Posted on August 02, 2016 in Divorce

In Illinois, an individual who wants to file for divorce must file the Petition for Dissolution of Marriage and summons to serve his or her spouse with the circuit court of the county in which he or she resides. Further, in order to file for divorce in Illinois at all, the individual must have resided in the state for at least 90 days. The filer's residency is what determines where the county in which the divorce proceedings are held and if the couple resides in different counties, a dispute can arise regarding where the proceedings can be held. If you are served with divorce papers and you would prefer to have your case handled in your home county, rather than your partner's home county, you may state this desire in your response to the divorce petition. Although you can request a change in venue, you are not guaranteed to have your request fulfilled. Talk to your lawyer about the possibility of changing your divorce's venue and its effect on your divorce.

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 Posted on July 28, 2016 in Child Custody

Traditionally, the court determines a parenting time agreement for a divorcing couple and as this agreement states, the child spends a specific amount of time in each parent's household each week. This requires travel between two houses, which can cut into each parent's time with the child and cause the child to feel like he or she has two homes. This setup is not a problem for some families, but for others, a lot of value is placed on the child having only one home. For these families, birdnesting can be an ideal solution.

Birdnesting is an arrangement where a divorced couple's child remains in one home at all times and the parents rotate in and out of it for their respective parenting time blocks. When it is not a parent's time to be in the house with his or her child, he or she resides in a separate residence. This child-centered form of co-parenting has its benefits, but also comes with drawbacks.

Benefits of Birdnesting

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 Posted on July 26, 2016 in Children and Divorce

A parent's divorce can take a toll on any child. How a parent's divorce affects a child depends on numerous factors, such as the level of conflict in the marriage before the divorce, the child's relationship with each parent, how drastically the child's lifestyle changes following the divorce, and the child's personality. Some children are more easily upset by conflict in their homes than others. One factor that can play into how a child is affected by his or her parents' divorce is the child's age. At different developmental stages, a child can understand and process the effects of a divorce in different ways.

It is a myth that divorce affects one age group more profoundly than others. The truth is, divorce affects all members of a family, but it can affect children and adolescents in specific ways based on their ages.

Infants and Toddlers

Babies can pick up on the tension between their parents, even if they cannot understand the reason for the tension. Infants who live in high-tension environments can exhibit signs of emotional instability and experience delayed development.

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 Posted on July 21, 2016 in Child Custody

When the court determines appropriate parenting time and parenting responsibility arrangements for divorcing couples, it considers multiple factors. These factors are outlined in the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act. Examples of these factors include the child's personal needs, each parent's income and assets, the other individuals present in each parent's household, and the quality of the child's relationship with each parent.

As you can see, one of these factors is not like the others. The court can quantify each parent's annual income and expenses and determine the child's personal needs in concrete terms, but qualifying the child's relationship with each of his or her parents is much more difficult. What makes a quality relationship? How can the court find one relationship to be stronger than another, when every relationship that exists is unique?

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 Posted on July 19, 2016 in Divorce

A few of the most common reasons why couples divorce are conflicts about money, infidelity, and conflicting views about how to raise their children. These kinds of issues generally arise within the first decade or so of a marriage. But when a marriage can weather these difficulties and last 20, 30, or even more years, it can be difficult to imagine it ending in divorce. But statistics show that is is becoming increasingly common for older couples, those who have been married for short periods of time as well as those who have been married for decades, to seek divorces. This trend is known as “gray divorce.”

Since 1990, the divorce rate for individuals over 50 has doubled. Certain issues are unique to older couples that drive them toward divorce. These, coupled with the social attitudes and expectations of individuals in their 50s and 60s today versus the attitudes and expectations held by previous generations, are driving the trend of gray divorce in the United States.

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 Posted on July 14, 2016 in Child Custody

For many Illinois children and teens, summer is a season of outdoor adventure. Swimming, biking, hiking, and nights spent around the campfire become cherished memories and when summer is over, children often spend the colder months reminiscing and looking forward to their next summer vacation. For some families, summer also means family vacations and extended stays at summer camp. These, as well as everyday activities back home, are not without their risk of injury. Children can suffer life-changing injuries in accidents and all sorts of summertime scenarios, especially when they are not adequately supervised. To prevent an injury this summer, speak with your former spouse about safety rules for outdoor activities, vacations, and summer camp. Working together is part of your parenting agreement and as parents, it is your job to keep your child safe.

Summer Safety Topics to Discuss with Your Former Spouse and Your Child

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 Posted on July 05, 2016 in Property Division

Forensic accounting is the practice of using accounting skills to uncover acts of fraud or embezzlement. It can be used in a variety of situations, such as determining whether a financial adviser or other trusted party is embezzling money from his or her clients or determining whether a business is actually a front for a money laundering operation. In a divorce case, forensic accounting can be used to uncover assets that an individual is attempting to hide from his or her partner in an effort to come away from the divorce with a greater share of the couple's marital asset pool. If you suspect your partner is doing this, speak with your divorce attorney about your options for using forensic accounting to recover the assets.

How Does a Forensic Accountant Find Assets?

A forensic accountant is an accountant who uses investigative skills to determine how money is earned, invested, saved, and spent. Forensic accountants use multiple methods to trace assets. A few of these methods are listed below:

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 Posted on June 24, 2016 in Children and Divorce

When you are going through a divorce, issues pertaining to your children are often at the top of your list of concerns. Topics like your parenting time agreement, child support, and how the divorce and any future partners will affect your relationships with your children are likely at the forefront of your mind not only while your divorce is pending, but long after it is finalized.

If your children are over the age of 18, though, you do not have to worry about issues like parenting time and child support. If they are beyond the point of needing financial help from you or your former spouse, generally in or beyond their mid-twenties, your children's needs will not come up in your divorce proceeding at all. But although adult children are not financially or physically affected by their parents' divorces, they can be affected emotionally. Consider the following as you proceed through the divorce process.

Your Children Can Understand Why You Are Divorcing

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 Posted on June 22, 2016 in Divorce

For many engaged women, the decision to change their name to their husband's or not after marriage is fairly easy to make. Most women know long before they get engaged, even before they meet the men they eventually marry, whether they want to change their name or not because for many, the decision is primarily about her attachment to her own name. When a woman who changed her name gets divorced, she has a new decision to make: to change her name again or not. For some, changing their name back to their family name is an empowering way to strip themselves of the marriage and all its problems whereas for others, the name is no longer just their husband's, but their own and keeping it has nothing to do with holding onto him or the marriage. If you are not sure about whether you want to change your name after your divorce, consider the following:

Your Professional Identity

For many women, the decision to change one's name or not at marriage and at divorce hinges on how her professional identity is tied to the name. If you are well known by a specific name in your field, it might not be in your best interest to change it.

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 Posted on June 17, 2016 in Children and Divorce

When a couple with children divorces, they often wonder about how their divorce will affect their children in the future. Some of these individuals have parents who divorced when they were children and continue to feel the effects of the divorce today. Others worry that divorcing will lead their children down a path of instability and might consider staying together until the children are grown. Current research supports that this is not the healthiest option for most families and that remaining in an unhappy marriage can be worse for parents and children than divorcing.

How an individual is affected by his or her parents' divorce can depend on a lot of factors, such as:

• His or her age when the divorce occurred;
• The reason for the divorce;
• His or her personality; and
• How his or her parents interacted with each other and the individual after the divorce.

Having Divorced Parents Makes an Individual More Likely to Divorce

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