In her recent Vogue cover story, supermodel Gigi Hadid offered a rare glimpse into her co-parenting journey with ex Zayn Malik as they raise their 4-year-old daughter, Khai. Having navigated co-parenting two teenagers for over eight years, I found her candid insights strikingly familiar.
“Zayn and I do our custody schedules months in advance,” Hadid, 29, revealed in the interview. “That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t change here and there, but we help each other out and have each other’s backs.”
In my own co-parenting experience, balancing advanced planning with flexibility has been essential. What particularly stands out is Hadid’s commitment to approaching this relationship with “love, and a feeling of camaraderie” despite being in the public eye.
“There is the hard part of the world knowing this much, and thinking they know everything,” Hadid explained. “What we are interested in is raising our daughter together, with so much respect for each other.”
The unexpected benefits of co-parenting
While co-parenting comes with challenges (forgotten soccer cleats during transitions being a minor but frequent one in my household), there are unexpected benefits when parents prioritize respect and communication.
In my eight years of experience, I’ve watched my children develop relationships with a whole team of caring adults. Between parents, step-parents, and extended family, they have multiple perspectives and more people cheering them on at every milestone.
We’ve unintentionally modeled important life skills: respectful communication, compromise, and putting someone else’s needs above personal feelings. Now that my children are teenagers, this arrangement is simply their normal—and it’s a good one.
Related: Sweet co-parenting moment at gender reveal goes viral—and we love to see it
Finding what works
Every co-parenting family develops their own rhythm with transitions. While many families opt for a week-on, week-off schedule, my ex and I settled on a 2-2-3 arrangement (two days with me, two with their dad, then three with me, alternating the following week).
This means more transitions, but we live close to each other, and both kids have consistently told us that more than three days feels too long away from either parent. The key has been regular check-ins as they’ve grown and their needs have changed.
Hadid recognizes this need for adaptability, emphasizing that while she and Malik plan ahead, they remain flexible and support each other.
Making space for feelings
One truth I’ve learned is that children have big emotions about family changes, regardless of how harmoniously parents manage the situation. Hadid touched on this reality when she reflected on raising Khai: “We grow together. You wake up and do your best and you realize it is enough.”
This grace is essential for all parents—especially those navigating separate households. There’s no perfect approach, and transitions can trigger difficult emotions for children of any age. It’s vital to make space for those feelings without judgment.
Related: 5 tips for successful co-parenting, according to an expert
The bigger picture
What resonates most about Hadid’s perspective is her focus on what truly matters. As she put it, “What we are interested in is raising our daughter together, with so much respect for each other.”
That’s the lesson I hope my own teens have learned from our journey, just as Khai will likely learn from Gigi and Zayn: family takes many forms, but what matters most is how consistently we show up with love and respect.Co-parenting isn’t about perfect schedules or never disagreeing. It’s about showing children they are loved so completely that the adults in their lives will continuously work together to ensure they thrive—even when they’re physically apart.
