How can I avoid child custody disputes during the holidays?

Most parents want to spend the holidays with their children and when they are all living together as a single unit, that is traditionally how the festive season is spent. But when the Louisiana couple ends up divorcing one another, then the holidays are also split between the two new households. Those going through a divorce or already divorced understand that the holidays bring with them difficult conversations and negotiations about who will spend which holiday and which day with the children. Courts are often backed up with couples arguing over who gets to spend time with kids when.

One way to avoid this conflict at the last minute is to have a parenting plan in place. This helps avoid contentious arguments about who said what. The parenting plan is a written agreement between both parents and should ideally prevent further disputes, but its important to keep in mind that both parents are arguing over getting to spend the same day with their children and the disputes can get contentious.

There are also other approaches parents can take to splitting holiday time. One is to alternate years. This means parents decide one year the holidays are spent with one parent and the next year with the next one. This is the easiest compromise and the approach favored by most parties. However, this means one parent will be without the children for an important holiday. Another approach adopted by couples who get along with one another and live nearby is to split the day. This way, children get to experience the important holidays with each parent and neither parent is left lonely.

Decisions related to child custody are generally not easy to make and when it involves splitting important events between parents, it can be even more contentious. It may be beneficial to have an experienced attorney on one’s side to enter into unemotional negotiations with the other side.