A parent involved in a custody dispute may well feel moved
to punish his or her spouse for any number of real or imagined transgressions.
Unfortunately, the weaponry involved in the punishment may well impact the
children and heavily influence the determination by the court concerning the
allocation of parental rights and responsibilities. Numbers 7 and 8 on our list
involve just that sort of vindictive behavior.
7. Don't meet
your financial obligations
Financial obligations related to children, as every parent
knows, are both multiple and varied. When a divorce is in process, those
obligations are usually assigned to one or both parents as part of the
"temporary orders" process. The obligations can include the payment
of a monthly sum of temporary child support, daycare expenses, medical costs,
school fees and expenses – the list goes on and on. Obligations can also
include servicing the family debt and the payment of temporary spousal support.
P.
G. Wodehouse, the English humorist, compared paying money to an estranged
spouse to "feeding hay to a dead horse." Far too many divorcing
parents share this point of view, even when the financial obligations directly or indirectly impact the children they claim to love so much. Many
lawyers have heard their client's lament, "I know she (or he) is not
spending all that money on the kids. Why should I have to pay?"
There
are a couple of answers to that question. The first is easy: The court ordered
you to pay and not complying is contempt and could land you in trouble. The
second, however, is more poignant. You claim to love your children and to look
out for their best interests. That claim is unsustainable when you are not doing
your part to provide them with the financial support they need and deserve.
8. Interfere
with the other parent's parenting time
. In all but the most unusual cases,
those involving abuse or neglect, both parents are allocated time to spend with
their children. This parenting time is viewed not only as the right of the
parent, but of the child, as well. Temporary orders in divorce cases spell out
the time each parent is to enjoy with the child.
Interference with parenting time can
be a two-way street. A parent may refuse to permit the other to have the
children during his or her scheduled time, often making flimsy excuses, or
simply declaring that the other parent can't have the children due to some act
that has angered the denying parent. The opposite pole is the parent who does
not take advantage or his or her parenting time, imposing upon the other as an
involuntary baby sitter. A client recently reported to us that her former
husband, when confronted about not taking the children and thereby increasing
the mother's daycare costs, told her that "watching the kids is what I pay
you child support for!"
The bottom line here is that the
court will carefully scrutinize how obligations and rights related to the
children are fulfilled and enjoyed by the parents. If you want to lose your
custody case, not meeting financial obligations and interfering with parenting
time are sure paths to that result.
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