Paloma Faith: I don't believe in word 'co-parent' because it's never 50/50

Paloma Faith didn’t mince her words as she discussed her experience single parenting during an appearance on ITV’s Lorraine on Wednesday.

The singer, 42, shares two daughters with ex-husband Leyman Lahcine, who she acknowledges he is an “amazing” father who spends time with their children.

But she said she does not like the word “co-parenting”.

Appearing on ITV’s Lorraine to promote her first ever book MILF: Motherhood, Identity, Love and F*ckery, she explained: “I don't like the word ‘co-parent’ because ‘co’ implies to me that it's 50/50 and I don't believe it ever is.

“Unless, there are some anomalies, and there are men who write to me who are like, ‘I don't like the fact you say that’ and there are definitely some men pulling the main bulk of the work, but in majority of cases, the kind of unspoken silent mental load that a mother does and usually timewise, it's not 50/50 either,” she continued.

“I'm not saying that I don't think that my children's father is amazing but I think it's quite important that we acknowledge what's actually happening, which is that women are doing too much. So I don't use the word ‘co-parent’, I say ‘oh my kids go to their dad’s a few nights a week’ and I'm so happy that they do that and that they've got a lovely father, but let's not over compliment them because they do get that all the time… Let’s not over applaud them for actually parenting.”

The How To Leave A Man hit-maker’s book is released on June 6 and sees her open up on everything from her IVF journey and traumatic births to the breakdown of her marriage.

The former The Voice UK judge told host Lorraine Kelly that a lot of people have been “shocked” by how open she has been in her writing.

“There's loads of stuff about my confusion about the way that the patriarchy has kind of taken feminism as a kind of other way to over complicate women's lives and make us burn out because I actually think the kind of dream of having a career and kids sounds amazing but I feel like the patriarchy has lumbered us with too much to do,” she said.

“A lot of women I know, who have small children like me, are burnt out - me included. And then we get called snappy or we get called grumpy, or she's hormonal and actually that's quite dismissive and not fair because we are oversubscribed. “