Grandparents Rights

Although you will find more information about how to select and obtain an attorney in my book No Greater Loss the first question you must ask when considering filing for custody of your grandchildren is what is at stake? Once you decide on the importance of your efforts that should help you decide whether to hire an attorney. Although there are no hard and fast rules about hiring an attorney, the following general rules will likely apply to your case […]

One of the best times to ask for grandparents visitation rights is when the parents of your grandchildren are in the process of getting a divorce. Timing of agreements is important. Your best chance at having visitation rights is if they are stated in the separation agreement and that normally becomes part of the divorce decree. If the case involves parents who are divorced the courts will look at the divorce settlement and the custody and visitation arrangements already made. […]

If you are a grandparents who is actually providing primary care for your grandchildren you may need to take affirmative steps to protect your grandparents rights in the case that your grandchildren’s parents later come back and wish to assert their own custody or wishes. This can often be done by obtaining legal guardianship over the grandchildren, or by actually obtaining an order of custody. However you need to know the laws of custody and of your state to do […]

Anyone interested and involved with grandparents rights needs to be aware of the Troxel case and its subsequent implications on grandparents rights. The Supreme Court issued this ruling with a 6-3 decision in June of 2000. It cancelled out a state law in Washington which permitted courts to grant visitation rights to any interested party as long as it was in the best interest of the child. The Troxel v. Granville came about in 1993 when two grandparents asked for […]

This is a question I get asked all the time by grandparents who are feeling shut out of their grandchildrens’ lives. Some amount of conflict between parents and grandparents over the raising of children is common. If you are having difficulty seeing your grandchildren the first (and second) options should be to attempt to negotiate and mediate a compromise with the parents. If you can avoid going to court you should do so. There is a lot of information on […]

I have just published the definitive volume on Grandparents Rights today. My new book No Greater Loss: The Guidebook to Today’s Grandparents Rights is now available in print. It contains everything you need to know about Grandparents Rights regarding visitation, custody, guardianship and much more. I have written this book to help bridge the gap between Logic and Law. Grandparents have provided and still provide so much caring continuity in our extended families…and yet there is a danger that these […]

The thing that bothers me most about the increasing need for Grandparents rights is that it is the children who suffer.  Our grandkids deserve all the love and support we can give them.  It is when this support  is interrupted by two adults that are attempting to resolve and/or dissolve their own relationship with each other but using the children as weapons.  As a caring grandparent this makes me angry. I realize that marriages are disintegrating at an ever increasing […]

Grandparents Rights are not something that are given to us.  It is incumbent upon us to be proactive.  I don’t mean that we take something from someone as much as we give something to the most important people in our lives.  In today’s legal climate the best way to insure your Grandparents visitation rights is to be so much a part of your grandchildren’s lives that you are virtually indispensable.  If you take every opportunity to create those magic moments […]

I wrote a hub page post on Monday and one of the comments reminded me why I do this stuff.  In my mind Grandparents rights are all about the kids.  I know in my heart of hearts that if we are to do anything with our energy then the highest and best use of that energy would be to help these little ones reach for whatever it is that they want in life.  A corny but true fact is that […]