Adoption Bill Targets LGBTQ Individuals in Tennessee
Wednesday, January 22nd, 2020
Tennessee legislators have passed a new bill targeting LGBT individuals who hope to adopt or provide foster care in the state. This adoption bill allows child placement agencies to discriminate against any group that clashes with the organization’s religious ideals or internal policies. If Governor Bill Lee signs the bill into law, these agencies can legally […]
Read More »Divorce and Adoption
Tuesday, April 30th, 2019
A reality in the world of family law is that families sometimes fracture through divorce. Families with adopted children are no different. This might be because new parents are not quite ready to deal with the stress of the adoption process and raising children. A marriage may have already been on the rocks when they […]
Read More »Therapy: Who needs it? Why?
Tuesday, April 16th, 2019
Each of us probably needs therapy at some point. Why? As a family law firm, we suggest it to many clients as a way to cope with divorce-related life changes like adjusting to living alone, sharing custody of their children with their ex or having to find a new job. For some, there is stigma […]
Read More »Children: Delinquent, Unruly, Neglected
Monday, April 15th, 2019
People across the state of Tennessee often find themselves struggling to provide the care that their children need. When parents are unable to provide that level of care for their children, for whatever reason, the state may step in. When this happens, the state classifies them as falling into three primary categories: delinquent, unruly or neglected […]
Read More »What the drug crisis means for grandparents
Friday, March 29th, 2019
What does the drug crisis mean for grandparents? Many children are placed in households headed by relatives due to the large number of parents who struggle with drug addiction in Tennessee. Nearly 8 million children across the country lived in these non-nuclear households in 2017. Many of those households were headed by grandparents. There is […]
Read More »First in Adoption Law Changes
Friday, November 2nd, 2018
Only a few months ago, the governor signed Tennessee’s First in Adoption bill resulting in several key modifications pertaining to adoptions and termination of parental rights in our state. The first major change is an entirely revamped surrender form. A surrender is what parties execute in order to voluntarily terminate their parental rights to a […]
Read More »Positively Putative: Fathers and Adoption
Friday, September 28th, 2018
Adopting a child, as rewarding as it can be in the end, can also be fraught with frustration and confusion throughout the enduring process. One cause of this is the over forty applicable legal rules that can make crafting an adoption petition a meticulous task, yet one often overlooked rule regarding putative fathers can derail […]
Read More »How Open Adoption Helps Children
Monday, September 17th, 2018
In Tennessee alone, there are more opioid-overdose deaths occurring on a daily basis than there are traffic fatalities – quite an alarming statistic, as most local readers are familiar with the treacherousness that is I-40 (1). Yet while most people can conceive of the variety of ways that opioid addiction wreaks havoc on a victim’s […]
Read More »My ex abandoned our child. How do I terminate their rights?
Friday, December 8th, 2017
Many parents, unfortunately, aren’t “parental material.” Some have drug problems. Some just haven’t grown up. Some have anger management issues. For many reasons, parents believe that their child should not be around the other parent. Ever. No chance. They want finality, to be able to move on with their lives, or for the other parent […]
Read More »DCS took my kids. What now?
Sunday, August 27th, 2017
DCS just took my kids. Can they at least stay with my family while all this gets sorted out? Yes. When the Department of Children’s Services takes children from a parent, they are required to find somewhere for the children to be while their investigation is underway. The law requires DCS to place the children […]
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