Co-parenting

In a recent essay titled, “ Split Family, Shared Responsibility ,” Oregonian columnist S. Renee Mitchell discusses her experience sending her boys off to another city to live with their dad.

“When I decided to divorce my children’s father and move to Portland when our twins were 2, I thought I was the only parent Alex and Zavier would ever need,” she wrote. “I was mistaken.

“No matter how much love I poured into my children’s hearts, my sons were starving with ‘father hunger’ for the man named Lee, who named them and held them when they were just a few seconds old.”

Divorce and separation can often be difficult for children. How can we help these kids cope? For those of you who have experienced the end of a marriage or relationship, how did you and your ex figure out how to share parenting responsibilities while living in separate households?