Florida is governed by the best interest standard. The best interest standard when you're talking about children, parenting time, and decision making is what the court is going to consider in entering its orders in the absence of an agreement.

Now parents are free to come up with parenting plans in custody and divorce cases, but if they don't come up with agreements, the court is going to apply Florida  Statute section 61.13(2)(c) in determining decision making and parenting time. In all cases involving the best interest of the children, the court must make a decision based upon the factors in the best interest law. That means the court will do an analysis to determine what is in the child's best interest and what has been the actions of the parent to co-parent. Are the parents able to get along? Are they able to discuss the child's well-being together and make decisions together? There is always a duty no matter what for both parties to encourage and foster a loving relationship between the child or children and the other parent.

This means that a judge ultimately will decide is a parent involving the other parent in decisions and parenting of a child. Is the other parent supporting the child's relationship with the other parent? And often times, we find out that a parent is retaliating or vindictive in keeping a child from the other parent or denying the other parent contact. An example of that is when a parent is intentionally cutting off the phone calls between the child and the other parent. That's not encouraging and fostering a loving relationship between the child and the other parent.

So you should be mindful that your actions and your behavior when you're going through a custody case and you're going to be receiving orders in the years to come, you always want to encourage and foster a loving relationship between your children and the other parent.