Hello, Coparenting Conflict Hotline

Are you always the coparent trying to model good coparenting in the hope your ex changes?

Each time they request a swap of parenting weekend or day to take the kids to their family events, you accommodate as you want to be a good coparent and role model. What if your coparent doesn’t reciprocate?

Al Huntoon, Coparenting Conflict Specialist and author of “The Coparenting Compass” outlines what is really going on below;

Coparenting Conflict Hotline, how may we help you today?

Hi, yes, well, I'd like to report a coparenting conflict where I forgot I was a leading character in my own story.

Can you describe the nature of your inner conflict?

So..., I let my ex talk me into taking the kids to meet his sister's boyfriend's kids for the weekend, my weekend. I justified it as "important bonding" but the whole time I felt uneasy.

Ah, textbook case of empathic overfunctioning. Did you validate the other parent's narrative before remembering you had one?

Yeah, I even told their trauma story better than they could.

And your own experience?

I downplayed it. I wanted to look like a good person. You know, for the illusion of maturity.

Alright, we're dispatching a reminder: You can recover your lost protagonist energy. Your goodness is not a bargaining chip. Your clarity is not collateral damage. And your parenting story deserves a narrator who doesn't ghost themselves during conflict.

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I've worked with a number of coparents who are the targets of a manipulative ex, and I've repeatedly encountered a version of this metaphor:

The coparent is standing in a downpour. Their ex is hogging the only dry spot under the umbrella. Instead of trying to stay as dry as possible, the coparent hands over the umbrella entirely, thinking, "Maybe if I model sharing, they'll stop hogging the dry spot."

Spoiler: they don't.

If this sounds familiar, you're also seeing a well‑worn pattern play out, parents who lived in codependent dynamics pre‑separation keep running the same play post‑separation. They offer one‑sided concessions in the hope that "modeling" will inspire reciprocity.

It's a strange combination of aspirational self‑sabotage and empathic overfunctioning:

• Narrating the other parent's intentions more generously than the other parent narrates their own.

• Minimizing their own discomfort to avoid being labeled "difficult" or "uncooperative."

• Outsourcing their parenting judgment to the hope that the other parent will notice and change.

  
  

The coparent's empathy isn't broken. The system that rewards self‑erasure is.

The issue? That "modeling" isn't teaching the ex anything, ultimately, it's rewarding dysfunctional behavior. What it IS teaching the children is that this parent's needs are optional.

I've seen that the folks who shift out of this pattern often start by recognizing their over-giving as a kind of emotional reactivity centered in guilt. It's just presenting in a socially acceptable, pat yourself on the back sort of way.

The challenge is to begin connecting boundary-setting to self-worth rather than selfishness. And practicing intentional responses can help in preparing for future scenarios instead of hoping for different outcomes.

Bottom line: Innate well intentioned generosity can backfire and ghost a coparent's vulnerable sense of self.

Stay centered in your story, and you keep dry. Hand it over, and you disappear into the rain.

Author - Al Huntoon, Coparenting Conflict Specialist and author of “The Coparenting Compass”