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04/29/2026

WHAT IS PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY?

Separate from timesharing (your actual calendar time with your child), Florida has “Shared Parental Responsibility,” which is what some other states may call “joint custody.” This means that both parents have equal rights to their child, and that you must discuss and agree upon all major decisions involving your child, such as medical and educational decisions.

Shared Parental Responsibility is Florida law unless a parent is serving a life sentence in prison or something of that nature (unable or unavailable to discuss and make decisions), in which case the other parent could be awarded Sole Parental Responsibility – this is very rare.

An in-between option is called Shared Parental Responsibility, but with one parent having Final Decision Making Authority. This means both parents would still have equal rights and the obligation to discuss and attempt to agree to major decisions for your child, but only one parent would have the final say if an agreement couldn’t be reached. This is rare as well, and usually only ordered by the Court if both parents agree to it.

04/27/2026

Is My Spouse Entitled to My Personal Injury Settlement Monies in a Divorce?

When someone is injured because of another party’s actions or omissions, they are entitled to various forms of compensation that are intended to make the victim “whole”. This may include damages for direct monetary losses such as medical expenses, lost wages, and loss of future earning capacity, as well as noneconomic losses such as pain-and-suffering, emotional distress, diminished quality of life, permanent injury, and loss of consortium (companionship).
If the settlement award contains an itemized description of what amount is designated for each loss or expense, then the non-injured spouse may have a claim to a portion of the settlement. Specifically, they would be entitled to the amount awarded for loss of consortium, and to a share of the lost earnings. The earnings of the injured spouse are considered marital property, so both spouses have a claim to this income. Pain-and-suffering and other intangible losses that the injured spouse sustained should belong solely to that spouse during a divorce.

It is important to note that a lot of personal injury settlements are not itemized, and if the court cannot determine which specific losses were supposed to be covered by the award, then there is a good chance that the entire asset would be given solely to the injured spouse. There could, however, be a way to track down an itemized list if there is one available that was used during settlement negotiations.

Settlement Funds were Co-Mingled:
If the personal injury settlement award has been co-mingled with marital funds to the point where the court is unable to determine what amount is marital and what amount belongs to the settlement, then the funds would become part of the marital estate. For example, you deposit the settlement award into your joint checking account, which is the same account where paychecks and other types of income are deposited. Then these funds are used month after month to pay your mortgage, car payments, credit card bills, and other household expenses. At some point, it will be impossible to distinguish which funds are part of the settlement and which were part of the monthly household income.

Injury Related Bills were Paid with Marital Funds:
When someone is seriously injured, they immediately start accumulating medical costs. But it could be several months before the settlement award is received. In the meantime, if the couple used marital funds to pay the medical bills, then that same amount could be taken from the settlement money and placed into the marital estate.

04/10/2026

TIMESHARING ("custody") Law in Florida

Current Florida law when it comes to custody, which we call “timesharing” in Florida, presumes there should be EQUAL timesharing. This means that in the majority of cases, if one party asks for equal timesharing, then equal timesharing will be ordered. It can be very difficult to get around this law unless the parties either AGREE to something different, or there is a substantial reason why equal timesharing would be impractical or detrimental to your child. Some examples of when a court would agree that equal timesharing is not appropriate might be:

a. When a parent has a drug or alcohol addiction and is unable to safely care for the child;
b. A parent who is physically abusive to a child;
c. When parents live too far apart from each other to make equal timesharing work
(long distance parents, parent who lives too far away to realistically get a child to and from school)
d. A parent works the graveyard shift and cannot realistically exercise an equal number of overnights with the child.

As you can see, you need a pretty substantial reason to win an argument against equal timesharing if the other party is requesting it.

Some of the most common timesharing schedules that parties agree to, or that are ordered by the Court, are:

1. EQUAL TIMESHARING: Week on/week off, exchanging on either Fridays after school or Sundays at 6pm

2. EQUAL TIMESHARING: “2-2-3”, where you alternate weekends, from Friday after school through Monday morning return to school, and then one of you ALWAYS has every Mon & Tue, and the other one ALWAYS has every Wed & Thur

3. Every Other Weekend (true 60/40 split): You have majority timesharing, and the other party has every other weekend from Friday after school through Monday morning return to school, plus EVERY Thursday night from after school through Friday morning return to school, then you switch to a week on/week off equal timesharing schedule in the summer

4. Every Other Weekend: You have majority timesharing, and the other party has every other weekend from Friday after school through Monday morning return to school, or through Sunday evening at 6pm.

Unless you agree otherwise, the Court also provides for a default holiday schedule that alternates major holidays, school breaks, and the child’s birthday.

While the Court does require in most cases that a detailed timesharing schedule be contained in your Court Order, the hope is that you and the other parent can learn to coparent reasonably, be flexible, and simply agree upon your timesharing with your child, but you will have a detailed court ordered schedule to use regularly or to just fall back on at times when you cannot agree.

IMPORTANTLY, no matter what your timesharing schedule ends up being, you will always have (with some very limited exceptions) what Florida calls “Shared Parental Responsibility,” which is what some other states may call “Joint Custody.” This means that both parents have equal rights to their child, that you must discuss and agree upon all major decisions involving your child, such as medical and educational decisions.

03/11/2026

DID YOU KNOW that Florida alimony laws changed in 2023? Here is a summary of what current FL alimony law is:

We do not talk about alimony in all divorce cases in Florida. Alimony is only available when the right financial circumstances exist. While there are several factors a Court must consider when determining if there should be alimony payable from one party to the other, and if so, what that amount and duration should be, the most important factors are the requesting party’s financial need and the income disparity between the parties.

Florida courts determine the amount of alimony in one of two ways:

1. The Court could award alimony via a formula whereby the requesting party is entitled to up to 35% of the difference between the parties’ net incomes. “Net” income for purposes of this formula is often not the same net income that appears on someone’s pay stub. Rather, this net income is calculated simply by subtracting applicable taxes and health insurance costs from a party’s gross income.

2. The Court could also award alimony based on the requesting party’s “need,” or monthly deficit. This deficit is calculated by subtracting only necessary and reasonable living expenses from that party’s income.

After calculating potential alimony amounts using the above two methods, the Court awards the lesser amount. Importantly, this means that if the requesting party cannot show a deficit, there will be no alimony. Again, the Court does have some discretion here based on other factors in Florida’s alimony statute.

Regarding duration of alimony, the Court follows guidelines which state:

1. For a marriage that has lasted under ten years, you could be entitled for alimony up to 50% the length of your marriage;

2. For a marriage that has lasted between ten and twenty years, you could be entitled for alimony up to 60% the length of your marriage; and

3. For a marriage that has lasted over twenty years, you could be entitled for alimony up to 75% the length of your marriage.

Unless otherwise agreed upon, alimony amounts are always modifiable should there be a substantial change of financial circumstances in the future. Some examples of what could be considered a substantial change are:

1. Retirement of the payor

2. Loss of income of the payor or increase in income of the payee

3. Decrease of the need of the payee

Alimony does automatically terminate upon the death of either party or the remarriage of the payee.

Congratulations, Blais Family! We love our adoption cases! 🥰
01/12/2026

Congratulations, Blais Family! We love our adoption cases! 🥰

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