Family Justice and Divorce

Family Justice and Divorce

by Beth Barnett

I am talking to a grandparent today who asks, “Why am I so blessed to receive custody of my grandchildren when their parents are in jail for drugs and all their crazy behavior?”  I told her I use to wonder myself why the court system would give children to a grandparent who couldn’t get it right the first time... 

The answer (I think), is to give them another try to undo the damage they did in the first place.  I am not saying this to be judgmental; really feel they are given a chance to right a wrong.  The scary thing is if they couldn’t raise a well-rounded young adult the first time, what makes the judge think they can do it now?

Speaking of our family justice system:  There are so many things that still need improvement, but on the upside of things… We have come such a long way. 

For example, back in the eighties and maybe the very early nineties if your parent’s divorced mom received the kids, end of story and no matter how crappy of a mother she was… They never took the kids away from unfit mothers unless she just abandoned them.

Dad only received every-other-weekend visitation; was required to pay child support to the mom who probably did whatever with the payments (usually not spending it on the kids)… and to top that off she could move wherever she wanted (an hour or two away) and the dad could never really get to see his children.

The real diligent dads however, did drive that hour or more to make those every other weekend visits; only to find at times no one would be home; imagine the consideration of that kind of woman… but he never missed his payments (if he loved his kids).

The sad thing in all of this, over-time the kids grew to believe the dad was a bad guy b/c he didn’t spend much time with them… and the dad really didn’t know what kind of shape his kids were in…  It was a very bad system back then! 

Today, things are so much better than that of the past; because the parents in the divorce get to split time with the children (there is truly no comparison).  Meaning, little Johnny gets a week with mother and a week with dad.  Child support is not exchanged at all unless one parent makes drastically more.  This way the living situations for the children are not such an extreme from one parent to the next.  Children need the consistency of living in a similar socioeconomic class as with the other parent (when possible).   

Now-a-days parents are deemed unfit and children are removed from that situation and given custody to the other parent.  Most children I talk to today say they do have the best of both worlds having equal time with both parents. Some kids say they enjoy more time with their father since parents are divorced now than when the parents were together; since more mothers are apt to be the caregiver as a rule.