trends in the area of custody it

it’s really fascinating because over the

arc of my 25 years in this practice

there’s been such a monumental shift in

how

parenting schedules are formulated

when i started working there was the

presumption that the mother was going to

be the primary custodial parent

the father would have weekend time what

we would call the disney dad you came in

you took your kids out you played with

them it was fun

the kids came home on a sugar high with

balloons and presents and that was the

dad’s time and we called it visitation

because it was just this one glorious

visit

and then as the years progressed

and

the alternate parent traditionally the

father but the alternate parent became

more engaged and wanted to be more

immersed in the children’s lives then

the weekend time expanded and became

more grounded in

not only visiting with the children but

becoming involved in their lives doing

school projects with them taking them to

sports taking them to gymnastics or

dance getting involved in their

activities getting involved in their

friendships and that also came with time

during the week first dinners and then

overnights so that the alternate parent

became very enmeshed in the children’s

lives and that progressed in terms of

thought

to where we are now

where a lot of judges will tell you on

day one that they walk into any case

involving children with the presumption

that the parties can have if they choose

and they have the ability to schedule it

50 50 parenting there’s absolutely going

to be weekend time there’s absolutely

going to be time during the week and

because that is now the presumption

the trend that i’m starting to see in

custody

in custody cases

is creativity

parents don’t have to fight for time

anymore it’s not about

quantity at this point it’s become about

quality

parents will look at the children and

say

which one of us is parents are better

with homework

which one of us has more time during the

weekend to be flexible with

transportation

i’m starting to see instead of the very

traditional and rigid

alternate weekend and time during the

week

a lot of families now won’t do alternate

weekends they may give one parent all or

a disproportionate share of weekend time

because that parent is free to do more

things with the children during the

weekends i might see the other parent be

happy to take on more time during the

week because they’re better with

homework or they’re more available for

doctors

appointments

so i’m seeing that creativity because

the

foundational approach has become so much

more concrete you don’t have to fight

for those hours anymore and now that

there’s this certainty

that the time will be distributed fairly

parents can distribute that time in a

way that’s far more oriented to the

children’s personalities

and to their strengths as parents as

opposed to the old-fashioned every other

weekend and let’s check off wednesday

night as our overnight during the week

i’m also seeing

as another trend and this is one i

really really like and i

i present it to clients but i really

appreciate it when it comes from a

client to me

sometimes splitting up the children

to get some one in one time

so again the traditional approach was

you always get the children as a group

but now i’m seeing and again i believe

it’s because

there’s more certainty in the

foundational schedule that you’re going

to have time with your children both

parents

will have signifi if not significant

meaningful time with their children and

once there’s an assurance of that and

you look at the children and say now

what will benefit them

sometimes what benefits children is

splitting them up

and father will have one-on-one time

with one child or maybe

two of three children who are closer in

age so you get to service those

children’s interests instead of having a

group of children climbing over you

because they want your attention in that

moment because time with parents are

always split

post-divorce so to a child

every moment

with either parent becomes so much more

precious because by the nature of

divorce

that time has been lessened but when you

can manage to create some one-on-one

time there’s no

frenetic nature of i must take

you can slow it down you can have a

conversation if you have a child who’s

older than younger siblings you can do

more age-appropriate things if you have

one child who’s engaged in a practice

and you can take the other child out for

ice cream and leave the other parent

just to do pick up and drop off

that’s what i’m seeing now this focus on

children as individuals the quality of

time over the quantity of time has

become a very welcome and creative new

trend in custody