A good parenting plan determines who will make what decisions for your children, how much time they will spend with each parent, and how their financial needs will be met. If you have children, an important part of the divorce process is determining how to divide parental responsibilities. Some of the most important issues to consider with your children are:
- How much time the children will spend with each parent?
- Where the children will spend the holidays?
- How the children will communicate with each parent?
- Which decisions will require approval from both parents?
An effective parenting plan ensures a meaningful relationship for the children with each parent. An effective parenting plan works out how to meet the needs of the children in their best interest.
Mediation is an alternative to litigation. If you litigate, a judge who doesn’t know you and has limited information with which to base the decision will determine all of the important points of the parenting agreement. often, litigation leaves one or both parents in a situation where they feel that the agreement is less than satisfactory in meeting the needs of their children.
Mediation allows both parents to sit down together and talk about all of the issues that are important to them in this agreement. Specifics such as legal custody and time-sharing are determined by the parents instead of the court. Parents will have the ability to create a flexible plan that helps them balance their work and personal schedules with their parenting responsibilities.
A skilled mediator can get both parents to focus on figuring out a schedule that is most advantageous to the children. This can make the transition much smoother for both parents and children.
The following are some other benefits of mediation:
- Mediation is less expensive when contrasted to the expense of litigation.
- It can take months to get a court date and even longer for a judge to make a decision. Mediation works in a far shorter time period.
- Parents who make mutual decisions and generally more satisfied and more likely to follow and comply with the terms of the parenting plan.
- The parents can tailor their parenting plan to their individually unique situation.
- A mediated agreement can often preserve a working co-parenting relationship in ways that would not be possible in an adversarial hearing.
- Mediated agreements tend to last over time, and if a later dispute results, the parties are more likely to utilize a cooperative problem-solving approach to resolve their, rather than to pursue an adversarial approach.
Clients will leave with a legal Parenting Plan ready for filing.
For information regarding fees and appointments, click here.