The state of California doesn’t care how long you lived with your former partner. They don’t even care if you legally changed your name to them. If you didn’t get a marriage certificate or officially enter into a domestic partnership, then you were not legally joined. This means you also cannot legally get a divorce and will not be eligible for alimony or legal orders pertaining to dividing your assets and / or property.
There are options for long-time partners who are separating
That said, if you and your partner had children then you may still have options. You can petition the court for child support and child custody agreements. In some cases, this is true even if one partner isn’t the biological parent. This falls under what the court calls “parentage by estoppel,” which means that a non-biological parent can be considered a legal parent if they’ve always accepted the child as their own.
Petitioning for child custody after a separation
As long as you’re both biological parents of the child in question, when it comes to child custody it essentially doesn’t matter if you were legally married or not. There are many custody options including both legal custody in which you’re able to make legal decisions on the behalf of your child, and physical custody, which refers to who the child physically lives with.
If the child lives with one parent and has visitation with another, there are still numerous variables in play here because there are several types of visitation. They include:
- Reasonable visitation. This refers to open-ended visitation in which parents simply work together to agree on visitation and make changes as they come up. This is typically only an option for exes who get along well and don’t worry that their former partner will try anything funny.
- Visitation according to schedule. This is the most common type of visitation. In it, there are specific rules for visitation that ensure the child has fair access to both parents. It generally includes a general schedule as well as specific rules for vacations, holidays, and weekends.
- Supervised visitation. Unfortunately, not every parent is trustworthy enough to spend time alone with their children. In that case, supervised visitation may be agreed on. This allows the parent to still see their child – but only when supervised.
- No visitation. In certain issues, one parent won’t be allowed visitation at all. This is generally only done when there are issues of severe psychological problems, or they are a danger to their child. It may also be the choice of courts in the event of domestic violence charges.
No matter what side of the fence you’re on, if you need help with child custody issues then you need to contact Kendall Gkikas & Mitchell right away. We can also help with the division of assets, property, and much more. Call us now at 909-482-1422 for your consultation.
