Chicago Custody Attorney

Chicago Custody Attorney

Because child custody issues affect your rights as a parent and your schedule with your children, they are primary concerns for anyone who is going through a divorce involving children, facing a child custody modification, or parting ways with someone with whom they share a child but were never married. If you find yourself in one of these difficult situations, it’s time to reach out to an experienced Chicago custody attorney.

Your Parental Responsibilities

As parents, we recognize that we shoulder immense responsibility for our children’s ongoing health, well-being, and happiness, and the law addresses this in terms of the allocation of parental responsibilities, which is sometimes called legal custody. Parental responsibilities refers to how you and your children’s other parent will tackle the matter of making primary parenting decisions that guide your kids’ childhoods. The kinds of decisions involved include those related to all the following:

• Where your children make their primary home
• The medical care and attention your children receive
• The education your children receive
• The religious education your children receive 
• The extracurricular activities and travel your children participate in

The Allocation of Parental Responsibilities

You and your ex can address parental responsibilities in all the following ways

• Both of you make the decisions together. 
• Both of you make the decisions together, but one of you is afforded the ability to break a tie if your authentic mutual efforts fail to resolve the matter.
• You divide the decisions between you according to the category of decision that needs to be made. 
• One of you has sole parental responsibilities and makes each of these decisions on your own.

Parenting Time

Parenting time is sometimes called physical custody, and it determines the schedule by which you and your ex will divide your overnights with your shared children. If you’re able to hammer out a schedule that works well for both of you, you can expect the court to implement the schedule you come up with, but if you can’t come to a mutual agreement, the court is very likely to hand down one of its standard schedules. 

Regardless, however, of whether or not you devise your own or receive a standard parenting time schedule, they all fall into one of the following two categories:

• You divide the number of overnights each of you have with your shared children somewhat equally.
• One of you becomes the primary custodial parent, and the other has what amounts to visitation according to their parenting time schedule.

An Experienced Chicago Custody Attorney Can Help

If you’re facing a child custody case, your rights as a parent ride in the balance, which makes the matter critical, and the compassionate Chicago custody attorneys at WARD FAMILY LAW understand the gravity of your situation. We bring the full strength of our imposing experience and legal skill to every case we handle, and we’re here for you, too. To learn more about what we can do to help you, please don’t delay in reaching out and contacting us today.