If a family goes through a divorce, everyone involved most likely suffers from the experience to some extent. The two people who are getting the divorce suffer and the children suffer as well. In some cases, grandparents may be hurt as well.
As part of the divorce process, one of the important issues that must be worked out before the divorce is final is visitation with the children. That not only refers to the visitation of the non-custodial parent with the children. It can also mean the visitation schedule of the grandparents.
In Georgia, the Division of Child Support Services (DCSS) offers resources to help people in a divorce situation to figure out visitation issues. Across the United States, there are programs that help families who are trying to work out the visitation piece in a divorce and grandparents are an important part of the equation.
Are grandparents always allowed to visit their grandchildren?
In theory, yes, grandparents should always be allowed to spend time with their grandchildren. However, sadly, it doesn’t always work out that way. There may be a situation where a parent passes away and that parent happened to be the child of the grandparents. Perhaps the remaining parent will no longer allow the grandparents to spend time with the grandchildren. Even if the grandparents take legal action and reach out to the remaining parent in numerous ways, they may still be denied access to their grandchildren.
Courts usually rule in favor of the surviving parent over the grandparents. However, many studies have been conducted on the relationship that grandparents have with their grandchildren and many of those studies determined that the grandparent/grandchild relationship has positive effects on both grandchildren and grandparents.
A recent Georgia law, the Grandparents Visitations Rights Act, allows the courts to grant visitation to the parents (in this case, the grandparents) of the deceased individual if the court feels that having the grandparents in the grandchildren’s lives is beneficial and would be detrimental if they were not in their lives.
If you have grandchildren and your grandchildren are not in a healthy environment, you may wish to seek the legal advice of a Georgia attorney who can advise you on your rights as a grandparent as well as guiding you on how you can protect your grandchildren in the most effective way possible. There may be any number of reasons why you feel that you need to help your grandchildren and it is important to understand your rights and to take the most effective action for everyone involved.
