01 Decide what the message is for
A message between two homes does one of three jobs: it passes on information, it asks for a decision, or it proposes a change. Trouble starts when a message tries to do a fourth thing, which is to make a point.
Before sending anything, name the job. If the message is information, it needs no opinion. If it is a request, it needs a question mark and a deadline. If it is a proposal, it needs an option the other person can say yes to.
Messages that fail this test are usually the ones written within an hour of something annoying. That hour is the single most productive delay available to a shared family.
02 A format that works
Keep it to five lines. Say what has happened or what is needed, give the date, give the option, and stop. Do not open with a greeting that carries tone, and do not close with a sign off that does either.
Use one channel and stick to it. Two channels mean two threads, and the important message is always in the other one. A shared calendar handles the dates, as described in the shared family calendar, and the messages handle everything the calendar cannot.
Write it, then read it as though it had been sent to you by someone you neither like nor dislike. That single reread removes most of what would have caused a reply you did not want.
| Job | What not to send | What to send |
|---|---|---|
| Inform | A description of a difficult evening | Ate at six, in bed by eight, cough started Sunday |
| Ask | A general complaint about kit | PE kit is here. Can it come back Thursday? |
| Propose | A demand for a different Saturday | Could we swap 14 and 21 November? Either suits me |
03 Never route messages through a child
Asking a child to pass on a message, however small, puts them in a position they should never occupy. It also fails on its own terms, because eight year olds are unreliable postmen and the message arrives in a form neither adult recognises.
The same applies to reading messages in front of a child, and to the running commentary that adults sometimes supply while typing. Children read tone far more accurately than content.
Keep the channel adult to adult, and keep the doorstep for the child. That separation is the same one that makes handovers that work.
04 When a thread starts going wrong
Threads deteriorate in a recognisable way: the messages get longer, the paragraphs multiply, and the subject drifts from Thursday to history. The remedy is mechanical rather than emotional.
Stop replying in the thread. Send one short message that answers only the practical question, and answer nothing else. If there is nothing practical left in it, do not send anything at all. A thread with no fuel goes out.
If the same subject recurs three times, it is a plan problem rather than a message problem, and it should go to the annual review described in writing a parenting plan rather than being relitigated by text.
More like this
Co-parenting
