You cannot control how your ex behaves. If you could, you probably would not be divorced. What you can control is the structure you put around your contact with him, and structure is what turns a difficult ex from a daily source of chaos into a manageable, if annoying, fact of life. This post is about building that structure, one practical piece at a time.
The core idea is simple. Stop trying to have a good relationship with a difficult person, and start running your communication like a business instead. Businesses do not need warmth to function. They need clear channels, clear terms, and records.
Treat it like a business relationship
When you loved him, you communicated to feel close. Now the purpose has changed. You communicate to exchange information and to keep shared obligations running, usually about children, money, or property. That is it. When you accept that the goal is function and not connection, a lot of the pain drains out of it, because you stop hoping for an understanding he was never going to give.
Picture how you would email a vendor you find frustrating but cannot fire. Polite, brief, factual, on the record. You do not pour your heart out to a vendor, and you do not expect one to validate your feelings. That same posture protects you here.
Control the channel and the tempo
A difficult ex thrives on chaos: surprise phone calls, doorstep confrontations, a flood of messages at midnight. Take those away by choosing how and when you communicate.
- Pick one channel, ideally written, so there is a record and a built in pause. A co parenting app or a single email thread works well.
- Set a rhythm. You check and respond once a day, not the instant a message lands.
- Keep each message to one topic and a few sentences. Long messages invite long fights.
- Move anything heated into writing, where you can edit out the heat before you send.
You are not being cold. You are removing the friction points where conflict usually ignites.
Write the way a difficult ex cannot use against you
Assume anything you write could be read aloud someday, by a mediator, a lawyer, or a judge. That is not paranoia; it is good discipline, and it happens to produce calmer messages. A helpful format is often called BIFF: brief, informative, friendly, and firm.
Answer the practical question, leave out the history, skip the defense, and stop. If a message does not move a real task forward, it probably does not need to be sent at all.
When he sends three paragraphs of accusation, you are allowed to reply to the one logistical sentence buried inside and ignore the rest. You are not obligated to correct the record every time.
Keep the children out of the middle
If you share kids, the single most protective thing you can do is keep your conflict away from them. Children should never be messengers, spies, or sounding boards for adult grievances. The American Psychological Association has clear, research grounded guidance on divorce and child custody, and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry offers a plain, parent friendly summary on children and divorce. Both underline the same point: shielding kids from adult conflict frees them to love both parents.
Know the line between difficult and dangerous
Difficult means frustrating, stubborn, and slow to cooperate. Structure and patience handle difficult. But if your ex is threatening, stalking, or using contact to control or frighten you, that is a different category, and it is not something you should be expected to manage with better email habits. Please visit our Get Help page, and know that legal information and support are available through WomensLaw and confidential help through the National Domestic Violence Hotline.
Steadiness is the long game
A difficult ex is often waiting for you to lose your composure so he can point to it. Your calm, boring, businesslike consistency is not just self protection; over months it quietly changes the dynamic, because there is nothing to fight when one side keeps declining the fight.
If you want the exact phrasing for the messages you dread, from scheduling clashes to guilt trips to the ones about money, the What to Say book gives you calm, ready scripts you can make your own. You do not have to invent each reply under pressure.
Keep reading: When You Still Have Feelings for Your Ex After Divorce and How to Reach Indifference About Your Ex.
If you want the whole plan in the right order, start with Burn the Wedding Dress, the main book.