Parenting plan

The traditional legal language without a parenting plan is: One parent wins custody, while the loser gets only visitation with his own child gives rise to fears. Making decisions about where children will live is one of the most difficult tasks of parents going through separation or divorce. The idea of no longer being with your children all the time or even the thought of losing your children is scary.

However, good parenting isn't a game or a contest. With a solid plan, parents can take a different, more child-friendly approach to both legal negotiations.

A parenting plan spells out a clear, specific schedule for children as well as guidelines for each parent's coparenting responsibilities and role in decision making.

When you start constructing a plan for parenting, there are several key issues you need to recognize:

There is no such thing as the single ideal schedule. Joint physical custody, traditional every other weekend visitation, bird nesting (where the children stay in one place and the parents move back and forth), or the hundreds of variations in between can all work or none of them can. Making your plan work depends upon you, your ex-partner, and your coparenting relationship. (see parenting plan example topics)

Nobody, not even judges or psychologists, possess special wisdom or mysterious tests that tell you what is best for your children. You, the parents, are in the best position to make these decisions. Remember just one thing: This is about your children and your responsibilities as parents, not about your rights.

When setting up the plan think about the time with your children in termes of months and years. Your plan can be a living agreement, that can alter as your children grow older and your family circumstances change. What you decide for a 2 year old may not be best for her when she's 14 (or 4 or 7). You probably want to experiment with your ideas about a schedule, so you can see how your child reacts to a schedule. Guessing what will or won't work is not the best method.

Set up and stick to a parenting plan meeting schedule

Different schedules work better for children of different ages. Younger children benefit from having more of a home base. School aged children can manage more complicated schedules. For teens you need a third schedule: Their own. With more than one child, you have to deal with both opportunities and complications. Your 16 year old teenager may rebel about a week to week schedule, even though the plan is working fine for his 9 year old brother.

Your co-parenting partnership style is critical to making any parenting plan work. There are different schedule needs for parents with a cooperative, distant, or an angry divorce. You have many more options for children of a given age – and over time – if you can to develop cooperative, businesslike relationship with your children's other parent.

No matter the age of the children you are coparenting, a consistency in the routines at both homes is important. This does not mean everything must be exactly the same everywhere. You should keep your own style, but there should be this comfort level of consistency for your children. More about coparenting.

There are 5 types of divorced parents. These 5 types are: Perfect Pals, Cooperative Colleagues, Angry Associates, Fiery Foes, and Dissolved Duos.

The first two are referred to as functional co-parenting. The next two are dysfunctional relationships that can manage parallel parenting at best. The Dissolved Duos consists of 100% solo parenting. More details about divorced parents.

Communication between the ex-partners must focus on the children. It must be peaceful, consistent, and purposeful. Learn more about divorced parents communication.

The divorced parents syndrome is as much a syndrome for the adult children of divorced parents as for the divorsed parents. The article about the divorced parents syndrome contains a couple of scenarios to help you get through in the best possible way.

The child development of an emotional attachment to a primary care giver during the first six years of life is very important. A disturbance in this development can create problems in childhood, adolescence and in adult life. More on child development.

A single parent is a parent who cares for one or more children without the physical assistance of another parent. Mostly they result from an unforeseeable occurrence, such as death, child abuse, child neglect, or abandonment by biological parents. Many factors influence how children develop in single parents families

A step mom has a special position in the parenting plan. These six steps help the step mom in her relationship with the children of her husband.

For single dads, it is important to stay in the children's lives. Single dads must assure their children that they love them by taking an active role in their lifes. Single dads must also make sure that their own needs are met.

It is important to take good care of the relationship with your child. The following section explains why and gives you tips about what you can do to optimize the parent child relationship.