Helpful Tips for Co-Parenting During the Holidays

Source: Helpful Tips for Co-Parenting During the Holidays

Joint Custody 101

In decades past gender roles played a stronger role in determination of physical custody of minor children in Massachusetts divorce. Within the past 15 years, the recent trend of the family court is to award joint physical custody because it can help the children maintain an equal bond with both parents in a post divorce situation. Whereas the mother had always been the primary caretaker of the children, and father the breadwinner, this is situation is no longer the “norm” as it once was in Massachusetts child custody cases. Household roles and responsibilities have been redistributed in as there are more families depending on the incomes of 2 parents, as opposed to 1 in recent times. There are drawbacks, naturally, but this has been the direction of Massachusetts Family Court rulings in recent years.

Massachusetts Joint Custody has progressively become more popular

One litigant inquired whether or not her job, which involved the sale of sexually photography of herself, would be a determining factor in her soon to be ex-husband obtaining a joint physical custody arrangement as opposed to her being awarded sole physical custody – even though she had been the primary care taker.

The Massachusetts Family Court is not altogether concerned about the explicit nature of peoples jobs, so long as the children were not exposed to it or harmed by it, and are not likely to be harmed by it in the future. There are many people who work as exotic dancers, for example, who are still caring and responsible parents. It may comes as a surprise that professions of this nature are not likely to have as much of an impact on whether or not you have joint physical custody as much as other factors, such as the proximity of where you both now live, and the other parties willingness and ability to participate actively in the children’s lives.

The Massachusetts divorce court is also mindful of the importance of routine and stability, and will try to maintain that for the children. If a party had never been involved due to his job and that it prevents him from performing day today parenting duties, that is a legitimate reason why joint physical custody in Massachusetts would not be practicable. Moreover, one could successfully argue that even if this were not the case, changing a prior established routine would unduly harm the children and may thwart an attempt of the other spouse to obtain an joint physical custody award in Massachusetts.

A Massachusetts divorce attorney at the Wright Family Law Group should be consulted to discuss the viability of any proposed joint physical custody arrangement in Massachusetts.  Call us today for your free, no obligation consultation.