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If you are a parent and planning a divorce or separation from your co-parent, you may be anxious about how the change will impact your relationship with your children. In most cases, you will be spending less time with them going forward, but you still have certain rights to your time with them. Understanding the types of custody in San Antonio is critical for every parent navigating a co-parenting relationship over their children. Our child custody attorneys at Kimbrough Legal, PLLC, could ensure you understand your options and the outcomes meet your family’s goals.
Texas law uses specific language for resolving legal issues relating to parent-child relationships. For example, in Texas, physical custody of a child is known as possession and access. Learning these various terms is essential to ensure you fully understand the decisions you must make when you implement a custody agreement in San Antonio, and a lawyer could ensure you understand your rights and responsibilities within this framework.
The legal authority to make decisions and manage the child’s assets is called conservatorship. A child’s conservator also has the right to determine where the child lives. Parents with conservatorship rights are responsible for making decisions regarding their children’s lives, including:
When parents live separately, the children typically spend most of their time living with one parent and stay with the other parent on a fixed schedule. Most states use the terms custody, visitation, or parenting time to refer to these arrangements. In Texas, the parent who provides the children’s primary home has possession of the children, and the parent who has visitation has access.
In all decisions a court makes on behalf of children, Texas Family Code § 153.002 requires the judge to prioritize the children’s best interests. The law presumes that children benefit from a relationship with both parents and that it is best for children if both parents influence their upbringing. Accordingly, Joint Managing Conservatorship is the most common custody arrangement, in which parents share decision-making responsibilities, but one parent is the children’s primary custodian.
Most families split time according to a Standard Possession Order (SPO), which calls for the non-custodial parent to have regular visitation. When they live within 50 miles of the children, the non-custodial parent has possession of the children:
The SPO calls for less frequent but longer visitation for parents who live more than 50 miles away from their children.
For various reasons, parents may choose an arrangement that differs from the SPO. A judge will review a modified arrangement before approving it to ensure it promotes the children’s best interests. A San Antonio custody attorney could help you draft a modified type of arrangement that reflects the best interests criteria.
When there is a history of sexual abuse, domestic violence, or child neglect or abuse, it may be unwise for a co-parent to have unsupervised contact with the children. This scenario might also occur when a parent has untreated or uncontrolled mental health issues like addiction, is involved in criminal activity, or cannot provide a safe and appropriate home for financial or other reasons.
In this situation, a San Antonio lawyer could provide guidance about limiting your co-parent’s custody rights to the children. Judges rarely deny access, but supervised visitation and limits on overnight visits could be possible.
Caring for your children is your priority, and having them only part-time can be unnerving. Understanding the various types of custody in San Antonio can help you be confident that you have chosen the best plan for your children. Contact Kimbrough Legal today for help developing a possession order that works for your family.
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