A family law judge issued the order prohibiting Reyes from “exposing his daughter to any other religion other than the Jewish religion during his visitation” for 30 days.  Reyes defied the court order and took his daughter to a Chicago church with news cameras rolling.  Shapiro asked the court to find him in contempt and sentence him to jail for up to six months.

Father’s rights lawyers will be watching this case because the father contends that a court shouldn’t be deciding a child’s religious practices.

“Why?” I asked.

“It’s nothing but problems, problems and more problems.”

“Son,” said his dad.  “Thank God that every day you get up and have problems to solve.  Because you know when there are no more problems to solve?”

“No, when?” he said.

“When you’re dead.  You were put on Earth to solve problems.  Life is full of problems.  They are there to challenge you and make you grow.  Every day you have problems it means you are alive.  So let’s go eat breakfast and start solving  problems.”

You may be bitter about the amount of alimony and child support you have to pay.  Many ex-husband’s complain that their ex’s are living better than them financially.  That is not to say that single mothers have it any better.

Anger and hurt are part of the grieving process in a divorce according to many therapists.  These emotions should not be denied.  But it is also common to give them more significance than they deserve.  One way to cope is to find a meaning or purpose in your life that is bigger than your divorce problems.

Time does eventually heal the wounds and the divorce recedes into the past as your new life becomes larger and more satisfying than the old.  But ex-spouses still talk about their divorces with a hint of vindication or gloat over the misfortunes of their ex’s.

The way to know when you are over it is when you no longer want revenge.  That’s when you look at your life and you are satisfied.  The best revenge is living well.

If you post your thoughts on Facebook, you may be giving the other side a roadmap for your case.  Do you want your spouse and his or her counsel to know what you are thinking and what your strategy is?

If you make angry statements about your spouse, you may be stepping in wet concrete.  The other side can use these statements in court to attack your credibility if you say something different.  Or to show the judge what kind of person you are if the statements are unreasonable.

The solution is to keep this in mind.  The first thing your spouse’s attorney will do after signing the retainer, is print out all your Facebook posts to use against you at trial.

But a baby doesn’t need the same kind of access schedule that a 12 year old does.  Their basic needs and developmental tasks are different.  The baby’s “task” is to learn to bond, because all future emotional relationships depend on early bonding.  The baby needs continuity and frequency of contact, because for a baby, when someone goes away for weeks at a time, it is as if they died.

A 12 year old on the other hand, needs time with parents that takes into account his or her need to develop peer relationships and extracurricular activities.  And any children with issues like ADHD or special needs may have unique requirements that parents should consider when setting up schedules.

It is not easy to look at life through your child’s eyes. But a good parenting plan and child access schedule does just that.  You are a parent for the long haul; your children grow and change, and so should your schedule.  The way to begin to establish a schedule is by understanding the needs of each child.

During visitation, the daughter would spend some time with Darryl, his wife, her half siblings and some time with Darryl’s new girlfriend and the new girlfriend’s son.  Emma was opposed to her daughter being exposed to such behavior and asked the court to require supervised visitation.

The trial judge threw the case out with a brief decision, “Your application to modify visitation and [for] supervised visitation is denied.  Thank you very much. Have a pleasant holiday.”

While the Appellate Court said the trial judge should have explained his decision better, Emma had brought this objection up in previous hearings and had not shown a change in circumstances had occurred that would justify changing visitation to supervised.

Read more at New Jersey Family Law.

by the Zac Brown Band

I ride east every other Friday but if I had it my way
The day would not be wasted on this drive
And I want so bad to hold you
So much things I haven’t told you
Your mom and me couldn’t get along
So I’ll drive
And I think about my life
And wonder why, that I slowly die inside.

1.  dependency exemption,
2.  head of household filing status,
3.  child tax credit,
4.  child and dependent care credit, and
5.  earned income tax credit.

But each of these used to have a different requirement for when a child qualified for favorable tax treatment.  Now the IRS has created a uniform definition of a qualifying child.  This was done to streamline the tax rules related to children and make the regulations more consistent.  There are still a few variations left.  For more information.

Sean’s step father and maternal grandmother in Brazil said they “will not pursue any more legal channels” and will obey the order.

The Brazilian family will obey the order and “will not pursue any more legal channels,” an aide to a lawyer told the Associated Press.  Another appeal would have meant delays until February at least.  If all goes smoothly tomorrow, David will return with Sean to the US after a five year custody battle for his son.

Read More.