Child Custody Lawyer Joliet

If you are going through a divorce or facing another child custody concern, it is a difficult matter that requires careful legal consideration. Your parental rights are very important, and an experienced child custody lawyer in Joliet can help you protect them throughout the legal process (regardless of the matter at hand). 

Parental Responsibility

Child custody divides into both physical and legal custody, which Illinois refers to as parenting time and parental responsibilities. Parental responsibilities relate to who will be making the important parenting decisions on your children’s behalf moving forward. This can be awarded to one parent on his or her own, can be shared equally by both parents, or can be divided between both parents (according to the kind of decisions involved). The basic types of decision making involved in this determination include the following:

• The children’s education
• The medical care and attention the children receive
• The children’s religious upbringing
• The children’s extracurricular activities

Parental responsibility represents an important right of parenthood.

Parenting Time

Parenting time refers to what you likely think of physical custody, and this is how your children will split their time between you and their other parent. Parenting time can also be either sole or joint, but it is very rare for the court to cut a parent entirely out of his or her children’s lives without some form of visitation (unless there is a very good reason for doing so). Often, however, one parent becomes the primary custodial parent (who provides the children with their primary home) while the other parent is awarded a visitation schedule. Other parents, however, find a way to split their time with their shared children very nearly down the middle. 

Your Parenting Arrangements

If you and your children’s other parent are able to come to a consensus regarding how you are going to handle your parenting arrangements, the court will generally sign off on whatever you come up with. If this isn’t the case, however, the court is very likely to assign one of its standard visitation schedules. 

The Factors Taken into Consideration

When the court makes decisions about parenting issues, they are always based on the best interests of the children involved, and the factors they take into consideration include the following:

• Each parent’s preferences
• Each child’s preferences (if they are mature enough to weigh in)
• Each child’s relationship with each parent and sibling
• Each child’s level of adjustment to his or her home, school, and community at large
• The physical and mental health of each parent
• Each parent’s willingness and ability to foster a deep, ongoing relationship between the children and their other parent

An Experienced Child Custody Lawyer in Joliet Can Help

The trusted child custody attorneys at Sabuco, Beck, Hansen & Massino in Joliet have the legal skill, experience, and resources to help you obtain favorable parenting terms that uphold your parental rights and work for you. To learn more about what we can do to help you, please don’t hesitate to contact us today.