In Virginia, when custody and/or visitation are in dispute, judges use known criteria to discern what will be best for a child. The factors they weigh include:
- the age and developmental needs of the child,
- the primacy of the parent-child relationship,
- the ability of each parent to provide a healthy, non-abusive environment for each child,
- each parent’s willingness to promote frequent and continuing contact with the other parent,
- each parent’s willingness and ability to abide by Court Orders,
- how the child’s proposed schedule will affect school, extracurricular activities, the child’s time in transit between parents, and the parents’ work schedules,
- the parents’ abilities and willingness to provide transportation,
- the impact of the schedule on the family’s ability to preserve resources.
All of the judges I have met in Alexandria, Arlington, Fairfax, and elsewhere in Virginia are serious about trying to figure out what will be best for the children.
A parent who can stay calm, give the judge evidence of his or her bond with the child, commitment to the child, and ability to provide a good home for the child is likely to do well in court. A parent who sounds outrageously hostile or more interested in his or her own needs than in the child’s is not likely to get a favorable ruling.
Most judges treat the child’s relationship with each parent as a matter of considerable importance. If both parents want custody, their homes are near enough to each other to make shared custody feasible even during the school year, and the judge thinks they can do an adequate job of cooperating to get the child back and forth without causing scenes and disturbances, then the judge may readily order shared physical custody. I have even known a couple of cases in which the parents had a lot of hostility toward each other but each had a positive relationship with the child, and the judge ordered shared physical custody despite the hostility.
When shared physical custody is not sensible, most judges still treat the child’s right to have a relationship with the non-residential parent as a matter of great importance.
Going to court well prepared to demonstrate that you are an involved, loving, capable parent is likely to serve you and your child well. Going into court without a plan or without the ability to stop yourself from launching into nasty personal attacks on the other parent is not likely to lead to the outcome you seek.
Of course, knowing all this, you and your former partner may be able to work with a family mediator to develop a parenting plan (otherwise known as a custody and visitation schedule) that leaves you, the parents, in control of decisions. Making your case before a judge is more stressful than mediation, and a judge’s decisions can be hard to predict. When parents can develop an agreement about a schedule that will be good for the child, most judges will trust the parents’ decisions.
Nothing here should be construed as legal advice.
