When Georgia parents of young children get a divorce, they may need some sort of schedule for custody and visitation. This is necessary when one parent has primary custody and the other has visitation rights. If both parents share custody, they need a custody schedule.
How visitation schedules work in a divorce
Parenting agreements after divorce
When parents in Georgia divorce or stop living together, they will have to make decisions about who will take responsibility for their children. In previous generations, these matters were referred to as custody and visitation rights, but in recent years, these arrangements have also come to be known as parenting agreements.
Custodial interference and the law
When Georgia parents divorce, they usually create a child custody agreement that details how much time the child will spend with each parent. If one parent violates it, this is known as custodial interference.
Navigating the path to full custody
In Georgia, both parents have the ability to seek full custody of their children when they are going through a divorce. While mothers may be seen as better caregivers, gender alone does not determine if a person is fit to raise a child. Those who are in a custody battle should make the best interests of their children a top priority. This means that they should not badmouth their spouse or take the children without notifying anyone.
Manipulation can hurt parent-child bonds
For Georgia parents, one of the most difficult parts of going through a divorce can be their concerns about the effect of the end of the marriage on their children. The emotional, loving bond between parent and child is one of the most important bond in a person's life, and children who are placed in the middle of a contentious high-asset divorce can suffer psychological effects that are long-lasting and undermine the importance of this relationship. Child custody issues can linger on for years after the parenting plan is in place and the settlement signed.
Parenting after an abusive marriage
In some cases, both parents will be given access to a child even when violence existed within the marriage or during the divorce. The type of abuse and when it took place may play a role in how parents in Georgia or elsewhere work together to raise their children. Researchers at the University of Illinois performed a study looking at the first year after a marriage that involved domestic violence and its impact on co-parenting.
Providing stability for children after a divorce
Georgia parents who are divorced will need to continue working with their exes to raise their children. This can get complicated when there are two households that have completely different rules. By keeping the best interests of their children at heart, however, parents can provide stability, order, constancy and structure during an otherwise chaotic time.
How shared parenting can benefit children, parents
Georgia parents who are getting a divorce might want to consider shared parenting as a custody option. In around 80 percent of cases, mothers still get custody, but this can be a poor arrangement for the mothers, the fathers and the children. In a shared parenting arrangement, a child spends equal or nearly equal time with each parent.
Survey results shows more involved fathers
Georgia fathers may be spending more time with their children than in past decades based on a survey by Pew Research Center. The survey found that fathers spent an average of seven hours on child care weekly in 2015. This is almost three times higher than in 1965, but it is still less than half the average amount of time that mothers spend on the same task.
More immigrant families considering guardians for children
Some Georgia families might be concerned about how their children will be affected if their undocumented parents are deported from the country. With a crackdown on immigration happening under the Trump administration, some families are taking steps to ensure that they have appointed relatives or other loved ones as guardians of their children in the event that they are deported.
