What Happens when Parents Who Have Joint Custody are Not Capable of Co-Parenting?

When two people are not capable of co-parenting this can be either the fault of one person or mostly be the fault of both people. I have a hard time believing that the inability to co-parent is just the fault of one person. I tend to think that when there is an issue or dispute between two people some party has a role, even though it may be a very small role, in that ability to co-parent.

But what if two people have been at each other's throats and the relationship has been toxic for years or sometimes it's just several months. What if that inability to co-parent is really affecting the child and showing up in the child's behaviors at home or at school.

I have had the unfortunate experience of having a couple of judges really take severe action and doing something about that inability to co-parent. In a couple of my cases many years ago, some judges observed the parties and the fact that they were always in court. There was always high-conflict. There was always arguing and drama when they were having exchanges. They couldn't have any kind of conversation that didn't end up in a verbal loud dramatic arguments.

What these judges did was take custody of one parent and awarded sole custody to the other parent. And they also maximized one parent's time and minimized the other parent's time. Because they felt that the child being with one parent more, that parent would be making more of the decision making and everyday decisions and it would reduce the amount of the decision making that the parents would have to have with one another.

So what happened is one parent got more of the decision making and one parent got more of the parenting time, so really it could be said that one of the parent's lost out, but what really end up happening was the child lost out in these cases.

The child lost out on the benefit of two parents who have something to offer him or her...have a say in his or her life. And not just for major decisions but for those everyday decisions or everyday activities, extra-curricular activities that are happening in the child's life such as at school or with their friends. This not best for the children but the judges will go to those extremes if the two parties cannot figure out a way to co-parent.

Not all judges will do that but just know that there are some judges who WILL do that.