Co-parenting with a narcissist
Divorce is murder on everyone. And unfortunately, the worst is yet to come in cases where kids are involved. Any co-operative, co-parenting arrangement in place is usually an exception rather than the rule. After a divorce, one person typically recovers quicker. The greater the difference between the former couple’s personal, social and economic happiness, the greater the strife. Support payments notwithstanding, the path to a new life often has less to do with money and more to do with recovery from the hurt and betrayal. Sometimes even the simplest, most pragmatic decisions for a child can end in unnecessary and contentious discourse. And when your former spouse weaponizes your child, it becomes impossible for you to maintain any workable relationship requiring you to change your rules of engagement. I have friends who live with this occasionally and I have friends who live with this daily. I’m somewhere in between.
Your first action is to commiserate. That’s right, you are not the first man to exit a bliss-less, sexless and mindless relationship only to leave behind, partly or fully, a helpless daughter. Your pain is known to many. Talk to your buddies. Talk to a shrink. When you realize that you are not alone, you will find strength in numbers to pivot your life. A decision was made to end a relationship that no longer served you. You were living within her limitations and couldn’t grow. Ending it was a courageous declaration that you wanted something better. It’s not being alone you are afraid of, it’s the idea of the unknown that gives you pause. Big difference.
Your second action is to grow a spine. Much of this has to do with knowing where your boundaries end and where the other’s begins. While hell hath no fury like the wrath of a woman scorned, that is no longer your problem. Your problem is how you to keep your wits about yourself during your daughter’s upbringing. Admit that while you were shaken, you remain unstirred. You were not responsible for your spouse’s happiness. And it’s unrealistic to think that you should have been. It’s also immature for anyone to think that another can provide this for them. Now that the marriage is over, you should be even less inclined to be concerned about her happiness or her spite. But because you have a child, your boundaries must be undoubtedly clear and it must encompass your daughter’s best interest. Anyone crossing them will bear the consequences.
When your former spouse weaponizes your child and is hell-bent on extracting all sorts of redress to ensure your happiness never exceeds hers, you will have to change your rules of engagement.
Your third action is to end the mentality of appeasement. Often guys in relationship acquiesce to their significant other’s decisions not because they can’t make one, but because they have no preference for a particular outcome. Chinese or Indian take-out? Both are acceptable. Comedy or suspense on movie night? Well, let’s Netflix and chill. After a divorce, your flexibility and accommodation towards things will be interpreted as indecision and choices will not be made in your favor. So even if you have no preference, don’t abdicate your choice which will leave you with limited options. Making compromises and monetary concessions will only signal that you are willing to make peace with money. You’ll never have enough. And at the very best, you have a ceasefire. Anything worth keeping is worth fighting for. Your access and your time with your daughter are not table scraps. You are not an outsider needing to ask for permission.
Your final action is to not to parent like you’re a single-parent, but to parent like you’re the only-parent. While my buddies and I might bitch about how awful our ex’s are to us in our daddy drinking club, we never speak badly about our ex in front of our daughters. Regardless of your emotions, your ex is still your daughter’s mother and she loves her—even though I have to detox my daughter when she comes back to my house. I have so little expectations from my ex-wife that I just assume my daughter goes off to a boarding school when she’s not with me every other week. At least she gets three square meals, a shower and a bed each day and we don’t often talk about what happens at the other house. Personally, it’s been acrimonious to arrange anything with my ex who is hell-bent on clawing redress from me whether it is tangible (usually more money) or intangible (my happiness must not exceed hers). But my disengagement only invites more harassment. Now, I’m only minimally involved in the essential email exchanges and focus the rest of my time being a dad. My daughter is 9 years-old now. In nine more, she’ll legally be an adult. She’ll be in college and then a job. This means her mom and I will only be splitting those few 9 years in half. I hope to have many more, but that’s 4 or 5 more birthday parties; that’s 4 or 5 more Christmas mornings as children; that’s 4 or 5 more summer vacations. Time will fly and it is my choice not to waste a single moment focusing on the small and insignificant, but to keep an eye to the horizon.
Loving a child are table stakes; but being involved is the actual work. As her dad, you are arguably the most important person in her life because she looks for your approval and will use you as the yard stick to measure all other men in her life. Let her imprint on your unceasing devotion and unwavering defense. When she sees that you’ve never given up on her, she’ll learn never to give up on herself. That will stay with her forever. And isn’t this what you’re fighting for?