We want to move co-parenting out of the category of “something you hope works out” and into the category of “a set of learnable skills.” We also want to be honest about what usually goes wrong. It’s not always that people are cruel. Often, they are underdeveloped for the complexity they’ve been handed.

By Kenneth Braswell, CEO, Fathers Incorporated

Co-parenting maturity is the quiet difference between a child who grows up having to interpret tension and a child who grows up protected from it. It is the difference between “We can’t stand each other” and “We will not let our issues become our child’s atmosphere.”

At Fathers Incorporated (FI), we’ve learned to care far more about the co-parenting relationship than the romantic one. Romance can fade, restart, or end completely. However, once a child is born, co-parenting requires a lifelong connection. Romantic love may be optional, but responsibility is not. And that responsibility requires a particular kind of grown-up. Not a perfect parent. A mature one.

FI defines co-parenting the way we teach it in our Gentle Warriors Academy (GWA): It’s the level of conflict, cooperation, and support between two parents, regardless of the romantic status of the relationship.

This definition matters because it tells the truth without insulting anyone. It acknowledges that many parents are not together, may never be together again, and still must build a functional “parenting team” that can handle real-life decisions about daycare, school, medical care, faith, culture, discipline, schedules, transportation, money, and more.

When co-parenting maturity is low, the child becomes the messenger, the referee, and the emotional shock absorber. When co-parenting maturity is high, the child gets to be a child.

This is why we’re building “Dad and Company: Strengthening the Parenting Team.” We want to move co-parenting out of the category of “something you hope works out” and into the category of “a set of learnable skills.” We also want to be honest about what usually goes wrong. It’s not always that people are cruel. Often, they are underdeveloped for the complexity they’ve been handed.

Research has been telling us for years that the early season after a child’s birth is filled with hope and connection, even for unmarried parents. In the Fragile Families research, large shares of unmarried parents report being romantically involved at the time of birth, a kind of early optimism that gives families a real window for strengthening the parenting alliance before relationship instability surfaces. However, we know that many of these relationships shift over time, with unions dissolving at high rates by the child’s fifth birthday. This isn’t a reason for shame but for strategy.

If we know that many couples will fall out of love, the smartest thing we can do is build co-parenting maturity early, while goodwill still exists, while routines are still forming, while a father’s desire to be present is still fresh, and while a mother is still learning what kind of father she can trust him to be. This window of opportunity can’t exist on autopilot. It has to be optimized intentionally.

Co-parenting maturity is not a vibe. It’s behavior: emotional regulation in conflict, discipline in communication, and consistency in follow-through. It’s a parent who can hear something difficult without choosing warfare. It’s a parent who protects the child from adult pain.

And yes, co-parenting style is shaped by personal history. The way a child’s parents were parented matters. The models they saw matter. Their experiences with abandonment, betrayal, poverty, incarceration, child support, and family court all shape how they interpret disrespect and danger. FI’s own research has shown how strained or hostile co-parenting relationships can deter a father’s involvement, especially when the parents are no longer romantically involved.

So the question becomes practical: How do we gauge co-parenting maturity up front, and how do we build it?

Here are three assessment indicators that reveal early on whether a co-parenting relationship has the maturity to establish and sustain peace.

1. Do the co-parents practice child-first decision-making, even when under stress?

Mature co-parenting is tested most when things get tense. Anybody can be agreeable when life is easy. The test is what happens when parents are tired, broke, triggered, dating someone new, or feeling disrespected.

A mature parenting team can answer this question without hesitation: “Which choice protects our child’s stability, not our pride?” It sounds simple, but it requires discipline. It means parents do not make major decisions as revenge. They do not use access, money, schedules, or information as weapons. They do not negotiate with an eye toward punishing one another.

A quick way to assess the presence or absence of child-first decision-making skills is to listen to language. When parents say, “I’m going to make sure…” with the goal of hurting the other parent, the parenting team is not mature yet. But parents who say, “We need to figure out what’s best for the child and how we can both support it,” signal their co-parenting maturity.

2. Do the co-parents repair capacity after conflict?

All co-parents will have conflict. The question is whether they also have repair. Mature co-parenting is not the absence of disagreement but the ability to resolve it without collateral damage.

Repair requires humility. It requires a willingness to say: “I came in too hot. I misunderstood you. I should have told you earlier. I see how that landed. Let’s reset.”

This is not weakness. This is leadership. FI’s work consistently emphasizes communication practices that reduce conflict and keep conversations productive: planning ahead, choosing the right time, using “I” statements, listening actively, and staying focused on the issue rather than the history.

If a co-parenting relationship has no repair, then every disagreement becomes a new layer of resentment. That resentment becomes a climate felt by children, even when nobody speaks it.

3. Is there reliability and trust in the co-parenting relationship?

Maturity is proven in the everyday. The strength of the parenting team is measured by its reliability.

Trust is not built through speeches but when a parent does what they said they would do: on-time pick-ups, honest updates, consistent routines, clear boundaries, and respect for agreements. Trust grows when one parent can say: “Even when we disagree, I know you’re not going to play with my child’s emotions.”

If there is chronic unreliability, constant last-minute changes, or repeated broken commitments with no accountability, the parenting team is fragile. Not because people are evil, but because the structure is unstable.

Tips for Mature Co-Parenting

None of these indicators is meant to label a parent as “good” or “bad.” They are meant to tell the truth about readiness. Co-parenting maturity is a skill set that can be developed.

So how do parents get there?

Start with a shared parenting purpose statement. 

Before schedules, money, or new partners enter the conversation, parents need one sentence they both agree to protect. This can be something like: “Our child deserves consistency, respect, and peace from both homes, and we will not use our child as a tool in our conflict.” When parents can’t agree on anything else, they can return to their purpose statement.

Create a communication protocol that limits damage. 

Most co-parenting conflict is not about any particular issue. It’s about the approach. Parents argue in the worst ways: sarcasm, late-night texts, passive aggression, vague accusations, or public embarrassment. This is immaturity expressing itself.

Mature co-parents agree on basic guardrails for communication:

• A single channel for child-related communication
• A reasonable response time
• A boundary against insults and name-calling
• A commitment to confirm plans in writing
• A rule that the child never carries messages

This aligns with the practical strategies FI has offered for years: 

• Listen objectively.
• Communicate with empathy.
• Be compassionate.
• Stop petty disagreements.
• Stop making decisions independently.
• Stop involving family and friends in the conflict.

Build emotional regulation as a parenting skill.

Many adults have never been taught how to stay calm in difficult conversations. They were taught how to win, dominate, withdraw, or explode. Co-parenting maturity requires each parent to control their emotions. Not silence. Control.

If co-parents can’t talk without escalating, they’re not ready for joint decision-making without proper support (coaching, tools, and practice).

This is one reason Fathers Incorporated’s programming pairs education with supportive services. Data captured in our GWA model show that, with these supports, fathers’ well-being as parents improved significantly, even when other parenting and co-parenting measures were slower to shift. That matters because regulated parents make better decisions.

Define the role of the support team before the support team defines you.

Friends and family can be helpful, but unmanaged influence becomes gasoline. Too many co-parenting relationships collapse because third parties become decision makers, emotional amplifiers, or constant commentators.

Mature co-parenting means the support team supports, but does not steer. Parents must work together to set boundaries, such as:

• No disparaging the other parent in front of the child.
• No using relatives as messengers.
• No allowing new partners to become voices of discipline or conflict.
• No “group chat parenting” where every disagreement becomes a public trial.

A child should never feel like their life is being voted on by adults.

Put safety first, without exception.

Any conversation about maturity must be clear about safety. FI’s work here has been consistent: The safety of individual family members is paramount, and violence is never acceptable as a way to control, coerce, punish, retaliate, or handle conflict.

Co-parenting maturity does not mean staying connected to danger. It does not mean “working it out” in situations involving coercion, abuse, intimidation, or violence. A parenting plan must protect survivors and children. A child’s stability should never be purchased with anyone’s safety.

This is part of what makes Dad and Company necessary. We built our training modules for the real world, not the fantasy world. Our curriculum assumes parents will face conflict. It assumes transitions will happen. It assumes emotions will run high. And then it trains fathers and their support circles to lead anyway.

Co-parenting maturity is leadership. It is the ability to say: “I will not let my anger set the temperature in my child’s life. I will not let my pride become my child’s burden. I can be hurt and still be responsible.”

And when this maturity is present, something powerful happens. Fathers stay involved longer. Mothers experience less stress. Children experience fewer loyalty binds. The parenting team becomes a protective factor, even when the romance is gone.

Dad and Company is our bet on that future.

One last thought: Many parents treat co-parenting like a mood that comes and goes. Mature parents treat it like a craft. A craft you practice. A craft you train for. A craft you do on purpose.