Do it like Charlie!
Tips to help you achieve your own child custody agreement!
Hearing the word “custody” and Charlie Sheen in the same sentence these days is not all that surprising. But what I did find surprising last week was hearing that Charlie and his ex, Brooke, have apparently arrived at a child custody agreement with respect to their twin infant children.
While details of the deal will apparently not be made public, you can at least rest assured, if Charlie can do it, so can you and your ex.
So here are three tips to help you and your ex negotiate your own child custody agreement just like Charlie.
Firstly, be sure to get some good legal advice.
No, this does not mean advice from any of your (unhappily) divorced friends or colleagues, your dentist, doctor, or anyone else who has not actually attended, and graduated, from an accredited legal institution. Better yet, find someone who has acquired years of actual family law experience in your particular province or state.
Why is this important? Well you’re dealing with, hopefully, the most valuable asset from your relationship, ie your children. Legal terms carry with them significant consequences, both positive and negative. Wrong, omitted or misleading terms can eventually have both of you heading off to court. Good legal advice will help you to avoid this unhappy predicament.
Secondly, give up the blame game.
You and your ex will both need to put aside those negative feelings about each other. This process is all about focusing on the children’s best interests. It’s not about your spouse hogging the remote, their excessive gambling/drinking/drug/sexual/ predelictions, or anything else which is not directly related to parenting the children.
Keep in mind; it’s also highly likely that for every finger pointing blame in one direction, there will be one pointing right back.
Lastly, be sure to just zip it.
Keep your family child custody agreement private. No calling CNN, Piers Morgan, the National Enquirer, or anyone else. Your children deserve their privacy, whether you and your spouse crave it or not.
So far, congrats to Charlie and Brooke on this last tip.
After all, your children don’t want their parents to be either Tigers or Goddesses. Just staying mom and dad would be best of all.