Common Custody Issues: Extracurricular Activities

Kids keep you busy.  If it’s not one season, it’s another.  And between the after-school events, social activities, birthday parties, sports, summer camps, classes, and other activities, it can be overwhelming shuttling the kids to and from all of it. Keeping up with the calendar alone can be challenging enough, but for separated and divorced...

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Common Custody Issues: His Parenting Time

  It’s hard to transition from having custody of your child full time to sharing custody, no matter what specific allocation of time your child’s father gets.  Sharing holidays is a challenge, especially when you consider that it means that there will be major holidays that you’ll spend alone.  Any deviation from the standard schedule...

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Common Custody Issues: Birthday Parties

There are a few issues that seem to pop up again and again and, if you’ve been in family law as long as I have, you’re bound to see it.  If you’re going through a divorce or custody case, you may very well come across it, too – which is why I write today. It...

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Virginia Child Support When Your Child Has a Job

If one thing is true about children, it’s that things are always changing.  That’s why custody, visitation, and child support are modifiable based on a material change in circumstances. When you determine custody and visitation for the first time, you usually do so either as part of a custody agreement or a court order.  Either...

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Coparenting Issues: Are You Gatekeeping?

There are a million different issues that come up in coparenting.  One of them – or, at least, one of the ones I hear about the most often – is gatekeeping. As a mom myself, I can completely relate.  All of the information coming at you about the kids at all times can feel insane. ...

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Virginia Coparenting Methods

I’ve never come across a parent who admits that he (or she) is deliberately making things difficult on the children.  No, almost every single parent I’ve met – including the opposing parties – insist that its all about the kids. But it’s not as though there’s only one way to move through a separation, divorce,...

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Help! My child calls stepmom ‘mom’ now!

Mom is a special word.  For months, I couldn’t wait until my babies said it back to me – though, to be honest, at this point, I wish they’d use it a little less often over the course of the day.  Still, there’s no question that it’s a special thing to be called.  It’s a...

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Up until the court formally decides custody and visitation – or, alternatively, the parties enter into a signed custody agreement – there’s no formal child custody, visitation, or child support. For many couples, especially the ones that stay together (regardless of whether they’re married), that’s enough and it doesn’t go further than that.  Even for...

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