Getting Started

If you believe your marriage is in trouble, and that custody of your children may be an issue, keep the following tips in mind:

1. Don't sign any papers and negotiate on your own. If your spouse requests that you sign any residential responsibility or parenting time agreements, etc., refrain. The consequences of signing such papers may be irreparable and detrimental to your case. Just as important as not signing any documents, you should not verbally agree to any terms or agreements prior to talking to an experienced family law attorney.
2. Hire an Experienced Family Law Attorney. Choosing the right attorney to represent you is an important, and often difficult, decision. In making the decision, you should look for an attorney who is:
   • Professional: Your attorney should look and sounds like a professional person. If you meet with a lawyer who is inappropriately dressed, is not well-spoken, who keeps a disorganized, sloppy office, or whose office is in an unusual place, these might be problem signs.
   • Competent: Divorces often involve important issues such as the residential responsibility of children and complex financial issues. You should entrust these important considerations to someone who has the knowledge and skill to handle them competently.
   • Respectful: Your attorney should treat you as an adult who needs help with a problem. He or she should recognize that you are in an emotional situation, and not ridicule or embarrass you because you are in a relationship that has not worked out.
   • Compatible: Your attorney will be helping you through an unfamiliar and often traumatic period of your life. Throughout the process, you may need to disclose intimate or even embarrassing information to your attorney. Your attorney must be someone with whom you are comfortable under these circumstances.
   • Candid: Throughout your divorce, you may have to make numerous difficult decisions. It is imperative that your attorney is open and honest with you in helping you make these decisions, rather than simply telling you what you want to hear. While the truth about a given situation may be unpleasant, it is to your benefit to be fully informed.
3. Don't Procrastinate. If you have been served with a Summons and Complaint stating that an action has been commenced against you, don't wait until the last minute to find an attorney. Giving your attorney ample time to make a well thought response can only help your case.
4. Don't move out of the marital residence. In situations where there are children involved and residential responsibility is a concern, do not move out of the marital residence without talking to your attorney first. If you are in danger and have no choice but to leave, take the children with you.
5. Journal, Journal, Journal. Every parent facing the prospect of parenting time litigation should keep a journal. The outcome of any case will likely turn on a multitude of events. The details of those events will have been lost unless written down. Without those details, statements of prior events lose persuasive impact. General statements such as "he always..." or "she never..." do not sway judges. As such, you should record such things as abuse events, the use of bad language, whether parenting times have taken place or been missed or interfered with, whether parenting times have started and ended on time, what a person has done with the kids during parenting times, what kind of care the other parent is providing, and more. If your common sense tells you it is important, then write it down as it happens. The details of your memory will be your most powerful evidence.
6. Keep your children out of the divorce. Don't put your children in the middle of your problems or ask them to take sides. Don't use your children as confidants. Don't argue in front of your children. Don't pump your children for information about the other parent or use your children to carry messages back and forth. Tell your children you love them and make sure your children know that it is okay to love the other parent. Reassure your children that they are loved by both parents and they always will be taken care of.
7. Play Nice. Don't speak negatively about your spouse in front of your children or discourage their communication with the other parent. Include your spouse in your children's school activities and special events. If you are separated from your spouse, allow the children to have reasonable contact with the other parent. Don't be mean just to be mean; don't be petty just to be petty. Take the higher ground. Develop a workable and cooperative parenting plan that gives your children access to both of you. Make every effort to agree with your spouse about discipline. This will help your children feel more secure. In the end, your parenting time arrangements will be more bearable and it will be easier for you and the children to move forward.
8. Avoid exposing your children to your new significant other.