Know How Children’s Issues are Handled When Preparing for Your Texas Divorce

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Children’s issues can be some of the most hard fought and contentious parts of a Texas divorce. It is not uncommon for parents going through a divorce not to care about anything but the children. It is not uncommon for there to not to be any property or property issues and the only issue is the children.

Divorce Attorney in Houston – Generally, the concern is expressed in either trying to get custody or protect their rights as a parent. I am often asked what they should be doing to prepare for the upcoming court case. I often give parents homework on what they should start doing immediately at its most basic level it comes down to knowing and being involved with their children.

In today’s blog post we will discuss the parts of a Texas custody case and what a parent can do to prepare.

PREPARE AS IF YOU ARE GOING TO TRIAL

A good way to approach a custody case even when agreement is expected is prepare as if the case will be going to trial. Most cases never go to trial and end up settling. However, many cases do make it as far as a Temporary Orders hearing.

Do not let the name “Temporary Orders” fool you into thinking it is not an important hearing. You could be living with the orders that result from this hearing for a year or more. The decisions a judge makes in this hearing are often the same ones a judge will make in final trial.

CUSTODY CASES CAN BE EXTREMELY EXPENSIVE

The cases involving contested custody issues are:

1. Incredibly Expensive
2. Time Consuming and
3. Mentally Exhausting

I have had cases where the parties involved had no property and the only issues were involving the children. They were unable to agree so multiple court battles later they had both spent more than $20,000 each on attorneys.

WHAT SORT OF THINGS SHOULD YOU BE DOING TO PREPARE?

One way to start preparing is to keep a detailed journal about:

1. The activities of both yourself and your spouse
2. Who is tending to the daily needs of the children

Daily needs of the children could include a variety of things such as:

1. Dressing the children
2. Preparing meals
3. Taking or picking up the children from school
4. Attending parent teacher conferences
5. Taking the children to the doctor
6. Taking the children or picking up the children from activities

CUSTODY & CONSERVATORSHIP – WHAT DOES CUSTODY MEAN IN TEXAS?

Houston Family Attorney – A good place to begin your custody case is to know what custody means in Texas. A good place to begin is that in Texas we do not have custody we have conservatorship. In Texas under the Family Code is presumed that parents should be Joint Managing Conservators.

Presumption of Joint Managing Conservatorship

When You look at Texas Family Code Section 153.131 it states:

(a) Subject to the prohibition in Section 153.004, unless the court finds that appointment of the parent or parents would not be in the best interest of the child because the appointment would significantly impair the child’s physical health or emotional development, a parent shall be appointed sole managing conservator or both parents shall be appointed as joint managing conservators of the child.

(b) It is a rebuttable presumption that the appointment of the parents of a child as joint managing conservators is in the best interest of the child. A finding of a history of family violence involving the parents of a child removes the presumption under this subsection.

This means that if a parent is asking to be sole managing conservator of the children they have an added burden of showing the court why both parents should not be joint managing conservators. A parent would have to show that by appointing the parents joint managing conservators would somehow:

1. significantly impair the child’s physical health or
2. emotional development

In some cases, there are facts that make a Judge more likely to find that this burden has been reached such as:

1. One of the parents is a registered sex offender
2. Has committed family violence, or
3. Has a huge problem with drugs that is well documented with several people willing to testify against them

However, just because a parent is awarded sole managing conservatorship does not mean they will not have visitation. Visitation may be restricted depending on the facts. There are very few cases where a judge will keep a former spouse from having some sort of contact with their child.

Houston Family Law Attorneys – Sometimes spouses ask about terminating the rights or giving up their rights as a parent. This scenario is generally even more unlikely than the above scenario. This is the case in most circumstances even if both parents agree.

Rights and Duties of a Parent

Texas Family Code Section 151.001 sets out the basic rights and duties of parents. Under this section of the code a parent of a child has the following rights and duties:

(1) the right to have physical possession, to direct the moral and religious training, and to designate the residence of the child;

(2) the duty of care, control, protection, and reasonable discipline of the child;

(3) the duty to support the child, including providing the child with clothing, food, shelter, medical and dental care, and education;

(4) the duty, except when a guardian of the child’s estate has been appointed, to manage the estate of the child, including the right as an agent of the child to act in relation to the child’s estate if the child’s action is required by a state, the United States, or a foreign government;

(5) except as provided by Section 264.0111, the right to the services and earnings of the child;

(6) the right to consent to the child’s marriage, enlistment in the armed forces of the United States, medical and dental care, and psychiatric, psychological, and surgical treatment;

(7) the right to represent the child in legal action and to make other decisions of substantial legal significance concerning the child;

(8) the right to receive and give receipt for payments for the support of the child and to hold or disburse funds for the benefit of the child;

(9) the right to inherit from and through the child;

(10) the right to make decisions concerning the child’s education; and

(11) any other right or duty existing between a parent and child by virtue of law.

WHO GETS TO MAKE THE DECISIONS?

Divorce Houston – Part of the Texas divorce process revolves around how these rights will be shared by the parents … Continue Reading