You have your reasons for preferring to limit or eliminate contact between your children and their grandparents, whether these grandparents are your parents or your ex’s parents. However, the grandparents may be talking about going to court for the right to see your child.

Could they be able to visit your children over your objections?

Parental rights tend to come first

If divorce is in the wind, you are probably beginning to wonder how the family breakup will affect your children. It is an important issue, and you want to be prepared.

Raising your children in a post-divorce world will require a good parenting plan, but when problems pop up, do not be discouraged. Remember that there is a learning curve to the job of co-parenting.

Planning

Ideally, both parents would remain involved in their children’s lives after a divorce. However, as you are aware, sometimes one or both parents are unsuited to care for their children. To protect the children involved, family law courts in Texas must occasionally revoke parental rights.

You may be interested in learning the different reasons for terminating a parent’s rights. According to FindLaw, this is usually done for the children’s physical or emotional well-being. Parental rights are most often revoked in the following situations:

• Physical, verbal, emotional or sexual abuse
• Chronic or severe neglect of the children’s needs
• Abandonment of the children or failure to maintain contact or support
• Drug addiction, alcoholism or substance abuse
• Endangerment of the children
• Physical or mental incapacity that keeps the parent from being able to care for the children

A parent may also voluntarily give up his or her rights to care for the children. Usually, parental rights are involuntarily revoked after repeated attempts to help an unfit parent become a better caregiver. These efforts may include court-ordered counseling, rehabilitation for alcohol and drug abuse and supervised visitation.