Posted on August 28, 2015 in College Expenses

With college tuition rates consistently rising in the United States, many parents are deciding to start saving for college earlier. Ideally, parents should begin saving as soon as the child is born. Even if the monthly contribution is small, starting early can give parents the extra boost they need to keep up with ever rising college costs. It is a smart move and your child will appreciate it down the road. In the case of a divorce, the college savings becomes uncertain. Co-saving, like co-parenting, is possible post divorce, but there are a few things you need to know to save successfully.

College Savings Accounts

When setting out to save for a child’s future college tuition, many families invest in some sort of 529 college savings plan. These are tax-advantaged investment accounts, and help many parents save more money faster. Often, parents open these accounts jointly. In the unfortunate case of a divorce, parents must explore their options for future account ownership. Typically, one parent will need to be designated as the sole owner of the account. There are however, other options, such as freezing the account, or splitting the savings into two accounts.

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 Posted on August 27, 2015 in Divorce

Most grandparents share special bonds with their grandchildren. Children crave the love, attention, and care that grandparents often provide. Grandparents enjoy being a source of support and love for their grandchildren while not being the primary caregiver. In most cases, grandparents and grandchildren have amazing, loving, lifelong relationships. Watching a grandchild experience a divorce can be extremely difficult. Chances are, your grandchild is going through sadness, pain, and confusion because of their parents’ divorce, and understanding how to help can be challenging. While each divorce is complex and different, there are a few basic strategies you, as a grandparent, can employ to ensure the safety, security, and happiness of your grandchild.

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 Posted on August 25, 2015 in Divorce

Same-sex marriage was recently legalized across the entire United States. While some gay couples have still faced discrimination, for the most part, same-sex couples in every state have been able to celebrate their relationships and officially marry. As joyful as marriage is, legalizing marriage for a large group of people in the United States will eventually, unfortunately, and inevitably lead to divorce for some of them. While one would assume that same-sex divorce cases would be handled the same as any other divorce case, a lack of laws and prior precedent means a same-sex divorce could be messy, and the splitting of a couple’s financial assets could be left up to a judge. Planning ahead can help ease a couple’s stress about the unfortunate possibility of divorce down the road.

Unique Challenges

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 Posted on August 20, 2015 in Divorce

Divorce is always difficult. However, divorcing someone who is suffering from mental illness can be all the more difficult—and has the potential to even become dangerous. There are several mental health issues that can lead to divorce, or contribute to a reason for it. Sex addiction, drug addiction, alcoholism, and mental instabilities, such as bipolar or borderline personality, can all make a marriage impossible to sustain in the long run, or even temporarily. Other situations in which one partner suffers from a less definable mental illness, such as someone who is severely passive-aggressive or a narcissist, can be just as delicate to navigate during a divorce.

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 Posted on August 18, 2015 in Family Law

With a very wide array of adoption routes to take, exploring the idea of adopting a child can seem daunting. Adopting a child is a wonderful decision and can bring immense happiness to parents and the child. Many hopeful parents considering adoption fear the high costs commonly associated with the process. While it is true that certain routes to adoption cost more than others, every adoption does not have to be expensive. Illinois residents looking to adopt may be surprised to discover that not all adoption methods cost thousands of dollars.

There are different types of adoption that each have varying degrees of costs associated with them. As one would imagine, adopting infants typically is much more expensive than adopting a child in foster care or a child under the care of another state agency. In the United States, there are more hopeful parents waiting to adopt infants than there are infants available to adopt. Many would-be adoptive parents work with agencies to locate available infants, and these agencies can be costly. Adoption agencies can set strict acceptance criteria and can charge high rates for home studies, counseling, and medical expenses. Choosing to adopt through an adoption agency can often range from $20,000 to $40,000.

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 Posted on August 13, 2015 in Divorce

The Catholic Church has historically been a strong opponent of divorce. In the eyes of the Catholic Church, divorce, no matter the cause, is to be avoided if at all possible. Those in a new relationship after divorce are also thought by the Church to be committing adultery. A recent new opinion from the leader of the Catholic Church himself, Pope Francis, shows an interesting shift in the views of the Catholic Church. For the first time in history, Pope Francis has declared that divorce can be considered a “lesser evil” in cases where getting a divorce is “morally necessary.”

The Catholic Church has always considered marriage a permanent union. Catholics believe that, in the eyes of God, a couple getting married forms an unbreakable bond. For this reason, civil divorces are not considered valid by the Church. Divorcees are not able to receive Holy Communion, though the church does make exceptions for those who have had their marriages annulled and those who have not been remarried. While divorcees are still allowed to be a part of the Catholic Church, they are often left with feelings of guilt and exclusion. Any Catholic wishing to remarry in a Catholic church is forbidden unless their former spouse passed away, or they had their marriage annulled. The Catholic Church considers the idea of marriage permanence as universal.

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 Posted on August 11, 2015 in Child Support

Establishing initial child support arrangements that adequately reflect the financial abilities of both parents can often be a challenge. Having one standardized system for determining child support is an important step toward equality in payments. Federal law requires a specific system, but does not require a uniform model for all states. Two primary standards have developed, as a result, in determining child support formulas: percentage of obligor income model and income shares model.

Illinois Obligor Income Model

Under current law, Illinois employs the lesser-used system, known as the percentage of obligor income model, because of its ease and simplicity. In this model, the income of the payor, or supporting parent, after taxes and other deductions, is taken into consideration, and a percentage of this income is set as the payment based upon the number of children to be supported. However, the more money and assets one possesses, the more difficult it is to determine fair payment, especially if the custodial parent has more income or assets than the payor parent.

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 Posted on July 30, 2015 in Visitation

After divorce settlements and child custody arrangements have been determined, parents must make decisions on how visitation rights will be structured. In Illinois, unless a parent is viewed as a threat to their child’s well-being, visitation rights for the non-custodial parent are required by the courts. Parents have the option to create visitation schedules on their own, or the court may set a visitation schedule for them.

Reasonable Visitation

Illinois courts require that visitation be “reasonable,” meaning that visitation rights are neither prohibited nor unlimited. The specific application of “reasonable visitation” varies from case to case. In some cases, supervised visitation may be required, either at a visitation center or in the home of a third party. Parents have the ability to drop the child(ren) off at predetermined locations if they do not want to have contact with their former spouses. Visitation rights can also be granted for other relatives such as grandparents.

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 Posted on July 28, 2015 in Divorce

Most custody cases deal with living children, but, in light of increased use of in vitro fertilization, a very important legal question is beginning to emerge: Who owns an embryo?

Legal Statutes Struggle to Keep Up with Rapidly Advancing Technology

Not long ago, infertile couples had virtually no options for bearing children of their own. Reproductive medicine came along and changed all of that by providing a solution that enabled them to create and carry their own baby through an assisted reproductive technology known as in vitro fertilization.

The first birth from this technology happened less than 40 years ago. Since that time, several advancements have been made in the field of reproductive medicine. Most were aimed at improving success rates or reducing risks, but they have happened so rapidly that there is now a dearth of legal statutes governing fertility treatments.

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 Posted on July 24, 2015 in Divorce

Illinois couples may elect to initiate divorce proceedings for a variety of reasons. In some cases, a spouse may have mental health issues that contribute to or cause a breakdown in the partnership. While the spectrum of mental health issues and personality disorders is broad, one disorder that is often misunderstood or overlooked is narcissism. Contending with a narcissistic partner can be an emotionally exhausting experience and many spouses may be unaware of what exactly they are dealing with and just how much of a toll it is taking on them.

Many experts in wellness, both mental and physical, have thought-provoking ideas about how a relationship with another person can be unhealthy if that other person has narcissistic qualities. A person’s holistic wellness in relationships is about having healthy, positive people around us which, in turn, creates healthy, positive relationships. Keeping a narcissist in one’s life can only contribute distress, thus deciding to end the relationship, if it cannot be changed, is often imperative.

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