Social worker Rachel Birnbaum can still recall overhearing two young kids on a train trip complaining about having to travel back and forth between two cities to visit their separated parents.
“If that’s what their parents want, they’ll make their parents happy,” said Birnbaum, who is also a family law researcher at King’s University College, an affiliate of the University of Western Ontario.
“But that doesn’t necessarily mean [the kids are] happy.”
Parents who divorce or separate in Canada can often struggle to figure out parenting schedules that make everyone happy.
Canada’s legal system does not presume parents will share parenting time equally. Instead, it puts the onus on parents to come to their own arrangements. In this context, sources say there are numerous factors parents should keep in mind.
“I like this idea of thinking about … parental arrangements … as living documents that move with the child,” said Denise Whitehead, associate professor at the Department of Sexuality, Marriage and Family Studies at the University of Waterloo.
“Shared time parenting is not just what parents do for children. It is also very much what children are doing for their parents. And I don’t think enough parents have heard that message. They don’t realize the work it takes.”
‘Blind spots’
Many divorced or separated parents are surprised to learn there is no presumption of equal parenting time in Canadian law, says Birnbaum. Instead, families are expected to develop their own schedules, taking account of the best interests of the children and parents.
Parents typically take one of several approaches to setting a co-parenting schedule.
A minority of parents — just 10 to 15 per cent in Canada — rely on courts to establish their shared parenting schedules, says Birnbaum. The cost of using lawyers and going to court is, for many families, prohibitive.
Others opt for mediation, which is less expensive and does not force a families’ intimate details to be disclosed in court.
But the majority opt for the least expensive route — of simply figuring out a shared parenting schedule between themselves.
Ken Maynard, a separation and divorce mediator at Divorce the Smartway in Ontario, says couples can have many “blind spots” when working out co-parenting schedules.
Some wrongly assume child support is negotiable. “But the child support is not in the parents’ hands,” he said.
“You will see [parents] often … saying, ‘Well, [the mom] will stay in the house, and then that way I don’t have to pay child support,” he said. “You’re now trading in the children’s money — you can’t do that.”
“Child support is a child’s right and they are entitled to it by law,” a Government of Canada fact sheet says. “Judges may refuse to grant a divorce if they are not satisfied that reasonable arrangements have been made for the continued financial support of your children.”
Parents also need to discuss and agree upon funding their children’s future expenses, such as extracurricular activities and college funds, says Maynard. “It’s important that parents have these uncomfortable conversations ahead of time.”
Housing can be another issue. In most cases, one of the parents finds another home. At times, parents do not consider the long-term impact of having one parent move far from the family’s neighbourhood.
“The kids [have] got to go to school … and not in two different jurisdictions,” said Birnbaum.
Showing off
Another key consideration is how much time a child will spend with each parent.
Research shows equal time with both parents has positive effects on children’s development, says Susan Chuang, a professor in the Department of Family Relations & Family Nutrition at the University of Guelph.
And kids who are entirely cut off from contact with one parent can really suffer. Most of the time, children lose contact with their fathers, says Chuang.
Fatherless children are more prone to suffer from mental health issues such as depression, anxiety and suicidality, she says. They also are more likely to engage in high-risk behaviours that can lead to outcomes such as early pregnancy or crime.
Birnbaum says the vast majority of children benefit from having both parents actively involved in their lives.
“Kids want their parents to be at their school for parent-teacher meetings,” Birnbaum said. “Kids … want to show off in front of both their parents, irrespective that the parents might not like each other.”
But Whitehead, of the University of Waterloo, thinks it is for the best that Canadian law does not mandate a shared parenting schedule.
Her research, which involved interviewing children with separated parents, shows children often hide their own emotions to protect their parents’ feelings — even though many prefer to spend more time with one parent.
“We’ve been told that children have these ideal outcomes if they’re in shared parenting,” said Whitehead. “And what I found was that parents tend to underestimate the degree of emotional problems that children experience following their parents’ divorce,” said Whitehead.
“[C]hildren don’t have a lot of wiggle room to … say, … ‘This is actually really hard, and I don’t like doing it.’”
Flexibility
Even once a co-parenting schedule is chosen, parents need to remain mindful of the toll that a separation can take on their kids, says Maynard. They must take care not to put too much responsibility on their kids’ shoulders.
Both parents should still have oversight over the kids’ homework, extracurriculars and their children’s belongings, says Birnbaum.
When necessary, parents should also be flexible with the parenting schedule if that serves the best interests of the child, says Whitehead.
For example, a child who has to study for a big test may benefit from not moving to the other parent’s house as scheduled.
Whitehead says her research shows flexibility — and avoiding rigid parenting schedules — can ultimately benefit the whole family.
“Parents who offered their children… flexibility had children who were more likely to stay doing shared time parenting, because parents made it easy and didn’t punish them for it,” said Whitehead.
“Parents really have to step up to the plate to accommodate their kids,” said Birnbaum “Not to accommodate their [own] needs, but the needs of their children.”
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