Orland Park Child Custody Attorney

Child custody concerns are often a term of divorce, but child custody modifications after divorce – in response to significant change – and child custody matters between parents who were never married are also common. When your rights as a parent are involved, it’s an important legal matter, and having an experienced Orland Park child custody attorney on your side is in your best interest. 

Child Custody in the State of Illinois

Illinois has done away with the terms legal custody and physical custody and has replaced them with parental responsibilities and parenting time, respectively. Parental responsibilities determine how you and your children’s other parent will address the matter of making key parenting decisions, and parenting time refers to the schedule by which you and your children’s other parent will split your overnights with your shared children. Each is a pillar of your parental rights and needs to be explored further.

Your Parental Responsibilities

The kinds of decisions that parental responsibilities focus on are those that shape your children’s lives, including matters such as the following:

• Their medical care
• Their schooling or daycare 
• Their participation in extracurriculars and travel
• Their religious upbringing

You and your spouse have a range of options when it comes to this decision-making authority, including:

• You can make every decision together. 
• You can make every decision together, but one of you retains the ability to break a tie if your good-faith efforts at negotiation are not successful.
• You can divide these decisions between you according to which category of decision needs to be made. 
• One of you can take on sole parental responsibility and can make the decisions on your own.

When decisions need to be made in emergency situations and when everyday decisions arise, the parent who is with the kids at the time – or who can be reached first – is responsible for making them.

Your Parenting Time

When parents think of child custody, they tend to think of their time with their children, and this is what parenting time entails. You and your divorcing spouse can devise a schedule whereby you split your time with your kids in a way that works for everyone involved, or the court will provide you with one of its own standard parenting time schedules. There are two primary options when it comes to parenting time:

• You and your children’s other parent can divide your overnights with your children relatively equally.
• One of you can take on the role of the primary custodial parent who has the children for the majority of their overnights, while the other parent has what amounts to a visitation schedule. 

An Experienced Orland Park Child Custody Attorney Is Here to Help

The capable Orland Park parenting attorneys at SLG Family Law have an impressive track record of helping clients like you resolve their child custody cases favorably – in protection of their parental rights and best interests. For more information, please don’t hesitate to reach out and contact us today.