coparenting

Effective Co-Parent Communication After Divorce

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When parents divorce or break up, communication can be a challenge. But when you have children together, you cannot just choose to ignore your co-parent, no matter how difficult the situation may be. Your ability to continue to communicate effectively with your co-parent will affect your children for good or for ill. Fortunately, you can take steps to make co-parent communication easier and more effective.

If you are on friendly terms with your co-parent, you will likely continue to communicate in the ways you do with other friends and family members – via phone, text, and email. If the relationship with your co-parent is difficult, or if you are prevented from communicating with your co-parent because of a domestic injunction, you will likely communicate with your co-parent with a dedicated phone application. These applications support text, videos, and calendars. They can provide a method for submitting receipts or otherwise tracking shared expenses.


In Wisconsin, the most commonly used app is Our Family Wizard, or OFW, for short. You can give your attorney access to view your OFW communications and the court can view your OFW account on its dashboard. This makes it easier for the court and other professionals involved to understand the problems that co-parents are experiencing. It also provides a measure of accountability to parents, who know that their communications may be viewed by attorneys, judges and guardians ad litem.


No matter what method you chose for communication, make sure you have a communication strategy so that you can prevent or diffuse difficult situations. One great method, developed by Bill Eddy, is call the BIFF method. BIFF stands for Brief, Informative, Friendly, and Firm. Here’s how each component works:

  1. Brief: Keep your response short and to the point. Avoid lengthy explanations or details that could open up more areas for disagreement. This minimizes opportunities for further conflict.
  2. Informative: Include relevant information only. Provide factual content that addresses the primary issue without emotional or judgmental language. Stick to clear information that helps clarify or resolve the matter.
  3. Friendly: Maintain a friendly tone, even if the situation is tense. This helps to defuse hostility and can make the recipient more receptive to your message. A friendly approach can reduce defensiveness.
  4. Firm: Be clear and firm about your message. Avoid giving in to unreasonable demands or making overly conciliatory statements. Respectfully assert your position or boundary without being aggressive.

These principles can help you craft communications that defuse conflict and convey necessary information in a way that minimizes escalation. And that is one of the most valuable things you can do for yourself and for your children.

Co-Parenting vs. Parallel Parenting: What’s the Difference?

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If you anticipate separating or have separated from the other parent of your child(ren), you may have been told that, post-separation, the two of you are going to have to co-parent. Co-parenting is a model where both parties equally share parenting responsibilities such as going to child-related events, functions, and appointments. Under this model, parents share similar views regarding child rearing and employ similar parenting techniques across the two homes. For example, the parties may agree that they will both use a gentle parenting approach in each of their homes or even enforce the same bedtime. Consistent and effective communication in person or over the phone is required for this parenting model to work and to limit the amount of stress felt by the child(ren).

For high-conflict cases where parents do not share the same parenting views or are unable to speak to one another, co-parenting may seem like an impossible task. Many parents in this situation use the parallel-parenting model as a way to raise their child(ren). Under the parallel-parenting model, parents raise their child(ren) separate from the other parent.  They may not even attend the same child-related events or appointments. Unlike co-parenting where parents share and exercise the same parenting views, parents who parallel-parent take different approaches to parenting in each of their respective homes. For example, where one parent uses a gentle parenting approach to raising the child(ren), the other parent may use a more authoritative approach. Communication between both parents is still needed to ensure the needs of the child(ren) are met. However, parents using this model can limit communication to solely emails, text messages, or a monitored app such as Our Family Wizard to minimize conflict and maintain boundaries.

Regardless of what parenting model is best for your unique situation, the most important thing is that you and the other party keep the child(ren) removed from any parental conflict and continue to love, support, and do what is in your child(ren)’s best interests.

If you are in the process of a separation or divorce, contact Nelson, Krueger & Millenbach, LLC at (414) 258-1644 to speak with one of our attorneys regarding your specific situation.