Adoption – an action to assume legal responsibility for a child and accept the child as your own; once an adoption is complete, the adopting parent has all the legal rights and responsibilities as a natural parent including, but not limited to, the obligation to provide support and the right to have parent-time.

Alimony – the amount of financial support that a spouse must pay to an ex-spouse. There is no set formula for calculating the amount of alimony that will be ordered, as there is for child support. The calculation of alimony amounts is a balancing of several factors such as need of the requesting party, ability to pay of the non-requesting party, income and expenses of both parties, length of the marriage, etc.

Child Care – daycare, out of pocket costs for daycare are usually divided equally between the parents and is completely separate from a child support award; the costs to be divided typically only include work-related day care

Child Support – the amount of money that has to be paid to the custodial parent to provide necessities for the minor child. Child support is calculated using each parent’s income, the number of children, and the physical custody arrangement.

Conservatorship – gives a party the power to make decisions regarding another individual’s financial well-being including paying their bills, managing their bank accounts and properties, etc.

Contempt Actions – an action to enforce current court orders and to request sanctions against the party who has violated the court order.

Custody

Legal – the authority to make decisions regarding a child’s upbringing, such as religious training, child care, schooling, medical care, etc.

• Sole – one parent is given the authority to make all major decisions regarding the child’s upbringing. The other parent still retains the right to be involved in all aspects of the child’s life.

• Joint – both parents have authority to make major decisions in the child’s upbringing. Joint legal custody requires that the parents consult each other and try to come to an agreement on what is best for the child.

Physical – determines where the child will live.

• Sole – the child resides primarily with one parent, and typically has standard parent-time with the non-custodial parent.

• Joint – the child’s time is divided between each parent’s home; however, joint physical custody does not always equal a 50/50 parent-time arrangement.

• Split – is when the parties have more than one child and at least one child resides primarily with each parent.