okay okay you probably can't tell but my four is getting better it needs to be better but it's still getting better um set the teleprompter up on emails. Okay. Okay. Sorry, I thought I'd do this while I was waiting for the timer to start. Paste. Done. Save. Oh, and look at that. It's just started. So I haven't been going back to watch the replays of this either, so hopefully they've been edited correctly. The only reason I'm bringing it up is because when I specifically said in the VSL last week to cut that and... like continue on from when I was starting again, that was still in the movie, the film, the video clip. So I've always made an assumption you're watching back these episodes videos once you've edited them. If you're not, can you please make sure that you do it? Because that would have been pretty embarrassing if I didn't check that and that went out. So yeah, if you have any questions, let me know. I feel like I've got something on my eye there. Maybe not. Okay, so we'll start. If you have been trying to co-parent well with someone who won't cooperate and you keep ending up feeling like the failure, I want to stop you right there because you might be trying to play a game that they were never going to play with you. So there are actually two different models here and almost nobody tells you which one you're in. Co-parenting is the model most of us picture two parents talking, coordinating, making joint decisions, presenting a united front. It works beautifully when both people can be reasonable. It falls apart completely when one person uses every conversation as an opportunity for control. Parallel parenting is different. It's not a lesser version of co-parenting. It's a deliberate structure for exactly your situation where each of your parents, sorry, obviously cut that part and actually cut that part, please. It's a deliberate structure for exactly your situation where each of you parents in your own home on your own terms with contract reduced to the logistics that generally require both of you. You're not friends raising a child together. You're two separate households running side by side with a clear boundary line down the middle. Here's the part I think matters most. If you keep trying to force a cooperative model into someone who treats every text message as a chess move, you're not failing at co-parenting. You're using the wrong tool for the situation that you are actually in. So what does it look like? Communication is narrowed to what the child actually needs. Health, school, safety. Not commentary on your parenting, not litigating the relationship. Handovers happen at neutral points, school pickup, not your driveway unless that's okay. So less opportunity for a scene. You stop expecting agreement on values, house rules or bedtime. What happens in their home is their business unless there is a genuine safety concern. Big decisions that must be shared, school, enrolment, medical procedures go through a written channel, not a conversation. So there's a record and less room for that's not what I said. A lot of people feel guilty moving to parallel parenting, like it means they've given up on their child having two involved parents. It doesn't. Your child can still have two parents who love them. What they don't need is to watch you try over and over to get water from a well that isn't giving any. So you don't need your ex to become reasonable for your family to function. You need a structure that doesn't depend on it. If this is where you're at, that's not lowering the bar. That's you finally building something on solid ground. Now, I am not a psych. I am not a counsellor. I am not any of those things. But I know that this is going to be relevant to those people who are having difficulty trying to co-parent in a situation that might not be ideal. I do hope this helps and if you have any questions or whatsoever, if you have anything else you want me to discuss about co-parenting, welcome. You are more than welcome to reach out to me and my team and we will do our absolute best to help you so we can structure more podcast episodes like this because you are probably not the only one having issues with co-parenting. Please be kind to yourself and I will check you out next time. Nope. Cancel that bit, that checkout part was weird. Thank you for joining in. Please remember to subscribe and share because you don't know who else is going through this situation and I'll catch you next time. All right, there were obviously some things that need to be fixed in that gym. If you can make sure you do that correctly. Thank you.
