When it comes to dividing custodial rights and responsibilities, things are never easy. Parents go through the rollercoaster of the divorce process in an attempt to guarantee the best possible future for their kids. Although, they may want the same outcomes divorcees often are not ready to cooperate on the custody decisions. For example, famous custody cases depict how parents use all means, including social media, to sabotage each other and get the upper hand in custody. Check out how to protect yourself from social media spoiling your custody battle outcomes and reach the desired results for your family with no hassle.
How Social Media Can Affect Your Child Custody Case
When you go through child custody tips, you may spot the recommendation to decrease social media use in any brochure or guidance. So what about social media that may harm your custody rights and perspectives so much? Look closer and you will know the details:
- Spoil your reputation – the wrong image on your social media page or the image that your partner will present of you may spoil your reputation. Wrong comments, photos, or posts, and you will be a person who shouldn’t be trusted in the eyes of the judge.
- Used as proof you are an inappropriate candidate – any information you share online may be misunderstood or misused to depict you as a person who cares about how long does it take to get divorce in Texas but not about the kids’ wellness.
- Reveal your bad traits – everyone has a bad side. but it doesn’t mean you have to talk about it openly and in the judge’s face. Within social media, the court may get to know some spicy details about you that will worsen your position in the divorce case.
- Tell too much about your private life – you may be dating another person already, go to parties for singles, and commit to your personal life the way you want. But if you spill some details to social media, your spouse may use it against you in court, and you will hardly win the child support and custody battle in the end.
- Display you have the wrong priorities – talking about significant purchases, posting your location, being tagged on photos may prove that you can have fun without your children and may display you as a parent who doesn’t care much.
Even if you are a dream parent and prioritize your kids’ wellness, your activity online may be misused and misinterpreted to prove that you are not a suitable candidate for a significant custody share. This is why you need to be extremely careful with social media use during divorce and take appropriate measures to succeed in custody agreement.
How to Deal with Social Media During Child Custody Case
It is necessary to find your own golden rule for exploiting social media when dealing with a custody case. Check out some child custody trial tips to protect yourself and your family from any negative impact of social media:
- Stay away – the best approach is to decrease social media use during divorce cases as much as you can. But if you cannot make such drastic changes, you need to be very careful about what to do and what to avoid online.
- Don’t delete – no matter how much you want to hide your past from the court or how much you want to prevent any misunderstandings, never consider deleting your social media account or removing any data and posts from it. You will look even more guilty and as if you are trying to keep some proofs on the case n the secret.
- Adjust privacy settings – do you know who can view your page, who can tag you on photos, who can share your posts? Review the privacy settings and adjust them so that you cannot be sabotaged or spied on during a custody case.
- Clean up your friend list – the next step after privacy settings is to look through your friends list. Remove everyone who may be a threat to your reputation during the case, who may spy for your ex and any people who you barely know. This will protect you from any kind of privacy invasion.
- Don’t share your divorce details – no matter how tempted you are to share your side of the story and prove father involvement in your kids’ life, better keep it to yourself for now. Remember that everything may be misinterpreted and drive the results of your custody case not in your favor.
- Don’t set an online conflict – avoid bickering online. No matter your intentions to protect your own name or the good name of your family. Everything you post or comment on to develop the conflict may be exploited against you in social media and child custody battles later.
- Stay away from bragging – purchased something great, moved to a new place, achieved a new position, or any other pleasant things that happened to you recently. This doesn’t mean that all your followers should know about it. Your ex may get envious or angry about your progress and use it against you.
- Ask before posting pics of your kids – when things are complicated between you and your ex, you should better not do anything that can worsen the relationship between you two. This includes posting photos of your kids without your spouse’s consent.
- Stay away from dating platforms – your private life is your personal concern but changing your marital status too soon or joining a dating platform may prove that kids are not your priority.
- Care about a positive image – if you still decide to keep on using social media, care to present yourself in a good light. You can ask your lawyer for advice on the best choices.
Social media misuse may prevent you from reaching positive and comfortable child custody arrangements and drag out your case. So, if you want to go on with your active social life online, care to follow simple rules not to sabotage yourself or grant your ex a chance to spoil your reputation. Anyway, if you want to obtain the best possible results of the custody case, get an amicable divorce to help you.