When Your Partner Won’t Set Boundaries With the Ex
BOUNDARIES
22 July 2025
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Your partner won’t set boundaries with his ex, and you’re the one paying the price.
Maybe he fears retaliation. Maybe he's terrified of conflict. Either way, it feels like the high conflict ex still has emotional control over your partner and far too much influence in your lives.
You’ve tried raising it gently. You’ve tried stepping in to help. But now you’re stuck in the middle and it’s affecting your relationship and your happiness.
In this episode, you’ll learn what’s really going on when your partner won’t stand up to her, and how to deal with this without more emotional burnout.
Key Takeaways
Most partners and ex-partners of high conflict people have been conditioned to avoid conflict at all costs, they've seen how bad it gets and learned that avoiding conflict equals peace.
To start a conversation with him, pick a calm moment, start with "I'd like us to be on the same page about how we handle her", and share how the behaviour affects you rather than criticising him directly.
If nothing changes, stepping back from managing his co-parenting relationship isn't abandoning him, it's refusing to keep helping to hold a broken system together.
Things might get messier when you step back, and that's not your failure, it's revealing what the system actually looks like without you helping.
You don't need your partner to be all-in for things to change, when you start showing up differently, that is contagious.
Next Steps
If you've ever felt like nobody actually gets what this is like:
→ I do. Join my list. My emails are where I share things I don't share anywhere else (because I don’t just teach this stuff, I actually live it).
Hi, I'm Kellie
I'm a stepmum of two, high conflict survivor and a certified coach. I help stepmums handle the sh*t that comes with the ex, with no-BS strategies that actually work (I know because I use them myself).