Note that information given in this section cannot take the place of a divorce lawyer. For legal divorce advice about your specific situation, you must consult a qualified lawyer. See our disclaimer.

"I have joint custody. What if I suspect that my ex-spouse is physically or emotionally abusing our child?"

Nothing is more important than your child's safety. If you have good reason to believe your ex is physically abusing your child, you should immediately seek an order of protection and ask that all future visitation be supervised until further order of court.

But before you do that, you better be sure you have proof of actual abuse. Not only is this kind of fight very emotional, expensive, and ugly, but if your allegations of abuse turn out to be unfounded, you can be accused of trying to alienate your child from your ex-spouse. In that case, you could potentially lose custody of your child. As for emotional abuse, that's a lot harder to prove -- and to deal with. Judges are reluctant to harm the parent/child relationship. Most of the time, unless the emotional abuse is both well-documented and extreme, the judge will allow a parent to continue to spend time with his/her child without interference from the court.

Karen A. Covy, J.D. is an attorney and family-law mediator in Chicago. She owns and operates Midwest Mediation as well as a successful family-law firm. This answer is an excerpt from When Happily Ever After Ends (2006), used by permission of its publisher, Sphinx Publishing, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc. She can be reached at (312) 236-1670. View her Divorce Magazine profile.

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