When parents separate, their relationship with each other changes. Their responsibilities to their children do not.
The challenge is figuring out how parenting will work when the children now have two households, parents may have different schedules, and decisions that were once made together become more difficult. Even parents who agree on the big picture can find themselves disagreeing about school nights, activities, holidays, medical decisions, transportation, or how much flexibility each household should have.
Keller Legal Services helps parents in Glen Ellyn address child custody matters under Illinois law. We represent parents establishing arrangements for the first time as well as those dealing with disagreements that threaten an existing parenting structure.
A good custody arrangement should do more than divide days on a calendar. It should provide enough stability for children while preserving meaningful parental relationships and establishing clear expectations for the adults responsible for raising them.
Illinois law no longer uses “custody” as the primary legal term for determining parental rights after separation or divorce. Instead, the law addresses the allocation of parental responsibilities.
For parents, this generally involves two major questions:
Those questions are related, but they are not the same.
A parent can have substantial parenting time without having sole authority over major decisions. Parents can also share significant decision-making responsibilities even when their parenting schedules are not equal.
Keller Legal Services’ main resource on child custody under Illinois law provides a broader explanation of how the state’s custody framework works.
One of the difficult parts of separation is that children often experience several changes at once.
They may begin spending time in two homes. Transportation changes. Holiday traditions may need to be divided. A parent who previously handled school mornings every day may no longer do so. Children may have to remember clothes, homework, sports equipment, medications, and other belongings as they move between households.
Illinois law recognizes the importance of the child’s circumstances when parenting time is determined.
Under 750 ILCS 5/602.7, courts allocate parenting time according to the child’s best interests. Among the statutory considerations are the child’s adjustment to home, school, and community, the child’s needs, each parent’s previous caretaking role, the parents’ and child’s schedules, and the distance between the parents’ residences.
For Glen Ellyn families, these practical considerations can be important when evaluating a proposed schedule.
A parenting arrangement should account for the child’s actual life rather than simply dividing available days between parents.
There is no single parenting schedule that works for every family.
Some parents can successfully use schedules that provide each parent with substantial weekday and weekend time. Other families need a more traditional school-week arrangement because of work schedules, transportation, distance between households, or the children’s particular needs.
Illinois does not automatically require 50/50 parenting time. The court considers the child’s best interests rather than applying an automatic equal-time rule.
When developing a schedule, parents may need to think about:
Our page addressing parenting time in Illinois provides more detail about how these arrangements can be structured.
A parenting plan cannot eliminate every disagreement. It can eliminate many unnecessary ones.
Consider a common situation: both parents agree that they should alternate holidays, but the agreement does not specify when a holiday begins and ends.
Does Thanksgiving begin Wednesday evening or Thursday morning? Does Christmas Eve end at bedtime, midnight, or Christmas morning?
Those details can seem minor while parents are cooperating. They become much more important when communication deteriorates.
Illinois law requires parenting plans to address numerous subjects beyond a basic weekly schedule. Under 750 ILCS 5/602.10, a parenting plan must include provisions concerning significant decision-making responsibilities, living arrangements, parenting time, transportation, certain communications, and other child-related matters.
Parents can find a more detailed discussion of these requirements on Keller Legal Services’ page about creating a parenting plan.
The objective should not be to create rules for every possible situation. It should be to establish enough structure that ordinary parenting issues do not repeatedly become legal disputes.
Not everything that happens during parenting time requires consultation with the other parent.
Illinois law distinguishes routine decisions from significant decisions. A parent generally handles routine and emergency decisions affecting the child while the child is in that parent’s care.
Significant decisions are different.
Under 750 ILCS 5/602.5, the major categories of significant decision-making responsibilities include:
The court can allocate responsibility for these decisions to one or both parents according to the child’s best interests.
This allows parenting arrangements to reflect the family’s circumstances rather than assuming all decision-making must be divided identically.
Keller Legal Services discusses this issue further in its resource on significant parental decision-making responsibilities.
Parents do not need to have a friendly relationship to co-parent effectively.
They do, however, need a workable way to exchange important information and carry out the parenting arrangement.
Some conflict after separation is normal. A legal problem may begin developing when communication problems interfere with the children’s schedule, significant decisions, or compliance with the parenting plan.
Examples could include:
Illinois law specifically allows courts to consider the parents’ ability to cooperate when allocating significant decision-making responsibilities. It also permits consideration of whether each parent is willing and able to encourage the child’s continuing relationship with the other parent.
That does not mean parents are expected to agree about everything.
The relevant question is whether conflict is affecting their ability to carry out their parental responsibilities.
Custody disputes can become intensely personal, particularly when they occur during a difficult divorce.
Children should not become messengers, investigators, or negotiators between their parents.
Parents should be cautious about asking children to report what happens in the other household or placing them in a position where they believe they must choose sides.
Illinois courts can consider a child’s wishes when determining parenting time, taking into account the child’s maturity and ability to express reasoned and independent preferences. But that does not mean children are expected to decide custody cases themselves.
A child’s preference is one consideration within a much larger best-interest analysis.
Some parenting disagreements can be resolved through direct negotiation between parents and their attorneys. Others may benefit from mediation.
If parents cannot reach an agreed parenting plan, Illinois law establishes procedures for submitting proposed plans to the court. Section 602.10 also recognizes mediation as a means of attempting to formulate a parenting plan.
If disputed issues remain unresolved, the court can determine the parenting arrangement.
The fact that parents disagree does not necessarily mean every issue needs to be litigated.
For example, parents might agree about the regular school-week schedule but disagree about summer parenting time. They might agree about parenting time but disagree over educational decision-making.
Narrowing the dispute can allow parents to preserve agreements they have already reached while concentrating legal resources on the issues that genuinely require resolution.
For married parents, custody issues are generally addressed as part of the divorce proceeding.
The family may therefore be making parenting decisions while also dealing with the marital home, finances, property division, maintenance, and child support.
Keller Legal Services assists clients with the broader dissolution process through its Glen Ellyn divorce representation.
Financial support for children is another important part of many cases, but child support and custody are not interchangeable. Keller’s Glen Ellyn child support lawyers address the financial support side of these cases separately.
Parents should be especially cautious about allowing financial disputes to drive parenting decisions. A disagreement about money should not become a reason to interfere with parenting time, and parenting time should not be used as leverage over support.
A divorce is not required for a custody dispute to occur.
Parents who were never married may still need a court-approved arrangement establishing parenting time and decision-making responsibilities.
Parentage can be an important threshold issue in these cases. Once legal parentage has been established when necessary, parental responsibilities can be formally addressed.
Because the process for establishing parentage raises separate legal questions, Keller Legal Services provides additional information about paternity matters in Illinois.
A formal parenting arrangement can be valuable even when unmarried parents have historically managed parenting informally. As children get older, school schedules, activities, new relationships, employment changes, and other developments can make informal arrangements increasingly difficult.
There is an important difference between ordinary co-parenting conflict and a situation involving abuse, violence, or genuine concerns about a child’s safety.
Illinois law allows courts to consider physical violence, threats of violence, abuse, and whether restrictions on parenting time are appropriate when determining a child’s best interests.
These situations should not be treated as ordinary scheduling disagreements.
Parents dealing with abuse or threats may also need to consider legal protections outside the ordinary custody process. Keller Legal Services provides separate information regarding orders of protection.
Children’s lives change considerably over time.
A schedule developed when children are very young may become difficult once they begin school. Teenagers may have sports, jobs, activities, and social commitments that did not exist when the original parenting arrangement was created.
Parents’ lives change too.
Employment schedules shift. Families relocate. Transportation becomes more difficult. New circumstances can make an existing arrangement less workable.
A court order should not simply be ignored because it has become inconvenient. Illinois law establishes requirements for modifying parenting arrangements.
Rather than duplicating that separate topic here, Keller Legal Services explains the process in its resource on changing an existing child custody order.
Custody decisions are based on the child’s best interests. The statutory factors focus on the child, parenting history, relationships, schedules, needs, cooperation, safety, and other relevant circumstances rather than establishing an automatic preference for mothers or fathers.
No. Illinois does not require an automatic 50/50 parenting-time schedule.
Yes. Significant decision-making responsibilities can be allocated to one or both parents depending on the child’s best interests and the circumstances involving each category of decision.
Disagreement alone does not necessarily make shared parenting impossible. The nature of the conflict matters, particularly whether it affects the parents’ ability to make significant decisions, follow the parenting plan, or meet the child’s needs.
Parents may informally accommodate occasional schedule changes, but an existing court order remains the governing arrangement unless it is properly modified. Significant or permanent changes should be addressed carefully.
A child’s wishes can be considered, but there is no automatic age at which a child unilaterally determines the parenting arrangement. The child’s maturity and ability to express an independent preference are among the considerations.
The most useful custody arrangements are not simply designed to end today’s disagreement. They give parents and children a structure they can rely on as family life moves forward.
Keller Legal Services helps Glen Ellyn parents address parenting time, significant decision-making responsibilities, parenting plans, and contested custody issues with an eye toward both the immediate legal dispute and how the arrangement will function in everyday life.
Call 630-505-1515 or contact Keller Legal Services to schedule a free consultation and discuss the parenting issues affecting your family.
