Just a couple of years ago, I added parent coordination to my skill set. It gives me a somewhat different view of divorces and families. Here's the thing I just don't understand. All of the couples I have seen in parent coordination had children together, obviously. That means some part of them thought that the other would be a good gene donor or an acceptable parent. While they were together, they trusted that the other would not harm the children and would parent in an acceptable manner. Now, everything the other one does is suspect. "They did it just to upset me." "They said no because they knew it was something I wanted to do with the children." "They always hated my family." "They're out to ruin my life." What changed their attitudes toward each other as parents? When I was only wearing my lawyer hat, I would have said that when love goes away, distrust rushes in to take residence. Now that I'm a parent coordinator, I can say that is only part of the problem. The real problem is that all of my parent coordination clients were in litigation. They said horrible things about each other; made terrible accusations. They can't take it back, they can't forgive and they can't forget. How did they ever have children with this person who thinks so little of them? How could they not have seen that the other parent was the type of person who would use their flaws against them, violate their trust in such a public way? How could they have been so blind? How do I know this? They tell me. It comes up time and time again in our meetings. One thing for sure, it will be a long time before they trust their co-parent again. Here in the Trenches.
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