15 Celebs Who’ve Gotten Candid About the Realities of Co-Parenting Post-Divorce

We're only a few weeks into 2022 and we already have our first shocking celebrity split. After 16 years together, Jason Momoa and Lisa Bonet announced that they are divorcing. It's unclear how long they've been separated, but their divorce announcement makes it clear that their co-parenting reality will be based on "our devotion unwavering to this sacred life and our children" and "teaching our children what's possible." They ended their statement with the wish, "May love prevail." Here's hoping they live up to the standard they are setting for themselves!

In a 2019 interview with Harper's Bazaar, the normally private Angelina Jolie revealed one of the challenges that co-parenting after a divorce can cause: the loss of freedom to move. She noted, "I would love to live abroad and will do so as soon as my children are 18. Right now I'm having to base where their father, [Brad Pitt], chooses to live."

Although Kourtney Kardashian and Scott Disick weren't legally married, the long-term couple did split in 2015, and since then they have been good role models for how to successfully co-parent. Though they've seemed to make it work, it hasn't been without challenges, something that the two dealt with in couples therapy after their split. As Kourtney explained, "The hardest part was when we both started new relationships. …We literally had to go to therapy to be able to, like, communicate together."

Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner have been divorced since 2015 and share custody of their three children. They've both been complimentary of each other's parenting since that time, and in 2017 Ben shared this simple but powerful truth about co-parenting: "If you recognize that you both have the best interests of the kids at heart, it's quite a special connection. We're the only two people in the world who care this much about these three kids."

A couple that is still in the early days of figuring out how to co-parent is reality star Lala Kent and Randall Emmett, who share a baby daughter named Ocean. The two split in October 2021, and currently only communicate via app, revealing the truth that co-parenting can involve staying in contact with someone who is disliked. "We communicate through an app, and it has just to do with Ocean. There was no closure at all when it came to my relationship and exiting it," Lala said. "Ocean is the main focus, and that's how we communicate. If it doesn't have to do with her, I have no desire to communicate with that person."

Kristin Cavallari revealed that it isn't always easy to know what co-parenting should look like, but that doing it well involves giving credit where credit is due. She posted this tribute to ex-husband Jay Cutler in 2020: "Modern family? Co-parenting? Whatever you want to call it, we are navigating it the best way we know how. And what I do know is, our three kids are lucky to have him as their daddy. Hopefully they all get a smidge of that heart of gold."

For singer Adele, co-parenting with her ex involves continuing to live close (she has shared that they live across the street from each other), continuing to have family traditions like movie nights, and sometimes having to answer really hard questions. In an interview with Vogue, she said: "He has so many simple questions for me that I can't answer because I don't know the answer. Like, Why can't we still live together? That's just not what people do when they get divorced. But why not? I'm like, I don't know. That's not what society does. And why don't you love my dad anymore? And I'd be like, I do love your dad. I'm just not in love. I can't make that make sense to a 9-year-old."

While Gywneth Paltrow usually promotes an image of having it all together and of being cool co-parents with her rock star ex Chris Martin, she confessed to pal Drew Barrymore that it's not always picture-perfect. "Some days it's not as good as it looks. We also have good days and bad days," she said.

Ryan Phillippe and Reese Witherspoon have been divorced since 2006 and are now in that space where they have been separated for longer than they were married. One thing that Ryan has confirmed is that good co-parenting is about being unselfish and always putting the kids first. He shared with Entertainment Tonight that a key to success is that people "have to get to that point as a divorced parent, as any parent, where you're not putting yourself first."

For David Arquette, who is co-parenting a daughter with ex-wife Courteney Cox, the experience of parenting has ebbs and flows. He admitted that the teenage years can be tough, sharing in 2020, "There're difficult parts, especially through the teenage years. There're a lot of emotions and feelings." But he said he and Courteney have made it work because they're "friends" and communicate a lot "because of Coco."

While sometimes effective co-parenting is a result of the parents being able to form a real friendship, sometimes it takes external help. When Jenna Dewan and Channing Tatum split up, their divorce agreement revealed that they not only use an app to coordinate schedules, but they also have a parenting coordinator to help them figure out how to resolve any schedule conflicts.

Co-parenting after divorce can be hard, so there is real value in giving credit where credit is due. Naomi Watts revealed that she is able to give both herself and ex-husband Liev Schreiber that credit. "I'm pretty proud of us, corny as that may sound," she said in 2019. "We've made it our absolute priority to be good and kind to each other and we're absolutely committed to that."

Jennifer Lopez has never been afraid of hard work, and she's been open about the fact that co-parenting with her ex Marc Anthony is a kind of work. "When my marriage ended, it was not easy to find forgiveness. It wasn't the dream that I had hoped for, and it would have been easier to fan the flames of resentment, disappointment, and anger," she told W magazine. "But Marc is the father of my children, and that's never going away. So I have to work to make things right. And that is, by far, the hardest work I do."

One of the co-parenting goals that Orlando Bloom said he has for his relationship with ex Miranda Kerr is to maintain the "remarkable relationship" and to keep their son from going "back through the internet where people have made up lies" about the couple. Sounds like a wise strategy.

Another celeb who doesn't sugarcoat how hard it is to co-parent after a divorce is Kelly Clarkson. In a conversation with Khloé Kardashian, who is also navigating the co-parenting waters, Kelly described it as "tough." "It's just a difficult thing because we're in different places, and it's like, we both agree on the main things, but it's a hard thing when you're not together all the time, for me personally," she told Khloé.