Books?

[Dovetail]

DH has teens who are in the middle more than ever right now. Any tried and true books on how to navigate this age & trying to coparent with a PDex?

[Penny Lane]

Yes! This question is my jam!

Don't Alienate the Kids! By Bill Eddy and Co Parenting with a Toxic Ex by Amy Baker and Paul Fine. Both of these directly address what you're asking about. (Eddy and Baker both have books specifically about the divorce process. Less about coparenting issues but if your DH ever finds himself in court they might be helpful to read especially if you're not super familiar with the court system). Eddy talks about building resilience in kids specifically to bolster them against alienation from the other parent, and I found that to be super helpful.

If things are pretty extreme, Divorce Poison by Richard Warshak is also good although if things are not as extreme (I mean everything with a PD is extreme, extreme even on the spectrum of extreme behaviors) it might kind of scare you.

And specifically as it comes to helping the kids deal with it, I like the Love and Logic parenting series as well as How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk. Both have books focused on teenagers and Love and Logic has a stepparenting book as well. I like these series because they focus on how to help kids build the skills they will need in life. And when you're coparenting with a PD, you lose so much control over so much of the kids' lives, the best thing you can do is make sure they have the skills they need to survive and hopefully thrive. These books give you the tools to help them get the tools they need. Obviously regular parenting books don't contemplate the dynamic of helping kids deal with an abusive parent, like the previous ones do. So there will be areas where you have to say, you know what regular good parenting isn't going to serve me here. But using these skills with the kids in the non-PD areas of their lives will help them get through the PDs.

These four books, no joke, laid the foundation for me as a stepmother and me and DH as a parenting unit. They've been instrumental in my entire philosophy of how to handle an impossible situation. I hope some of them can help you as much as they helped me.