Child Support Is The Financial Support Parents Owe To Their Children To Help Ensure Their Healthy Development And Clearly Reflects How A Parent Feels About Their Children
Child Support, also known as Child Maintenance, is the financial support parents owe to their children to ensure their children have the necessities of life and a chance for a healthy and happy future. Child Support is a legal obligation that is court ordered and takes the form of financial support payments paid by parents to parents or to the legal guardians of the children who need and deserve the financial ability to live healthy and meaningful lives. Child Maintenance often occurs when parents divorce but can also occur in the absence of a marriage, a divorce, or even in the absence of a relationship of any kind. Single Parents very often depend on child support to help with the financial burden of raising a child alone, and Unplanned Teenage Pregnancies often end in court ordered Child Support payments being awarded. Other issues such as Legal Separation, Child Custody, Visitation, Long Distance Parenting and Child Custody Agreements have points that revolve around and intersect with this most important topic as well. The support and care of children is the obligation and responsibility of the parents, and child support is the MINIMUM obligation and duty of care that parents owe to their children. Financial support is only the starting point for all of the needs and various types of support a child has the right to expect to be filled and supplied by its parents. Share Your Favorite Parenting Success Story What has your child accomplished? Beyond financial support, children need from their parents emotional support, love and affection, interaction and physical association, mentoring and learning by example, and a myriad of others needs that involved and attentive parents are uniquely qualified to give for the lasting benefit of their children. Unfortunately not all parents want to be parents, and the law cannot dictate that a parent be kind, attentive, respectful or any other positive parental quality at all. It would be worth your while to understand some of the Effects of Single Parenting, especially upon young children. Laws cannot dictate love, and proper Parenting is the voluntary and daily gift of love in action. So the law does what the law can do, and that is to demand that if a parent give nothing more than the means to maintain an adequate standard of living for his or her child, then that is what the law will require. This truly falls short of the vision and expectation of true parenthood, but being able to create life does not make one a parent any more than owning a piano makes one a concert pianist. Having and doing, being and making a difference are two separate things entirely.
It is my assumption that most parents want to be parents, and good ones at that. There are many an ex-spouse or lover who no longer likes their partner, but there are very few parents who don’t love their children, and thank goodness for that. There are some people who are exceptionally selfish and self-centered (and hence would never make a good parent), but my hope is that you and your children were never associated with such a one as that. If you once were, be grateful that you no longer are. If you look hard enough there is always something to be grateful for. But as this is a discussion of Child Support, let me tell you that Child Maintenance payments are intended to house, feed, dress and educate the children who benefit from such payments. Some jurisdictions specify exactly what the payments are to be used for, while other jurisdictions simply assume that the money will be spent on the general welfare of the child and leave it at that. To assume that the recipient of Child Support in any way, shape or form has an easy time providing for his or her children is to miss the point entirely. Children’s needs almost ALWAYS outstrip the ability to provide for those needs, and anything and everything that must be provided for a child’s health, welfare, education and happiness must come out of funds that are never sufficient, even if Child Maintenance is paid promptly each month. Government agencies help to ensure collection of Child Maintenance payments as these payments are often used to offset the Governmental costs of providing welfare assistance to those in need. It is estimated that 50% of all past due Child Support payments in the U.S. are owed to various government agencies to reimburse for welfare expenses. It is heart-warming to note that the needs of our children are placed ahead of the need to collect the funds required for their support. There is no perfect answer, but people are always more important than things; ALWAYS!
So thanks to Child Support our children can go off to school well supplies and well nourished at the very least. There are various ways to calculate the amount of Child Maintenance payments due, and to re-calculate based on changing life circumstances and economic conditions, all of which are beyond the scope of this discussion today. It will be instructive to cover the basic nuts-and-bolts behind the Child Support system, which we will do as follows: 1. The parent seeking Child Support must go to court and file a complaint, or an application to petition the court to grant said support. This legal paperwork can be confusing and lengthy so legal assistance is highly recommended (i.e. seek the help of a competent family law lawyer). 2. The parent from whom the Child Maintenance is being sought will be served a court summons to appear in court to determine if this parent is in fact responsible to pay Child Maintenance in the case in question. 3. If there is any doubt as to whom the parents of the children are, the court will in all likelihood require DNA testing to prove who the biological parents are. This is important since only a child’s parents OWE an obligation to their child equal to what will be required under a Child Support Order. 4. Once paternity (and in some cases, maternity) has been established and Parental responsibility clearly affixed by the court, the court will determine the amount, timing and duration of Child Support payments to be made, and establish any other provisions for the child’s welfare and maintenance that the courts deems necessary. Being a Parent is no small matter, and hence the issues surrounding Preteen Sexuality and also Teenage Sexuality takes on greater significance when viewed against the very real yet minimum legal financial requirements of being a parent. And once again, what Parent who is even remotely worthy of being called a parent wants to only do the minimum legally required to aid and help and guide and provide for their child in a life they themselves have helped to create?
There is a lot more parenting wisdom to share. Here is another Child Support thought: Be the Parent who supports their child not only with the finances needed to sustain a healthy standard of living, but who supports your child with your time and love and attention and affection and emotions and your heart and soul and your all at any time, for any reason, over and over again. Child Support Is The Minimum Obligation Parents Owe Their Children To Help Them Financially Live Healthy Lives Free Of Want And Need. No Parent Should Be Happy Being A ‘Minimum Requirement’ Parent, So Do Whatever It Takes To Always Be There For Your Children In Every Way Possible: Physically, Emotionally AND Financially. Return from the Child Support Page to the Single Parents Page
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