A Guide to Amicable Separation: Children and Co-Parenting

Whilst divorce is often a difficult time for the children involved, keeping it amicable can significantly reduce the emotional impact and help children adapt to a new normal. If a separation is handled in the right way, always keeping the children’s best interests at heart, they can go on to have great relationships with both parents and thrive in a positive, conflict-free environment where they feel loved and supported.

A high-conflict divorce and ongoing conflict post-separation can have many repercussions for children. From taking a toll on their mental wellbeing and impacting academic progress to feeling stuck in the middle or even, in extreme cases, losing a relationship with one parent.

Our research found that more than two-thirds of people think children’s wellbeing is most impacted by a difficult divorce, above both financial circumstances and parental wellbeing. Nearly half (42%) felt that emotional strain was the most significant challenge children face when their parents go through a high-conflict separation, with 27% saying that children feel stuck in the middle.

Of course, children trapped in an unhappy household are also likely to face these challenges, and often a separation is a way to resolve this and create a better environment in two separate homes, with each parent. The key is making the process as amicable as possible to reduce the impact on the children involved.

If it’s suitable for you and your situation, mediation can often be the route with the least conflict, as it’s focused on finding common ground, proposals and solutions to resolve matters. Court, on the other hand, is an adversarial process, with each party advancing their position to the judge and if an agreement cannot be reached, handing over the decision to a third party.

In mediation, you are both the decision makers, discussing options and considering together, with the help of the mediator, proposals to move forward. A mediator reminds parents to keep their child’s perspective in mind and to put children at the centre of their decision making: What do they need from you right now? How would they like you to speak to each other when discussing arrangements for them?

Mediation provides a calmer experience, and a more comfortable environment compared to court; it works around your availability and timescales, and you can take as many sessions as you both like to discuss the details. You can also cover things that are important to you as a parent but that the court wouldn’t get involved in, such as how to approach the introduction of new partners.

Children can also meet with a mediator (known as child inclusive mediation) if they are over the age of 10, enabling them to discuss their thoughts and feelings. If the child consents, the information from this discussion can be shared with the parents. Meeting with a mediator can be a good way for a child to speak to an independent, neutral third party whom they can talk to freely about how they are feeling and what they think is important. It can be helpful for a child to talk to a mediator because they may not tell a parent how they are really feeling, especially if they are worried about their feelings and disagreements between their parents.

The biggest source of conflict we often see between parents is how much time is spent with their child or children. As parents, creating memories with your children is important and understandably, both parents want to be involved in significant life milestones and occasions.

Things that can help include:

• Using all the occasions yet to come in your child’s life, from a graduation to a wedding, as motivation to keep things amicable so that these can be enjoyed together with you both present
• Think long-term and consider how the decisions you make now will have an impact in the future
• Try to form a new kind of relationship where you communicate constructively in a way that works for both of you
• Focus on seeing yourselves as parents, first and foremost, and separate this from other disagreements (such as regarding finances) that may exist between you

The court’s primary consideration is the welfare of the child, and a family judge will always make an order in the child’s best interests.

It is important that as a grandparent, you receive good, specialist family law advice to help you make your children application, and have the correct reasons set out, together with information about what you are asking the court to do. The judge will want to see that your application is well-motivated and is going to promote the welfare of the child and this is in his/her best interests.

The family court will need to weigh up whether any continuing contact with the child, might have a negative impact on the rest of the family relationships, and in some circumstances, albeit extreme, the family court may refuse access to the grandchildren.