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Grandparents' Rights in Missouri - MO Visitation, Custody, and Legal Strategies to Fight for Your Grandchildrens Best Interests Through MO Family Law

Missouri Child Custody Laws, MO Grandparents Visitation Rights, Filing Divorce Papers, Parenting Plan Agreement, Mediation, Evaluation, and Court Hearing Support

Missouri grandparents’ legal rights, guidelines, regulations, and rules of law allow you to ask for visitation, and temporary custody of your grandchildren. MO grandparents can also file for full custody, guardianship, or adoption, to raise their grand-kids, through a MO family law custody court judicial process. The proper legal advice, guidance, and strategies are key to ensure a successful outcome to any predicament regarding your grandchildren. Fortunately, studies have shown that the “Best Interests” for your grandchildren is that they have an active relationship with their grandparents. Grandfathers and grandmothers can often provide a healthier and more stable environment than the children’s biological parents. As a result, Missouri’s “Best Interest of the Child” guideline fully supports a grandparents’ rights for visitation and custody. The legal extent to which you can visit, provide, and support your grandchildren will need to be determined and approved through a MO family law court hearing litigation process.

Children are all too often kept from their grandparents, or exposed to abuse and neglect. Typically, most if not all of these circumstances Grandparents Visitation and Custody Rights - Grandchildren Need Grandparents Help Protecting Them from Abuse and Neglectare completely out of their control. This unhealthy environment is a damaging situation for children’s emotional and physical well-being. Children often don’t have a voice to be heard, and it is our responsibility as grandparents to be that voice. A voice that defends, supports, protects, and cares for all grandchildren that so desperately need our help.

The Missouri Judicial Legal System Recognizes the Importance of Grandparents’ Rights Regarding Visitation and Custody of Grandchildren; and Fully Understands That Abuse and Neglect are Prevalent in MO Families.

MO family law fully acknowledges the ability for grandparents to provide a positive and stable environment. An environment, which is able to provide leadership, and a parenting platform so many children desperately need. Grandchildren even spending limited time with their grandparents can help provide the much-needed comfort and security that children require on a regular basis.

The situation grandchildren are exposed to varies greatly. Some are in a positive stable environment, and grandparents are simply denied access or may be allowed very limited contact with their grandchildren. The other end of the spectrum is a situation that needs to be addressed as soon as possible. If you can prove your grandchildren are being subjected to an abusive and neglectful environment, the Missouri judicial system will act quickly and forcefully on your behalf. Don’t think for one second that as grandparents your rights will be restricted or limited. Remember, the “Best Interest of the Children” is a standard that is fully recognized and supported in the state of Missouri.

If your grandchildren are in an abusive or neglected environment you may file a petition for a MO child protective proceeding. If abuse, neglect, or imminent danger exist, child protective services may enforce an emergency removal of the children and place them into protective custody. A child protective proceeding is typically followed by a number of court hearings. A fact-finding court hearing is set to determine if the allegations are true. A dis-positional hearing is set to decide what should be done if the child has been neglected or abused. Finally, a permanency hearing is set to determine and finalize the permanent placement and security of the children.

It’s important to recognize, the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act (UCCJEA) was established to ensure that any Broken Families, Marriages, Relationships, Children, Teenagers, and Parents Need Help Nowchild custody litigation occurs in the child’s “home state”. The “home state” is defined as the last state where a child has lived for 6 consecutive months with a parent. This act was adopted to discourage parents from moving out-of-state in an attempt to manipulate the judicial system for whatever reason. Parental attempted kidnapping by moving children to another state or jurisdiction was one of the main reasons the UCCJEA was adopted.

Missouri Grandparents’ Legal Rights, Guidelines, Regulations, and Rules of Law Enable You to Defend Your Visitation Rights, Fight for Custody, or the “Best Interests” of Your Grandchildren Through MO Family Law.

The modification to your grandchild’s custody situation may be modified in Missouri on your behalf. In some cases it will be a temporary modification based on a continuing effort of both parents to SUCCESSFULLY overcome the obstacles that prevent them from retaining full custody again. Parents inability to provide a safe, stable, humane, and secure home environment can be due to many different factors, including but not limited to: (substance abuse, incarceration, mental health issues, anger management, poor leadership skill sets, endangerment, physical abuse, emotional abuse, domestic violence, divorce, etc.). In other cases you may be awarded full custody. Often times, full custody comes with the option to legally adopt your grandchildren.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that you have no legal rights in the state of Missouri when it Grandparents Legal Rights for Visitation and Child Custody - Family Law Custody Court Judicial Procedurescomes to your grandchildren. MO family law will help ensure your grand-kids get what they deserve and need. Remember to focus your efforts on their “Best Interests” at all times. Your grandchildren will thank you when they are mature enough to realize the decisions and sacrifices you made for them and their future.

I cannot stress enough, the fact that grandchildren need their grandparents. For some grand-kids seeing their grandparents on a regular basis is the best option. Others need to be removed from a physically and emotionally damaging environment permanently. Grandparents are often the first and best option for children to find the stable and secure environment they desperately need and deserve. Check out the links below to help secure visitation with your grandchildren, or fight for the rights of someone who is unable to defend themselves.

The time to act is now, because all children deserve the best that our society has to offer. As a Missouri grandparent you have rights. Grandparents Visitation and Child Custody Rights, Laws, Advice, Support, and Dispute Resolution Through Negotiation and Court LitigationThese rights enable you to request visitation, and also allow you to be a voice for someone who may desperately need your help and support. Life can come with many challenges, but if you believe that everything happens for a reason then life’s challenges will suddenly become an obstacle with a manageable solution. Don’t forget, Missouri grandparents’ legal rights, regulations, guidelines, and rules of law, regarding grandchild visitation and custody, were also legislated for guidance, advice, and strategies to support the “Best Interests of the Children” standard through MO family law.

6 Responses to “Missouri (MO) Grandparents’ Rights for Visitation, Custody, and Support”

  1. Christina Reinert says:

    We have just lost our son to suicide, and we are wanting to make sure we are still able to see our grandson. There is a lot of tension between our son’s family and the mother. They were going through an awful separation, and my son had moved back into my husbands and my home. His father lives in Kansas, but wants us to fight for temporary custody or more before she has a chance to run off with him. She was moving out of their apartment and trying to either move into her grandpa’s house that my husband and I took her out of due to it being a drug house and no hot water; or she told my son a few days before his death that since her uncle had just gotten released, she was going to move in with him. He was arrested and in prison for drug selling and using. He also had weapons even though he is a felon.

  2. Natalie Lane says:

    My granddaughter has been with me from the age of 3 til now at the age 7 because both her parents abandoned her. Now her biological father wants to take her. I need legal help to protect her.

  3. Susan Zwinge says:

    I need help, I need someone to hear me and believe me. My daughter and son in law are mean people. We bought a home together 5 years ago, and my daughter has been abusive to me every since but I dealt with it because as long as I lived in the basement I could keep my grand-kids safe. I had to move because I couldn’t turn them into cps while living there, I was afraid they would shoot me. This story is to long to tell here but the short version is this. My daughter and her husband are abusive both mentally and physically. They are what is described online as narcissists. Most of the abuse has been emotional, I never got proof of the physical but have a family member that saw bruises on my grandsons body. He told her mommy did it. It got very violent the last week I was there. The two older girls ran away when I left because they were scared. They came to me and I called sheriff who also treated me like I was a criminal. CPS finally took the kids but they won’t let me take care of them. They say I have to be out of the equation because I am stopping mom and dad from uniting their family. My grand daughters who are 14 and 12 years of age want nothing to do with mom and dad. Mom and dad claim I brain washed them and turned them against the parents. That is so far from the truth, I tried so hard to hold the family together. I told my daughter what the kids were saying in hopes she might change, she didn’t and only got worse. The grand daughters have told everybody what mom and dad did but nobody is listening to us. Mom and dad want them put into the dads brothers home so they can have access to them. The brother is a drunk. I was told by CPS to retract my offer to keep the kids or be denied, then if denied I couldn’t reapply for one year. Now it looks like they are going to put the kids into the brothers home. I have been told that mom and dad wouldn’t sign a release form so I can’t even be told how the case is going. I’m not rich and can’t afford to get a good attorney at $2500. There is so much more to this story. I don’t know what to do, CPS has used me to gather all their evidence against the parents, yet the parents are making all the decisions stating that I wouldn’t let them be parents, and also that I forced my way into the home. I have bank statements showing I made the house payment from January 1st 2016 thru July 2017. This is killing me, and my grand daughters are so sad and afraid they will have to live with the Aunt and Uncle. There is a hearing January 18th 2018 and I can’t afford an attorney right now, but I really feel like they are going to be moved to the aunt and uncles home at the next hearing. I don’t have a problem with my daughter, I am willing to forgive her but she just keeps getting worse and so does my son in law. They have told so many lies on me it’s ridiculous. They have hired an attorney to place the kids in the uncle and aunts home. I am so afraid that the older boy who is in his late teens will do something to the kids because he has issues. I am so desperate here, I need someone to hear what me and the girls are saying. I need someone to help me get guardianship. I need a loan to hire an attorney. I even offered to take a lie detector but everyone said they couldn’t use it in a court of law. I’m so desperate to get the kids that I don’t know what to do. I need legal help and would be more than happy to give an attorney as much as I could then pay so much later.

    • Susan Zwinge says:

      One more thing, I have been with all three kids for all of their lives. The two girls spent the last two years living at my house, but told I can’t have them because I would hinder the reunification. I feel like I was tricked into signing paper to retract offer. Please help me and my grand kids by telling me what to do. Thank you and God Bless!!!

    • donna smith says:

      This is awful and I feel for you. I am going through almost the same thing.

  4. donna smith says:

    My son and daughter-in-law(dil) were married for almost 11 years and have 3 children. They lived next to me on my land the whole time. During that time the kids were almost always with me. They did almost everything at my house with me. The only thing they really did at their house was sleep maybe 25% of the time. When my son and my dil got divorced they left the children with me as they both wanted to try to build a new life and everything was fine. We still pretty much did everything together. Even when my son started dating another girl for almost a year, we all still got along and the kids still stayed with me. However, the next year (about 7 years ago in 2012) he met another girl, who had a small baby, and they started dating. Shortly after we moved, still in the same town but about 3 miles away and the kids moved with me. Him and the new girl were always fighting and cops were called a lot. She then had another baby boy with him. I let them live in the house I moved out of, rent free, for the next 4 years. The ex-wife would babysit for them all the time, but when the baby’s started calling the ex “mommy” the new girlfriend got mad and started to cause problems.
    Shortly after that the new girlfriend/wife start posting crap that the kids would be moving in with them and no one could stop it. The middle girl 2 years ago wanted to move in with her dad and did so. That’s ok because I want them to be happy. They have not talked to the oldest girl in 2 years and have only had the youngest one time last year for vacation to Vegas. Which was for them not the kids. They have not given any support to them at all in two years. No birthday presents, christmas presents, no school supplies, no nothing. Which I didn’t care because the 2 that still lived with me were happy. I take that back, last valentines day she sent flowers to school for all the kids except the oldest one which really made her feel bad. Anyway last Friday they took the youngest from school called me and said he would be living with them. Me and my husband have had these three kids since they were babies, now I can only see them on their terms. It is not right. Please Help.

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