Evaluating the Advantages and Disadvantages of Different Shared Custody Schedules

 Posted on July 14, 2022 in Child Custody

When parents divorce, they must contend with many difficult issues. If the parents want to share custody, they just decide how to divide parenting duties. In Illinois, the time a parent spends caring for his or her child is called parenting time. A parent’s right to make decisions about his or her child’s education, medical care, and other important matters is referred to as the allocation of parental responsibilities. Divorcing parents who want to share parenting time must decide which days each parent will care for the child. They will also need to determine how to handle parenting time arrangements for birthdays, holidays, school vacations, and other special occasions.

Considerations for Shared Custody in Illinois

If you and your child’s other parent can agree on a parenting time schedule, you can design whatever schedule works best for you and your child. As you make your parenting time schedule make sure to consider:

• How your child wil bel transported to and from each parent’s home

• How your child will get to and from school

• Each parent’s work schedule and other commitments

• Sports, after school activities, and other extracurricular activities

• How any changes to the parenting time schedule should be handled

• The right of first refusal (each parent’s right to extra parenting time if the other parent cannot fulfill his or her parenting time obligation)

• How religious holidays, national holidays, school vacations, birthdays, and other special events will influence the parenting time schedule

Popular Parenting Time Schedules for Divorced Parents

Parents who share custody use a variety of different schedules. Some parents alternate weeks. For example, the child will stay with the mother on the first and third weeks of the month and with the father the second and forth weeks of the month. This arrangement may be useful if the parents’ homes are not close to each other and the parents want to reduce the number of times the child is transported between the two homes. However, this arrangement also forces the child to go without one of his or her parents for a week at a time which can be especially difficult on very young children.

Some parents decide that the child will stay with one parent during the weekdays and the other parent on the weekends. This is a common arrangement for many parents but it may come with certain disadvantages. For example, if the child wants to attend a sleepover with friends or weekend another event, this may cut into the weekend parent’s parenting time.

A 2-2-3 schedule is another common option for divorced parents. The child stays two days with parent A, two days with parent B, and then three days with parent A. The following week, the schedule is two days with parent B, two days with parent A, and then three days with parent B. The 3-4-4-3 schedule is similar. These plans ensure that the child spends ample time with both parents, but it can also be hard to keep track of.

Contact Our DuPage County Parenting Time Lawyers

If you are getting divorced and you have children, contact our Wheaton divorce attorneys for legal support. Call Goostree Law Group at 630-364-4046 for a free consultation.

Source:

https://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/fulltext.asp?DocName=075000050K602.10