Custody and Visitation on Halloween

Custody and Visitation on Halloween

Holidays are hard. They’re always hard. I field questions about holidays probably almost every single day. Generally speaking, holidays are alternated between parents. We alternate legal holidays – the Fourth of July, Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Thanksgiving. We usually alternate Christmas and Spring Break, too, to varying degrees, both to reflect the need for...

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There is no shortage of ways that sly fathers will seek to avoid responsibility for their child support obligations. I’ve seen a lot of creative solutions – and even outright requests for downward deviations from the guideline amount of child support – over the years. One of the trickiest ways I’ve seen a child’s father...

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Handling divorce and custody separately

It happens sometimes – though I definitely don’t prefer it – that custody is handled separately from the rest of the divorce proceedings. It can happen for any number of reasons. Like everything else, divorce and custody cases are highly variable, and all sorts of things can happen that can result in people choosing to...

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Protective Orders and Divorce

Domestic violence is often a big part of a divorce case. It’s sad (and really, really scary) but true. We see these types of cases all the time. When I first started practicing family law, I was surprised at how many cases there were that involved some kind of physical, emotional, or sexual abuse; maybe...

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Sometimes, my job isn’t fun, because sometimes I have to tell people things that they don’t want to hear. I like to give only good answers that make people (women specifically) feel happy and hopeful. That isn’t always possible, though. Sometimes, there aren’t great, exciting, happy, hopeful answers to give. And part of me doing...

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When will he start paying me child and spousal support?  It’s a question we hear all the time.  Financially, divorce can be complicated. In most cases, even in cases where there’s plenty of money, there’s some nervousness and confusion when it comes to how everything will be divided. Even though, in the Virginia Code, the...

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