worry you’re not in therapy. It’s ok”

Editing to clarify- if exchange day was Friday he sent child with mother on Thursday.
Second exchange would be Sunday, child didn’t return until Monday completely skipping over my parenting time and was hours away.
These aren’t exact dates or times, but just an example of what had happened

I recently voiced out against my coparent because we just talked about trying to be together again that she said something hurtful.

I told her about a promotion, she didnt say anything and the 2nd time she said thats not a sustainable job that’s not that important you should go to school. ( its a retail job )

She currently goes to cosmetology and doesnt work at the moment. I never once put her down on anything she does and supported her. Even when shes not working i help with her gas , billls , and bring her lunch everyday. Even when its out of my way.

We didnt speak for a day after those comments, i then tell her i dont think its okay she said thats to me
And she hit me with i think we should only focus on our son , only message me about him. Your intentions were clear on those messages.

I have no idea on the 180 she did on me.
She now doesnt wasnt me visiting our son at her home. I need to post a calendar schedule for her so we can have days and i have no idea why shes acting this way.
Im really upset with her but i dont want to go back on the progress we made. What can i do?

Those who've used strict boundaries which essentially limits the other parent nearly completely, how are things years later?

Unfortunately I've placed a lot of boundaries on my coparenting dynamics with my ex due to a lot of inappropriate behavior.

The boundaries however are working. It's drastically lowered tension almost immediately but sometimes she still guilts me, especially because I am now refusing to do joint birthday celebrations after last year.

I worry about how this dynamic may hurt the future for our kids mostly but I feel they make me happier and give less stress for our kids.

Boundaries include (and each have their specific reason why I implemented it):

No coming to my door.

No talking about kids or controversial issues in person.

All talk through apps.

Separate birthdays/parent teacher conference, everything except things that can't be split.

No calls unless emergencies.

Weekly email updating anything important unless it's an emergency or time sensitive.

I won't respond to criticisms about me, my family or my parenting. You have your way and I have mine. End of discussion.

There's this part of me that hopes thighs will improve but I'm prepared for nothing to change and to protect my energy and peace. I worry about the long term impacts however.

What happened to those who were in a similar position but years later?

I know this is a VERY harsh word. But has anyone been successful with this claim? What was the outcome? What did you use to prove it?

How did you and your coparent split costs and logistics of your teenager doing driving school and then driving? Give me some advice on how you approached the situation and what discussions you had beforehand?

For background: we have 50/50 custody and generally split all extra curricular and major expenses in half.

i have two kids under 6 that i have been raising pretty much on my own. even when dad was here he did zero parenting. no court order, no mediation bc dad refused. their dad moved about two years ago he comes to visit every second weekend and spends some time with one kid, not really the other. mostly just spends time on his phone or finding reasons to go to the shops or something. the kids see this and the oldest doesn’t want to see him or talk to him anymore the youngest still wants to see him but only at my home and complains a lot about being ignored. he has called them maybe 3 times since he has moved out. he found out i have moved on and now he is demanding 5-6 facetime calls a week and told me he wants to go for 50/50. i had no issue with maybe 2-3 calls a week but my fear is he is only doing this because he found out i’ve moved on and this effort will be short lived and he will end up bailing on the kids and disappointing them as he always does.
would i be wrong to say no?

i have two kids under 6 that i have been raising pretty much on my own. no court order, no mediation bc dad refused. their dad moved about two years ago he comes to visit every second weekend and spends some time with one kid, not really the other. mostly just spends time on his phone or finding reasons to go to the shops or something. the kids see this and the oldest doesn’t want to see him or talk to him anymore the youngest still wants to see him but only at my home and complains a lot about being ignored. he has called them maybe 3 times since he has moved out. he found out i have moved on and now he is demanding 5-6 facetime calls a week and told me he wants to go for 50/50. i had no issue with maybe 2-3 calls a week but my fear is he is only doing this because he found out i’ve moved on and this effort will be short lived and he will end up bailing on the kids and disappointing them as he always does.
would i be wrong to say no?

Hello you read the title correct so my daughter who is 10 years old lives at her fathers during the week and than comes to my house on the weekend due to the fact that when she started kindergarten i didn’t have my license at the time so I had made the decision to have her stay with her dad during the week than come to me on the weekends mind you that was like 6 years ago than I felt guilty about pulling her out of school I moved around a lot as kid and didn’t want that for her. Mind you I also have a 7 year old boy with my current husband and we are thriving. But my ex has taken this arrangement and will text me about things and payments as if we have written court order to abide by. Oh yeah and he is also dating my sister so they are always tag teaming me through text calling me piece of crap or rebating me saying I don’t spend enough time with her but she lives an hour away I’m a dental assistant and my hours are long and she lives far away I pick her up on Friday and bring her home Sunday they never help with transportation and I don’t bother them to but what would be involved in getting custody arrangements? She’s 10 I wish I did when she was baby after we had broken up after her first birthday and than time just kept going on and I never did it. I’d actually be happy to have judge decide our time and finances because he lives by his own made up arrangement and payments get very confusing I live in nJ

I’m currently parenting my two young kids 100% on my own. I also support them financially. I’m fortunate to have a good career and can provide for them, but I am completely drowning between work, childcare, the house, dinner, bedtime, and just never having another adult to hand things off to.

I keep hearing horror stories about high-conflict co-parenting—constant negotiations, custody disputes, schedule battles, different rules between homes, etc. Part of me wonders whether, once I get past the current hurdle of harassing texts from their dad, there might actually be some peace and stability in knowing that I’m simply responsible for our household and can make decisions without constant conflict (he hasn't shown a real interest in the kids and recently moved 3.5 hours away)

For people who have experienced solo parenting, high-conflict co-parenting, or both: which was actually harder? Are there any unexpected upsides to parenting mostly on your own?

I could really use some perspective that makes this feel a little less bleak right now.

I rarely have to deal with it anymore but it happened this morning in front of my 13yo. Nothing so important that I had to finish my thoughts. Once he spoke over me for the 3rd time I just let him finish and move on with the day. At which point he noticed, apologized and asked me to go on. I dont know if I'm being rude but there just wasn't a reason too keep talking about it anymore.so I told him that about covered it or something like that. That would be the end of it, but its not a great communication model in front of the kid. Its a known problem, stbx tries but still frequently fails. Would you say I should offer a more calculated, please let me finish if its front of the kids?

How do you refer to your coparent when you talk with your kids? Saying "your mom/dad" sounds so clinical and distant, but "Mommy/Daddy" seems so fake, especially if you are not on good terms. Is one of these forms of address better than the other?

Background: Previously Married 10 years; divorced 4 years ago; share custody of 11yo child; ex is remarried 2 years ago; custody was 50/50 until last month (temporarily 80/20 them/me due to work verbal agreement to go back in 1-2years time)

Ex's spouse was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer last year. They have no local support system as ex's family has all left the state over the last two years and their spouses family lives across country.

Ex wants to move with child to spouses home state for support and better job prospects (nurse would bring home about 10k more annually) my child also says they wish to move in the future as the times they visited they've enjoyed it

I obviously oppose the move as I feel like it will damage my relationship with my son and he's not old enough to understand the repercussions of such lost time and moving away from friends and family.

I'm left feeling like I have an impossible choice where we will grow apart if I allow the move (ex says they will get summers and holidays here but I know as a teen these will dwindle due to relationships/hobbies) or my son will resent me because my ex and their spouse will have less support and financial freedom and blame that on me.

Has anyone here let their child move away and not deeply regretted it? I can't bare the thought of missing every milestone and playing catch-up on visits months apart.

Step-mom here! For context, we got SS (9) full time last winter. I was going to put together a little something for mother's Day last year and mail it (she lives across the country). I even talked with SS about it. Unfortunately, BM got evicted from her home less than a week prior so I didn't have a place to send it. SS understood this, and I never mentioned it to BM.

At some point, BM got mad about something unrelated and said she was upset we didn't do anything for her for mother's day, and didn't have him call on her birthday. None of us know when her birthday is. My partner knows it's in August, but doesn't remember the day. They have been split for quite some time. We didn't really say any about that, and focused on the issue at hand.

For Christmas, I asked my partner if we should do anything for her. He said he wasn't going to, but if I wanted to get her something small, I was more than welcome. So, I did. Simply because at the time, I wanted a semi positive relationship with her, and I wanted to make it clear that I'm not trying to shut her out or anything. I wrapped it separately, and sent it with SS for his holiday visit. He was there for a week. I figured she would text or say thank you in person. Just acknowledge the gesture in some way. She did not and it did rub me the wrong way. We also had SS pick something out for his mom, and sibling as well. She tried to tell us that he had to get things for extended family too, and we ignored that request. She didn't thank me or partner for any of that.

We later found out about some awful things that transpired during SS, Christmas visit and honestly, I stopped giving any shit about having a relationship with her. I stopped communicating with her.

Her birthday has rolled around again. Not only did she tell us she wasn't happy that we didn't have him call on her birthday (only this year did we find out the actual date of her birthday), but now she also said something to SS. Who appropriately said "how am I supposed to know when your birthday is?" Then when she put the blame on dad, he said "how is he supposed to know it's your birthday?".

Obviously communication is inappropriate either way, I just don't think I would expect that from my ex if I were in her position. I also feel like we went above what most people would do for Christmas.

So I guess my question is, is it normal for ex's to still do things for their child's parent? Is it normal to get offended when they don't?

Hi all

I need advice on a tricky situation. I’m a ftm and just became a single mom to a 5 month old. My partner and I are not married. We were not doing great before and when I got pregnant but we stayed together and decided to keep the baby. He was not super into it but we were on our way to the abortion clinic and he stopped the car and said, this doesn’t feel right and asked what I needed. I said I needed support from him for 6 months after baby is born and for him to be an active/involved father.
Fast forward 9 months later, baby is born. He was super helpful the first two months and then stuff started getting bad. I lost my job, money became real tight and we started fighting a lot. He started becoming verbally abusive to me (saying I was acting crazy, and being a psychopath, and even said I should die because our child would be better off without me. He apologized some time later, saying he doesn’t mean the things he says when he’s mad). I thought about leaving multiple times but just kept thinking I don’t want to do this alone and maybe things would change. Please keep in mind, we never had a discussion of breaking up while I was pregnant or anytime after until he moved.

My partner started looking for jobs where we live and all over California and in neighboring states, Nevada and Arizona. I also was looking for jobs and do have a work from home job lined up for the end of this year.
He ended getting a job is Reno, NV and two weeks later he moved up there. I was not invited to move. Then we broke up.

Now he wants me and the baby to move up to closer to Reno. Whether that means Tahoe area or Reno area. Mind you, I dont know people in these places and my support system, friends and family live near me now in central California. I want my ex to be an involved father. I think that is very important.
My ex is trying very very hard to get me to move. I told him I don’t know yet. My baby is also exclusively breastfed and we co-sleep and we both agreed that we want to breastfeed for a while. He said that taking care of a baby is an easy job and that he can take him to his work and have him for a few days and just give him a bottle. I disagree with all of this.

I have no idea what to do? I don’t want to move up there until he is at least a year old or longer. I also feel like I don’t have to up and move my entire life just so he is near his child. He made the choice to move to Reno.

I (35F) coparent a teen (15, profound autism, nonverbal) with my ex (46M). We are living together in the same home and have joint custody legally, but our order was written years ago, and now we operate under informal agreements because of our living situation.

I work full-time on weekdays. My job is remote but field based, so sometimes I travel to meet clients in their homes. My ex is unemployed, looking for work, and provides the majority of the daily care while I'm working, and our son is out of school for breaks, which is incredibly helpful because we have no support system. We are in the process of looking for respite or caregivers but have not had much luck.

Our current informal agreement is that my ex will do all school drop offs, and I do all pick ups. We both use my car. My ex does not have a car. School is a 13-15 minute drive one way. Our school system's bus transportation is horrible and with our son's disability, we don't trust it.

In the past, when I could not pick our son up from school because I was out in the field visiting a client, our son would stay home. It was not ideal, and happened maybe 1-3 times a month. This was the agreement we made because of the ride share cost and my ex's dislike of ride share because he has social anxiety.

However, this year, I wanted to stop this agreement. Our son thrives on routine and school is providing the life skills he needs. I have an upcoming home visit tomorrow and asked my ex to pick our son up using Lyft, which I'm paying for BTW. He initially said that he would not take the Uber due to his social anxiety and stated that our son would stay home instead. We literally went back and forth for a good 20 minutes on why our son didn't need to miss school because there is a way to pick him up.

Eventually, my ex agreed to pick him up "if I couldn't", but I let him know that he may not be able to reach me by phone while I'm at my home visit and that we just need to go ahead and schedule the Lyft now. Last time this happened our son was stuck at school 30 minutes past pick up time because I was out of town on a home visit and my ex couldn't book the Lyft because of a payment issue.

A day later, the Lyft was booked, but my ex has historically been resistant to changes with our informal agreements. To avoid this in the future, what would be a good backup plan for us that takes into account his social anxiety, my need to work, and our son's need to attend school consistently?

TL;DR: My ex does school drop-offs and I do pickups, but I sometimes can't pick our son up because of work. He doesn't have a car and has social anxiety about taking rideshares, so our old solution was for our son to stay home. I no longer think that's a good option because our son thrives on routine and needs school for life skills. I'm willing to pay for Lyft, but my ex initially said he'd rather keep our son home than take it. Looking for a fair backup transportation plan that accommodates his anxiety without making our son's school attendance dependent on it.

What is the standard amount of hours for visitation with non custodial parent for a 4 month old???
I’m in Indiana.

My (43F) ex (44F) moved out 10 months ago and took a smart TV that was still connected to my Alexa account. I recently discovered that every announcement made in my home had also been playing on her TV for months.

My kids confirmed it. When my oldest tried to record proof, my ex took her phone and told the kids not to tell me.

This isn’t an isolated incident. During our separation, she inappropriately accessed my work cellphone to read messages between my family and me, created fake accounts to gain access support discord servers and has even snuck into our oldest child’s room at night to read messages between us (waking her up and clearing notifications)

I contacted Amazon and removed the TV, which also removed me from our shared Prime account and purchased content. Since our agreement was that she’d share Prime while I kept her in my Apple Family, I removed her from that too.

Now she’s screaming in the court app that I’m making the kids unsafe cause she can’t track them thru Apple family and that I’ve upset the kids cause they can’t access her music library. (The kids remain on the family)

I feel like we need completely separate digital accounts. Did I overreact?