The Rising Importance of Grandparents Rights

About 50 percent of all marriages end in divorce today. When divorce takes place in the family the separation of the family unit affects everyone, and each person is affected differently. There is blame and hurt from everyone in the family.

When parents separate or divorce the grandparents visitation rights affected. Grandparents are, of course, concerned about custody issues and they also want to help protect their grandchildren. Grandparents should be able to have a continued relationship with their grandparents to have some normality in their lives. Grandparents can be of great value at this time.

Just because there is anger or animosity between the parents is no reason grandparents should be shut out of their grandchildren’s lives. This is referred to in court as alienating behavior. Grandparents themselves must be careful not to get caught up in this type of behavior as well if they have anger about what occurred during a divorce.

Unfortunately not everyone takes the wise path. If you are a grandparent in the situation of being unable to see your grandchildren due to a divorce, you need to be informed of the best course of action. One thing that you should know is that it is always best to try to work things out without resorting to legal action. However, all cases are different and some are very stressful and difficult.

Much of this is dealt with in my book No Greater Loss which is one resource you can go to in these trying times. If you are seriously considering court action you will also want to go to a local attorney.  In almost every case where the courts are involved you should use an attorney to represent and advise you. Before you get to that point, however, you need to make sure you are as informed as possible about grandparents rights in these cases.