You love your children and want to spend as much time with them as possible after your divorce. It sounds reasonable, and your spouse is probably thinking the same thing. They also love the kids and want to spend as much time as possible with them.
How do you turn that into a workable custody arrangement?
Keep these 4 things in perspective at all times
The first thing to remember is there are two parts to custody — legal and physical. Unless a court finds one of you is a danger to the child, you will share legal custody. That means if you want to send your child to a particular school, you need to negotiate that with your spouse as they will share the right to make such decisions.
Second, the court wants your child to spend time with you and your spouse. Typically the minimum amount of parenting time either of you would get is a quarter. Unless, as with legal custody, one of you poses a threat to the child.
Third, when it comes to custody, the concerns of the parents take second place. The court seeks to do what is in your child’s best interests — and that doesn’t always match up with parental needs and wants.
Fourth, you might not want your child all the time, even if you could have it that way. Many people have no choice but to raise their children alone. They manage through a herculean effort but go and talk to one of them to learn about the downsides. They will tell you how difficult it is to balance work and child-rearing, about how restricting it can be for your social life and how they collapse into bed at night, utterly exhausted.
Sharing custody can be beneficial
If you have a spouse willing to co-parent, why fight that? Why turn down an opportunity many would love to have. With the right help, you can work together to create a custody plan that works for you, your co-parent and your child.