You want to take your kids on a fun road trip this summer. They don’t have school, so you’re taking some time off of work. You think it will be a good bonding experience for all of you, and you’re excited to see other parts of the country.
But the catch is that this is your first summer as a divorced parent. You now share custody with your children’s co-parent, in accordance with a court order that was handed down during your divorce. Can you take your kids on the summer trip as you’ve planned, or would that be a violation of your ex’s right to see the children?
Communication is key
First and foremost, look at the child custody order that was handed out by the court. In some cases, these orders will be specifically written to address vacations and school breaks already.
Even if the agreement doesn’t address these topics, it should still divide your time with the children. So you can use it to check and see if the time that you would be gone on your trip is going to interfere with your ex’s ability to see them.
If the other co-parent does have custody time during the trip, that doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t go. It just means that the two of you need to communicate in advance. Many co-parents will trade custody time during the summer so that they can make trips and other events possible.
But it is important that you respect the court order and the other person’s parental rights. You need to know what legal steps to take so that you don’t cause any issues moving forward.
