Halle Berry And Ex Still Using Daughter To Lash Out At Each Other, This Time Via Her Hair

Actress Halle Berry sought a court ruling this week to prevent her ex, Gabriel Aubry from doing further things to their six-year-old daughter Nahla‘s hair to make it look more Caucasian. Co-parenting is often difficult, but there are some things parents should be able to work out without a judge, and how your child wears their hair is one of them.

According to TMZ, Berry sought intervention by the court after Aubry highlighted and straightened  Nahla’s naturally curly hair without consulting with Berry first. Though Berry was not present for the hearing, TMZ reports that through her lawyer, it was represented that Berry feels Aubry did this to Nahla’s hair in an attempt to make the little girl look less African-American. The court ruled in Berry’s favor, ordering the parties to allow Nahla’s hair to grow back naturally.

This is not the first time Berry and Aubry have been in court over their custody woes. This past January, they made headlines when Berry was ordered to pay $16,000 a month in child support. 

Berry and Aubry share legal custody of the minor child, meaning that they need to agree on all major decisions regarding her health, education and welfare. While most states don’t specifically spell out hair care under the list of things parents must agree upon before one of them acts, I don’t think Berry was out of line here. Personally, I’m not comfortable calling this a race issue without seeing court documents or a transcript that supports that accusation, (but if that’s true, I’m disgusted and disturbed) however I think any parent could reasonably object to having chemical processes done on a six-year-old’s head. And while we don’t know how little Nahla felt about changing her hair, the fact that Aubry used his daughter as little more than tool to upset his ex is appalling.

Raising a child with someone you no longer want to be in a relationship with is difficult. I worked in family court for years and I can count on one hand the number of times I saw couples who were really happy co-parenting. But being hard isn’t an excuse for not trying. These two need to suck it up and start communicating with each other. Sure, they are fortunate enough to have the funds to pay their lawyers every time they want to run to court, but I think they need to consider if that’s really the most effective use of their resources. Their little girl is only six, which leaves them years to go before she becomes an adult and they are through with each other. Honestly, assuming Nahla wants to have a relationship with her parents as an adult after being treated as a pawn in their chess match, they will never truly be out of each other’s lives, so the sooner they can figure out how to work together, the better.

Here’s hoping they can take a break from acting classes and premieres long enough to attend some co-parenting counseling sessions.

(Image via Twitter)