Out of state visitatation

[jinxs1591]

so a long story short...I was living with my girlfriend for 10 years and we have a five year old son we broke up and I moved to NY is there anyway I can get visitation and joint custody for our 5 year old son and I do want her to pay half of travel cost. because I was at home taking care of him for a year since job market wasn't that good in Colorado at the time and what are my legal rights?  and yes at the moment I'm on unemployment and going to school to make a better life for my child

[Waylon]

You can almost certainly get visitation...joint custody might be more difficult due to the distances involved. We'd recommend that you get a good family law attorney to help map out your legal strategy and proceed accordingly.

so a long story short...I was living with my girlfriend for 10 years and we have a five year old son we broke up and I moved to NY is there anyway I can get visitation and joint custody for our 5 year old son and I do want her to pay half of travel cost. because I was at home taking care of him for a year since job market wasn't that good in Colorado at the time and what are my legal rights?  and yes at the moment I'm on unemployment and going to school to make a better life for my child

[MixedBag]

file for JOINT legal, and joint physical -- however I bet Mom will get primary residential.

LEARN Colorado laws -- like get a copy of the code in book form -- not just the location on the internet.

[ocean]

Since you are the one to move, the courts will likely make you pay for the visits. You MAY be able to get a break on your child support in order to pay for the visits. You file where she lives...in family court. You ask for Joint custody (so you have a say in major decisions of medical, schooling..) and a long distance parenting plan. Look on this site for some good ones. Ask for long school breaks and most of the summer in NY. You could do every other Christmas break, spring break and all over summer except the last two weeks so mother has a chance to bring child on vacation too and the child can get ready for school.

Also, make your order as detailed as possible so they wont be any confusion. Ex: Father will have summer parenting time from May X to July X. Child will fly out of XX airport and land in XX airport. Put in there that if father is in child's state, you will have parenting time after school until XX time (giving mother at least 1 week notice of father being in home state).

So much more...you need to do your homework and ask questions here. You will probably need to hire a lawyer and it will need to be in mother's state so he can file for you but you will probably have to fly out there for court (possible phone conference...ask lawyer). If you have what you want, layed out before seeing a lawyer, you can hand them what you want them to ask for. Start making a list of how you want things written and post some here and we can help you tweak it.

Good luck! 

[KidsinAZ]

You are talking about joint legal and not joint physical, correct?  Because if you are talking about joint physical, you need to move back to Colorado.  A judge isn't going to order that a child commute over a thousand miles to school during the time your child is with you. 

As for your ex paying half the costs, well, why should she?  You are the one who moved away.  There are colleges in Colorado that you could have gone to. 

[MixedBag]

If dad can prove that he had a really really good reason for moving away.....

Joint Legal and Joint physical -- yep, ask for both.

Chances are that she will get Primary residential.

Joint physical isn't gonna mean 50/50 time....parenting time gets defined elsewhere.

And start gathering airline information about how long it physically takes and how much it costs for the travel expense that's now out there.

[MrCustodyCoach]

It would be a tough sell, not having this issues in place to begin with.  However, it's not completely impossible to get some meaningful custody time, particularly during the summer period, winter and/or spring breaks from school and such.

The biggest obstacles?  You're unemployed and, given the jurisdiction is Colorado, you would like need to get an attorney there and the case would be heard in Colorado if she fights you on it.