INTRODUCTION

You may have picked up this book on the recommendation of your therapist or attorney. At this point, you are likely sick and tired of coparenting with someone you see as the problem—someone you believe deserves very little or no parenting time. Each uncomfortable interaction with your coparent seems more troubling and stressful than the last. Perhaps the conflict has even reached the point that your child is now resisting or refusing contact with you or the other parent, and your family is now in a crisis.

Did you pick up this book because you are searching for a way forward that will bring some relief from the conflict and even peace—if you dare hope for that? You are not alone in searching for a solution. This is a crisis that has confounded professionals and the courts.

This book offers information and practical approaches to help you and your coparent restore coparenting coordination and cooperation. We want to help you remove your children from the crosshairs of your continual conflict. We want to help you for the sake of your children.

We are three psychologists who together have many decades of experience working with high-conflict parents. We regularly write professional articles and make presentations at conferences for counselors, attorneys, and judges about high-conflict coparenting problems including alienation, domestic violence, and parents with mental health conditions.

We know from experience that coparenting is never easy, even in the best of circumstances. We also know that splitting up one household with children into two separate households is guaranteed to require some adjustments for both parents and children. Children challenge even the most skillful coparents. They will leave important stuff at the other parent’s house. They may do what children in intact families do and pit one parent against the other using such common tactics as, “But Dad lets me do that!” They may even embellish or hide the truth about life with the other parent. Kids will be kids.

When a child resists or refuses contact with a parent without a reasonable explanation, the family goes into crisis. The resisted parent is alarmed; the favored parent is alarmed. Accusations, blame, and threats fly back and forth between parents. The child becomes distressed, if not traumatized. Polarized and often exaggerated explanations emerge to explain what is going on. Coparenting breaks down. Parents are also unable to agree on an explanation for the child’s resistance. Is it caused by poor quality parenting, alienation, the child’s exposure to domestic violence, or something else? Typically, coparents end up pitted against each other in a bitter dispute that involves extended family and legal advocates supporting one parent against the other. The peaceful, safe family nest the parents wanted to create is self-destructing at enormous costs for all.

Family members find themselves in a predicament with no easy escape but involving lots of difficult choices. For example, should a coparent insist a child spend time with the resisted parent, even though the child may be anxious and fearful or potentially act out? Should a parent call the police when the coparent does not bring the child to a court-ordered custody exchange, even though the child may witness the police confronting a parent?

With an alienation crisis, both parents are confronted with moral and legal dilemmas. For example, a parent may believe in complying with court orders, but also that the child should be able to choose, even though doing so violates a court order. The dilemma may be between the principles of justice and mercy. Should a parent argue about the unfairness of a situation, or should a parent focus on being compassionate and forgiving their co