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Asking for Parenting Time or Visitation in a Motion

Produced by Attorney Jeff Wolf for MassLegalHelp
Created March 2017

If you are in an ongoing court case and there is no Parenting Time or Visitation Order, ask for one by filing a motion and proposed order for parenting time or visitation.

Motion for Parenting Time

Here is a situation where

  • the parent that the child lives with wants the other parent to have parenting time, but
  • the parents cannot agree on a schedule.

Jane and John are getting divorced. They have two children who live with Jane. Both parents want John to have parenting time with their children, but they have not been able to agree on a parenting time schedule or on which one of them will be responsible for transportation. Their work schedules are the problem. Jane has a lawyer, but John does not. To ask for a parenting time order, John files a Motion for Parenting Time and Proposed Order for Parenting Time like our samples.

If you are in an ongoing case and you need to ask for parenting time, file:

Motion for Supervised Parenting Time

Rosa’s situation is where:

  • there is no domestic violence,
  • the parents are getting divorced,
  • she needs the visits to be supervised, and
  • she does not need or want to use a supervised visitation center.

Ramon and Rosa separated and are getting a divorce. They have a 5 year old son, Jose. Jose lives with Rosa. They have filed divorce papers but have not agreed on a parenting time schedule.

Rosa wants Jose to have a relationship with his dad. Ramon wants to be part of Jose’s life and Jose wants to spend time with him. Ramon is a lot of fun. He takes Jose to the beach and baseball games and plays catch with him. But sometimes Ramon forgets Jose is there or that you cannot leave a 5 year old on the beach alone while you go into the water.

Rosa does not think Ramon is grown up enough to look after Jose by himself. He is very impulsive and absent minded. He can spend hours playing on the computer or watching sports on TV. Ramon does not know how to cook or put a meal on the table. He does not do laundry or housework. Rosa needs Ramon to have supervised parenting time with Jose.

She would file a Motion for Supervised Parenting Time, A Proposed Order, and an Affidavit in Support of Supervised Parenting Time.

If you are in an ongoing case and you need to ask for parenting time supervised by an individual, file:

Motion for Visitation at a Supervised Visitation Center

In George and Martha's situation:

  • domestic violence, substance abuse, and mental health issues are part of the mix,
  • the parents are getting divorced, and
  • one parent was afraid the other parent was harming their children and visitation needed to be supervised.

George and Martha have been married for 8 years. They have 2 boys, James is 7 years old and Freddy is 5. George has become more and more abusive. At first, when came home from work after a bad day if his dinner was not ready or the house not clean to his liking he would yell at Martha or throw things at her. Martha was getting really depressed and she stopped caring about how she looked. George started punching and slapping her, to beat “some sense into her” as he put it. The children often witnessed their father’s outbursts. George was having trouble at work and it looked like he might get fired. He started drinking before he came home from his job, Once, when George came home from work, after stopping in first at the neighborhood bar, he started screaming at Martha for serving spinach for dinner. He threw the plate at her, but it hit James and cut his face. Martha told George to leave at once. “Go live with your brother,” she demanded. He did. Over the next week George telephoned Martha every day. He demanded that she do his laundry and let him take the children over to his brother’s house, for some “parenting time” as he put it. George’s brother was an out-of-work roofer with a serious drug habit. Martha got a restraining order that ordered George not to abuse her, not to contact her, and to stay 100 yards away from her and their house. The order gave Martha custody of the children and ordered George not to contact them. The order was in effect for a year, but George kept telephoning the children, often after he’d been drinking. He’d tell the boys that he hated Martha. He would tell them he needed to see them, and that if he couldn’t see them he might kill himself. James and Freddy keep telling Martha they want to see their father. She feels under a lot of pressure., After a month, Martha filed for a divorce. She did not have a lawyer. She read about supervised visitation decided to file a Motion for Visitation at a Supervised Visitation Center. She also filed an Affidavit in Support of Motion for Visitation at a Supervised Visitation Center and a Proposed Order for Visitation at a Supervised Visitation Center.

If are in an ongoing case and you need to ask for visitation at a supervised visitation center, file:

Motion for Visitation Supervised by an Individual

Here are two stories where people are asking for visitation supervised by an individual. Julie is dealing with domestic violence. Rosa is not.

In Julie’s situation:

  • there is domestic violence,
  • the parents are getting divorced,
  • the survivor wants the abusive parent to have visitation,
  • she needs the visits to be supervised, and
  • she does not need or want to use a supervised visitation center.

David Jones filed a Complaint for Divorce against his wife Julie. They have a 9 year old son named Jason. A month before he filed, David got fired from his job after punching his boss. When he came home, he had been drinking. He saw a car he did not recognize parked in front of the house. He suspected Julie was having an affair. When he came into the house he yelled at Julie, called her names, and slapped her. This was not the first time David had done this. Julie was really scared. She tried to dial 911, but David grabbed the phone and hit her with it. When Jason got home from school, Julie and David pretended that nothing had happened. Later, when David went out, Jason asked Julie about the bruises and the broken telephone. Julie told her son what had happened. She decided that it would not be safe for either of them if they were there when David got home, so Julie took Jason and went to stay with a friend. The next day she got a 209A restraining order that ordered David to leave the house, not to abuse her, not to contact her, and to stay 100 yards away from her, their house, and her workplace. The restraining order gave her custody of Jason. Two weeks later, after the restraining order had been extended for a year, David served her with divorce papers asking for custody of Jason. He scheduled a Motion for Temporary Custody. She does not think it would be at all good for Jason for David to have custody of Jason. However Jason misses David a lot. He keeps telling Julie about how much he misses doing the things he and David used to do together, like watch sports on TV and go to the playground after David would come home from work. Julie thinks that because David is so angry and unpredictable that visitation needs to be supervised by someone she trusts. She worries about David’s drinking and what David will say to Jason when they are alone. Julie does not think that something so formal as a supervised visitation center is needed. She thinks that Jason needs to be able to spend more time with David than a supervised visitation center could provide. She has a very good relationship with David’s mother, Sheila, and so does Jason. She talked to Sheila about a supervised visitation schedule, and Sheila was very agreeable. To ask for visitation supervised by David’s mother, she could file a Motion for Visitation Supervised by an Individual, Affidavit in Support of Motion for Supervised Visitation, and Defendant’s Proposed Order for Supervised Visitation, like our samples.

If you need to ask for visitation supervised by an individual in an ongoing case, you need to file:

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