How Much Say Do I Have in What Happens during My Former Partner's Parenting Time?

 Posted on August 04, 2016 in Child Custody

In most instances, not much. Your former partner has as much of a right to build and maintain a meaningful relationship with your child as you have. During their time together, your child and your former partner might spend time with extended family or friends and do activities together. Unless your former partner is actively putting your child in a position where he or she can be harmed, such as spending time with individuals who use illegal drugs or engage in criminal activities or doing dangerous activities without taking the proper precautions, such as snowmobiling without wearing helmets or shooting guns without observing proper gun safety precautions, you cannot tell your former partner how to spend his or her time with your child. One of the reasons why the concept of child custody was replaced with parenting time was to eliminate the sense that one parent has a greater level of control over a child's life than the other. Co-parenting can be difficult. To make it easier, always be aware of the limits of your parenting time and parenting responsibility arrangements. In other words, pick your battles.

Identify Preferences vs. Requirements

If something your former partner does with your child upsets you, ask yourself if it upsets you because it goes against your preferences or if it violates the requirements of your parenting plan. For example, you might feel that certain movies are inappropriate for your child to view, but your former partner might allow your child to watch them. This is a preference and unless the films are having a significant impact on your child, such as giving him or her nightmares that cause him or her to lose sleep, it is best to let this type of situation go. However, if your child needs to take a certain medication each day and your former partner fails to give the medication to the child during their time together, this is a violation of your parenting agreement.

Parenting Responsibilities and Parenting Time

Parenting time refers to the time the child spends in each parent's household. Parenting responsibilities refer to the decision-making responsibilities each parent has toward their child. These include decisions about the child's upbringing such as where he or she will attend school, medical decisions regarding the child, and his or her religious training. When the child is in the care of one parent, requirements made about issues that fall into the other parent's set of parenting responsibilities must be upheld. For example, if the child attends catechism each week, both parents must ensure he or she gets to class and completes its assignments, even if one parent is not Catholic.

Work with an Experienced Kane County Family Attorney

You and your former partner have equal rights to your child. Although you might not approve of certain aspects of your former partner's parenting style, you cannot tell him or her how to raise his or her child if he or she is not actually causing the child harm. For help determining whether it would be appropriate to say something to your former partner about his or her parenting, speak with an experienced Kane County family attorney. Our team at The Goostree Law Group has been helping parents work cooperatively with each other for years and can draw upon this experience to help you reach solutions that work for your child.

Sources:

http://raisingchildren.net.au/articles/coparenting_tips.html

http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/ilcs4.asp?ActID=2086&ChapterID=59&SeqStart=8300000&SeqEnd=10000000