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How to Tell if You Suffer From Domestic Violence

Anyone can experience domestic abuse. Often, there is a psychological component to the relationship that leaves the victim taking the blame or denying that there is a problem. Abusive relationships are about one person trying to exercise control over the other. This can occur through the use of manipulation, fear, guilt, shame, and violence. If you aren’t sure whether your relationship has become abusive, consider the following signs:

Your Feelings and Thoughts

Examining your own reactions can help you determine if your relationship has deteriorated into abuse. Do you often find yourself feeling

• as if you can’t do anything right in your relationship?
• as if you’re crazy?
• afraid, helpless, or numb?
• that you cause your partner’s behavior, or that you deserve it?

These thoughts and feelings should not ever be part of any relationship, and they aren’t signs of respect or real love.

Your Partner’s Behavior

If you have a hard time determining whether your partner’s behavior is unreasonable and abusive, imagine how it would look if you were seeing it in someone else’s relationship – a friend, a sibling, or a parent, for example. Does your partner ever

• criticize you and put you down?
• blame you for emotional cruelty or physical violence?
• act jealous or possessive?
• get between you and your friends and family, or forbid you from seeing or communicating with them?
• threaten or hurt you?
• threaten suicide if you were to leave?
• force you to do things you don’t want to do?

A true partner cares about you and your well-being and exhibits behavior that reflects this.

For more information on a domestic violence lawyer in Newport Beach.

The Price of Silence

So many victims of domestic violence have to suffer in silence because they’re afraid for their lives. It is important to know there is hope to escape a life of abuse when you can reach out for help.

Facts About Child Support

Child support is meant to provide adequate financial assistance when a parent no longer lives full time in the home. These orders may cover medical care, extracurricular activities, or education as well as the child’s basic needs. You may have heard about this issue primarily in terms of battles between disputing ex-spouses; this angle is typically the focus of news stories about child support, but the facts often become skewed through people’s perceptions of these stories. Here are some facts about child support:

1. Almost a third of custodial parents never receive a dime in payments for their children’s needs, even when they have an established court order.

Unfortunately, there is sometimes a perception that noncustodial parents are living a life of luxury at the expense of the children’s other parent. In most instances, this is not the case. On average, child support payments amount to about $430 per month.

2. Men are not the only ones who pay for their children’s support.

While most stories on this topic focus on fathers, women make up about 15% of the total number of parents who are ordered to provide for their children’s financial needs.

3. Child support and visitation are separate legal issues.

These payments are not the noncustodial parent’s “ticket” to visitation; conversely, it is not legal to cut off support payments because the custodial parent makes it difficult to see the child.

4. Child support is governed by tax and bankruptcy law.

You may not discharge these payments in bankruptcy, and while they are tax-free for the custodial parent, the noncustodial parent may not use them as a tax deduction.

For more information on a child support lawyer in Irvine, visit this website.

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A Brief History of Child Custody Law

From the colonial era until the mid-nineteenth century, child custody cases were almost invariably settled in favor of fathers. The idea that children were the property of their fathers was a reflection of the widespread belief that divine law decreed fathers the undisputed heads of the household. During this time, our nation was largely an agrarian society, with most children growing up on self-sustaining family farms where their labor was essential for the economic survival of the family.

As the nation industrialized and increasing numbers of fathers left their homes during the day to work elsewhere, mothers took over the role of managing households. Husbands were still the breadwinners, but they were no longer seen as having absolute dominion over all members of the family. The children, on the other hand, began to experience something similar to the childhood we know today; rather than being put to work as soon as they were able, many youngsters were able to play and go to school. Children were now widely seen as needing nurturing, and mothers were the ones who provided it. Custody cases began to be settled “in the best interests of the child” – typically, by granting custody to the mother.

The concept of the child’s best interests has remained the focus of child custody law, but it has taken on different meanings as values have shifted. Through the 1950s and 1960s, divorce was strongly discouraged because it was believed not to be in the best interests of children. In the 1970s there was a shift toward the notion that youngsters were better off being raised by divorced parents than by unhappily married couples. As it became easier to obtain a divorce, mothers were still awarded custody more or less automatically under the assumption that they were naturally best suited to raise children.

In the 1980s, the idea of joint custody took hold as the standard for what was in the best interests of children. As mothers rapidly began to enter the workforce, fewer and fewer were primary caregivers within their families– and they were no longer seen as the automatic best option when it came to deciding custody cases. As the divorce rate continued to climb and family configurations began to rapidly evolve, the courts had fewer obvious answers when it came to determining what was in the best interests of the child.

Today, the definition of “family” is more fluid than ever, and there is even less consistency in terms of what is in the best interests of children when their family structures break down. Courts are still grappling with this question.

To learn more about a child support lawyer in Irvine, visit this website.

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