January 12, 2012
Additional Information: My husband and I are getting divorced after a 8 year marriage. We have 3 young children and have decided that that I will stay in our home in Natick, and that the children will primarily stay with me. We haven’t figured out when they will stay with their dad and already both sets of grandparents are voicing their interests in time with the kids too. Are grandparents’ visitation something that gets written into the divorce agreement? ATTORNEY ANSWER: The rights of grandparents to spend time with the children after a divorce can be problematic and depends upon the facts of each case. Generally, the rights of the grandparents to spend time with their grandchildren is ancillary to the parenting rights of the parents. Under Massachusetts law, however, the grandparents of an unmarried child may be granted reasonable visitation rights by the Probate Court when the parents are living apart under a temporary order or judgment of separate support, or following the divorce of the parents. The grandparents may also have rights if the children, who are born out of wedlock, do not live together but the paternity (of the paternal grandparents) has been established.

