Parenting across two households can be difficult even when parents communicate well. In high conflict situations, the challenge is not simply disagreement. It is the pattern that develops when communication repeatedly escalates, decisions become gridlocked, and children begin to feel the emotional weight of ongoing tension between their parents.
Coparenting work at my practice is intentionally hands on and highly structured. This is not a process where parents simply attend sessions, describe what went wrong during the week, and leave without meaningful change. High conflict dynamics tend to repeat in real time, most often through written communication, rapid escalation, and cycles of accusation and defensiveness. For that reason, my work focuses on the actual interaction patterns that keep parents stuck, and it emphasizes practical intervention that helps parents change what they are doing while they are doing it. Coparenting counseling is a structured, child centered process that helps parents reduce conflict, strengthen boundaries, and develop more workable ways to manage communication and decision making. The goal is not to improve the past relationship. The goal is to improve the parenting relationship so children can have greater stability, emotional safety, and freedom from adult conflict.
Coparenting counseling for high conflict and highly litigated cases focused on reducing escalation, improving written communication, and protecting children from conflict
In most cases, I require a formalized legal framework that defines custody and parenting time, such as a court Order, mediation term sheet, or Marital Settlement Agreement. In select matters, I may exercise discretion to become involved pre-litigation when early intervention is likely to reduce escalation and prevent protracted legal conflict. Because this work is designed for high conflict dynamics, I am selective in the pre-litigation matters I accept.
Cooperative Coparenting and Parallel Parenting
Many parents arrive in this process believing that “coparenting therapy” means they are expected to become friendly, emotionally aligned, or cooperative in the way intact families often are. In highly litigated cases, that expectation can feel unrealistic and can create immediate resistance. That is not the goal here. The goal is not reconciliation. The goal is functional, child centered parenting across two homes.
Cooperative coparenting is the optimal model when parents have the ability to communicate respectfully and make shared decisions without repeated escalation. In a cooperative model, parents can exchange information directly, problem solve efficiently, and maintain consistency for the child across households. This model often includes more flexibility, more shared planning, and more direct collaboration. It is beneficial for children when it is genuinely achievable because it reduces stress and supports continuity.
Parallel parenting is a different model, and it is often the most appropriate approach in high conflict situations. Parallel parenting recognizes that frequent direct communication can increase conflict and expose children to adult tension. The focus is on reducing contact between parents, creating predictable structure, and keeping communication limited, neutral, and purposeful. Parents may function more independently in day to day parenting while still meeting the child’s needs and adhering to the legal framework. The purpose is to disengage from conflict.
Most court involved and highly litigated cases are not starting from a cooperative place, and many may never become cooperative in the relational sense. That is expected. In this work, “cooperative” does not mean you have to feel cooperative. It means you are able to communicate in a way that is businesslike, proposal focused, and child centered, even when you do not trust or like the other parent. In other words, the standard is not emotional closeness. The standard is functional behavior. Whether a family is working toward a more cooperative model over time or operating primarily within a parallel parenting framework, the skills remain the same. The process is designed to reduce escalation, strengthen boundaries, and help parents move from conflict based interaction to clearer proposals, clearer decision making, and more stable parenting for the benefit of their children.
Grounded in the New Ways for Families Approach
My coparenting work is grounded in the New Ways for Families method, an evidence-informed approach developed specifically for high conflict family systems. It is skills based by design. Rather than relying on insight oriented or process oriented coparenting therapy, this model focuses on helping parents build practical capacities that predict better outcomes in high conflict cases: increased flexibility in thinking, improved emotion regulation, moderated behavior, and realistic self reflection.
New Ways for Families draws from principles that are consistent with dialectical behavior therapy, a well established psychological intervention that emphasizes skills for managing intense emotions, reducing impulsive or escalatory behavior, and communicating effectively under stress. This framework is particularly well suited to highly litigated coparenting matters because the parents who end up in entrenched conflict often present with rigid narratives, high reactivity, difficulty tolerating distress, and interaction patterns that escalate quickly once communication begins. In these cases, the problem is not simply disagreement about parenting. The problem is the predictable cycle that occurs when stress, mistrust, and emotion driven communication repeatedly derail decision making.
This is also why my work is intentionally structured and skills focused. In high conflict cases, traditional joint coparenting therapy without a specialized, evidence informed framework is often contraindicated. When therapy becomes a forum for competing narratives, emotional reactivity, or attempts to obtain validation from a clinician, it can intensify blame, reinforce polarization, and increase children’s exposure to adult conflict. In contrast, a skills based model creates containment. It prioritizes clear structure, behavior change, and child focused problem solving, so parents are learning how to function differently rather than repeatedly reliving the same conflicts in session. In my practice, these skills are applied directly to the real situations parents are navigating, including decision making, difficult exchanges, and written communication. The goal is to help parents shift from reactive, conflict based interaction to more intentional, child centered parenting behavior that is sustainable over time.
Would Parallel Parenting Work For Your Family?
A Forward Focused, Structured Process
I begin by meeting with each parent individually to understand communication patterns, recurring friction points, and the issues that most often pull parents into escalation. When a parenting application is already in place, I may review communication there when it is clinically necessary to assess the problem, identify what is maintaining the conflict, and determine what is most likely to be productive. This review is targeted and purposeful; it is not routine monitoring.
From there, I determine the next best steps. In some cases, the work begins with individual skills building sessions intended to reduce reactivity and strengthen communication capacity before any joint work occurs. In other cases, a transition to joint coparenting sessions may be appropriate earlier. Every case is different, and the structure is guided by what I believe is clinically necessary and likely to produce progress. If joint sessions are likely to be unproductive or destabilizing, we do not proceed in that format.
Depending on the needs of the case, I may also take a more active coaching and containment role between sessions, particularly around time sensitive parenting issues that commonly trigger escalation. In those situations, parents may ask for support with specific communication threads that are becoming protracted or unproductive. When clinically indicated, I may review the relevant exchange within the parenting application and provide structured, solution focused guidance in live time through joint email, with the goal of helping parents shift from reactive exchange to clearer proposals, clearer responses, and more effective decision making.
Parenting Applications and Real Time Communication Support
In many high conflict cases, the parenting application becomes the primary arena where escalation occurs. When a parenting app is part of the coparenting structure, professional access allows the work to remain anchored in the real communication patterns that are affecting the children and driving conflict. My use of the application is limited to what is clinically necessary. I do not monitor communications as a routine practice, and I do not read broadly through parents’ correspondence. The focus is on specific threads that parents identify as problematic, or on targeted review that supports assessment, skills building, and forward progress. When support is needed, the emphasis is on helping parents reduce unnecessary engagement and communicate in a way that is brief, child focused, emotionally neutral and solution facing, not to police either parent or to litigate message content.
Confidentiality and The Meaning of Alternative Dispute Resolution
Coparenting counseling in this context is considered a form of alternative dispute resolution, which means it is a structured process used to reduce parenting related conflict outside of the courtroom. Parents are often referred into this work because ongoing adversarial interaction is making it difficult to resolve routine parenting issues without repeated legal involvement. A central purpose of this kind of process is to create a protected space for problem solving, so that parents can work toward solutions without turning each discussion into the next round of litigation.
Even when a case is court Ordered and I am appointed by Order or by the parties’ joint consent, the process is generally confidential. Absent both parties’ joint consent, communications with my office, including email correspondence and the content of sessions, are not intended to be used in court or litigation and are not shared outside of the process. Confidentiality does not mean that progress cannot be formalized. If parents reach specific agreements and both parents provide joint consent, those agreements can be put in writing and shared with counsel. In some matters, a court Order may specifically require that I provide limited information to the judge, such as attendance, participation, or a narrow update. When that is part of the appointment, it is stated in the order at the outset so that all parties understand what information will be shared and the limits of that disclosure. Outside of what is explicitly authorized, the work remains a confidential problem solving process.
It is also important for parents to understand how confidentiality works inside the process. Coparenting counseling is not individual therapy, and there is no confidentiality between coparents. This means information shared in individual meetings may be brought into the work when clinically necessary to support progress and resolution. I do not share information in a covert or punitive way, and I do not function as a messenger between parents. The goal is to support direct, healthier communication within a structured process, not to facilitate indirect or triangulated communication.
Appropriateness and Process Considerations
If there is a restraining Order in place, I do not proceed with joint sessions or joint email communication unless the order explicitly permits participation in this process as an exception. If I have reason to believe that this structured intervention is not clinically appropriate or is unlikely to be productive given the circumstances of the case, including the legal constraints in effect and the parents’ ability to participate in a structured process in a way that allows meaningful progress, I will place my recommendations in writing identifying a more suitable alternative approach for counsel or the court to consider.
Insurance and Fee Structure
Coparenting counseling is not a medically necessary clinical service and is not covered by health insurance. Services are offered on a private pay basis and are handled on a retainer model. An initial retainer is required before services begin, and all professional time is billed against that retainer. As the retainer is spent down, replenishment is required in order to continue services. For current rates and retainer requirements, please contact the practice directly.