Over the last several years most family law courts have preferred to award 50-50 physical custody to both parents in child custody cases. This has been a trend that has taken the place of an old family law doctrine called the “Tender Years Doctrine”. The tender years doctrine approach started from the premise that the mother should have primary physical custody of the child until the child was of school age. However, in our more enlightened society where most families have both parents working, the courts have now adopted a more “current approach” to child custody arrangements.
If the parents live relatively close to each other and the children are not in school most courts will strongly encourage a 50-50 split of physical custody, more often than not making a court order of one week on and one week off or splitting child custody down the middle week by week. However, in a recent article by Renee Leff, an LMFT and JD certified in infant mental health, the author believes that the courts need to strongly consider having the mother be the primary caretaker until the child is 3 years old.
Ms. Leff stresses the importance of a young child feeling safe in one household and that moving the child back and forth between two homes is not in the child’s best interest. Our family law firm has been successfully representing both mothers and fathers in child custody battles for over 30 years. It will be very interesting to see if any family law courts begin to revert back to the “tender years doctrine” and follow the suggestions of Ms. Leff.
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