Is co-parenting counselling happening at all in New Zealand, and can it help improve a frayed family dynamic following a divorce?
Welcome to the Divorce Diaries. In our past instalments over the last year we’ve covered everything from when you’re most likely to divorce to whether they’re contagious to whether being on the contraceptive pill can effect your chances! and have now spoken to dozens of women – including one whose husband announced he was leaving her to have an open relationship with a 19-year-old, another who was quite literally ghosted by her own husband and one who discovered the real reason her husband divorced her was because he had a baby with her SISTER.
If you have a topic you’d like to discuss, share your thoughts, experience or advice about, drop a line to alice@capsulenz.com.
Wellingtonians Hannah* and Jeremy*, who are in their mid-40s, have three children aged 14, 12, and nine. They separated a year ago, after Jeremy initiated it due to ongoing relationship issues. “We could both kind of see it coming,” Hannah says. “It was fairly amicable to start with.”
Initially, for financial reasons, they both stayed in the family home but in separate rooms – asking their teenage boys to share a room for now. “So my husband and I were sort of flatmates. And this might sound bad, but all the things that annoyed me about him when were a couple, just annoyed me even more now that we weren’t. Also I don’t want to see my past right in front me when I’m trying to think about the future.”
So they started doing ‘week about’. One of them spent a week in the family home with the kids, while the other lived in a tiny rented apartment, then they would ‘swap back’. “It worked for the kids, but it was a weird, awkward time with us going back and forth between the house and the apartment.”
Things went downhill in terms of co-parenting. “It was all the way from me saying ‘why are you giving the kids such sugary food’ through to him saying ‘our lives would be easier if we’d never met’.” They began fighting about the children’s schedule, and about who should do different tasks. “I told him that it wasn’t up to me to ‘remind him in time’ about something.”
They’d never had couples’ counseling, and didn’t have counseling when they split up. “I didn’t think we needed it at first,” Hannah says, “plus it was expensive enough to set up two separate households”. Then a colleague of Hannah’s mentioned that she’d gone through co-parenting therapy with her ex, and recommended it. “I thought we really need to do it,” Hannah says, “because if we’re getting on better, that can only be good for us and also for the kids”. Jeremy agreed immediately.
They recently did four sessions with a couples’ counsellor whose work includes co-parenting therapy – and they found them valuable.
“Our counsellor helped each of us to put ourselves in the other person’s shoes. We’ve learned to communicate better. We know that making critical comments about the other’s parenting can be really upsetting, and now we set a specific time for constructive discussions about any parenting issues. We know not to talk over each other or raise our voices or go all passive-aggressive. We’re sharing the mental load – well, I’m still doing more of that but it’s trending in the right direction.”
For instance, Jeremy knows not to text Hannah at 9.30pm when she’s getting ready for bed to ask who’s doing what the next day. “We’ve sorted out exactly who is doing, with a shared family calendar on Google docs. We’ve got some consistency regarding the types of things the kids eat, how much screentime they get, etc.”
They’re currently getting on much better, and selling the family home to set up two separate, more modest homes that the kids can go between.
So, What IS Co-Parenting Counselling?
As awareness has grown about its potential benefits, couples’ counseling has shed some of its stigma – as in, the assumption that, if you’re going, your relationship must be in tatters. Many couples improve their relationship and stay together.
There are also some couples who go to counseling together to help during the separation – or ‘conscious uncoupling’ (thanks, Gwyneth).
But has anyone heard about co-parenting counseling? I’m talking about counseling that happens some time after the separation, not when the couple first splits up. It may be a proactive measure to deal with small problems and anticipate potential issues. Or it may be that things just aren’t working under the current arrangement and need to change ASAP.
Yes, counseling can be pricey, but it may only require a few sessions. And it can be a financial investment in your kids’ wellbeing, especially if they feel unsettled or stuck in the middle.
How Does Co-Parenting Counselling Work?
In an article called ‘Co-Parenting Counselling: How It Helps, Examples, & Cost’, Dr Emily Guarnotta, an expert clinical psychologist with a focus on families, explains how counseling can come into play for co-parents. “While some parents transition easily,” Emily writes, “others struggle with conflict, miscommunication, or a total lack of communication. Co-parenting counselors provides them with tools and skills to help improve communication, reduce conflicts, and create a plan for the future, especially in cases of blended families.”
“For example, parents may learn how to manage their frustrations, keep their focus on the children, and use ‘I’ statements rather than make accusations. They may also learn how to speak respectfully with one another through commonly used mediums like text messages and email.”
Kimberlee Sweeney (degreesofseparation.co.nz) is New Zealand’s first internationally CDC-certified divorce/separation coach as well as a Gottman-method-trained relationship coach. As she tells me, she works one on one with individuals (she doesn’t see couples together) before and/or during separation – and sometimes after separation with individuals who needs support around co-parenting.
“I help clients communicate with their spouse on where they’re at, and what their needs and the needs of the children are, how to tell the children [about the separation] and what they might need to start considering before such big conversations. We look at how co-parenting might look for their family, draft parenting plans and start gathering info to put a settlement agreement in place for division of assets etc, ideally before going to a family lawyer.”
Kimberlee says that generally divorce professionals have to ‘pick a lane’: coaching, counseling, legal advice or mediation, because it can be a conflict of interest to ‘be everything’ to one client. She’s largely a divorce/separation coach. But due to her relationship-therapy training and passion to save some marriages, she sometimes works with both halves of a couple, seeing them individually. “With all my coaching, someone sees me individually to work on their goals, mindset and future-focused solutions.”
As for Hannah and Jeremy, Hannah says that they’re co-parenting much better. “The kids are happier now that they know what the family’s structure is and that their parents are getting along okay. And that makes us happier.”
