California Divorce What Is Included In The Divorce Judgment
Today we’re talking about child custody and parenting plans and the different ways you can go about determining that.
We handle a large volume of cases in California and I wanted to address this because it’s a big part of getting a divorce which is dealing with your children, if you have them obviously.
And that is what kind of parenting plan are you going to come up with after you’re divorced. What kind of parenting plan, who’s going to have custody, the visitation and do you even need a parenting plan. That’s what I’m going to talk about.
When it comes to going through a divorce and we’re talking about divorce is where you’re trying to work through this amicably, more of a friendly divorce, you’re not going to court and have a long drawn out argument.
If you’re going to come into an agreement, the courts will allow you to pretty much agree to everything as it pertains to children regarding the parenting plan and it really just depends on you and what you agreed with your spouse on how you want to care for your children.
Let me give you some examples, first of all you can have a very specific child custody and visitation plan, a parenting plan if you will. That basically indicates every minute of the day of your children whose care they’ll be in for instance.
It could be that so specific that it says “husband is to have custody on alternating weekends from 5PM on Friday to 8PM on Sunday and a weekday visit on Wednesdays from 4PM until 9PM”. You can get very specific.
You can even indicate who is going to pick them up, who is responsible for transportation. You can get really, really detailed and really grind it out if you want.
Where we see that happening, not so much on what we do but when I worked for a law firm in the past where people are battling in and out, fighting for every inch. We see very specific child custody and visitation agreement or orders.
The other way to go is to say, and I had people straight out say this, “I don’t want the court involved in our ability and decision making on how we raise our kids and custody and visitation.”
So you don’t have to have a specific custody and visitation agreement if that is something that will work with you and your spouse.
You can simply say, we want joint legal and joint physical custody and as far as who’s going to have them, when and for how long is going to be determined on an on-going basis and the best interest of our children and leave it at that.
That way, it’s open for you guys to make decisions as you forward. Who’s going to pick them up, who’s going to have them, when it’s going to be and so forth?
And kind of be adults about the situation and probably treat is as you did when you were married if you’re able to have that on-going ability to communicate effectively after you’re divorced.
I just want to talk about those two differences in ways you can go. In our business, we see a lot of open ended custody and visitation or folks just wanted to continue on with raising their children the way they did without any court intervention or specific orders telling them what they have to do.
Tim Blankenship, divorce661.com. Go to our website for more information. I’d be happy to help you with your divorce in California, that’s what we’re specialized in.