Military families face custody challenges that civilian families rarely encounter. When a service member is deployed — sometimes with short notice and for extended periods — existing custody arrangements are disrupted, children experience anxiety and loss, and the non-military parent may seek to use the deployment to permanently shift the custody balance. Understanding the legal protections available to service members and their families is essential for protecting both the parent-child relationship and the service member's legal rights.
SCRA Protections for Service Members
The Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA) provides important procedural protections to active duty military personnel involved in civil legal proceedings, including custody cases. Under the SCRA, a service member who cannot appear in court due to military duties can request a stay — a postponement — of custody proceedings for at least 90 days, with the possibility of additional delays if military necessity requires it.
Critically, many states have enacted additional statutes specifically prohibiting courts from using a service member's deployment as the sole basis for modifying a custody order. Without these protections, a non-military parent could theoretically petition for sole custody every time the service member deployed, arguing that the absence constitutes a change in circumstances. Most jurisdictions now explicitly bar this tactic.
Family Care Plans: Planning Before You Go
Military regulations require service members with dependents to have a Family Care Plan — a formal document designating who will care for their children during deployment. This document is a military administrative requirement, but it also has legal relevance in custody cases because it demonstrates the service member's responsible planning and intent to ensure their children's welfare.
From a custody standpoint, the Family Care Plan should align with the existing court-ordered parenting plan. If the plan designates a grandparent or other family member to exercise the service member's parenting time during deployment, that arrangement should ideally be reflected in a temporary court order — not just an informal agreement — to prevent disputes about authority and access.
Temporary Custody Orders During Deployment
Rather than leaving custody arrangements to chance during a deployment, service members should seek a temporary custody order before they leave. This order can specify how the service member's parenting time will be managed during the deployment — whether it will be held in trust and exercised by a family member, suspended temporarily, or converted to virtual contact.
The temporary order should also include clear language restoring the original custody arrangement when the service member returns. Courts are generally willing to enter these orders on an expedited basis given the unique circumstances of military service. Having a formal order in place protects the service member from returning home to find their parenting time has been informally redistributed — or that the other parent is petitioning for a permanent modification based on the deployment absence.
Virtual Visitation During Deployment
When in-person contact is impossible, virtual visitation — video calls, phone calls, messaging — becomes the primary means of maintaining the parent-child relationship. Many states now have statutes explicitly authorizing virtual visitation and directing courts to include it in parenting plans. Service members deploying to combat zones or remote locations may have limited and unpredictable communication access, so parenting plans should be flexible about the timing and frequency of virtual contact.
Consistency matters even when you are deployed. Regular, predictable contact — even brief calls or voice messages — helps children maintain their bond with the absent parent and reassures them that the parent has not disappeared from their life. Apps that allow asynchronous messaging and video recordings can be valuable when live calls are not possible due to time zone differences or communication blackouts.
Reintegration: Rebuilding the Parenting Relationship
Returning from deployment is not always the smooth reunion families hope for. Children who were well-adjusted during the deployment may exhibit behavioral changes when the parent returns — regression, acting out, or emotional distance — as they adjust to the restored family structure. Service members may also struggle with the transition from the discipline and structure of military life to the unpredictability of co-parenting.
Gradual reintegration often works better than immediately resuming full parenting time. Shorter, more frequent visits in the first weeks following return can ease the adjustment for young children, particularly those who were infants or toddlers at the time of deployment and may not have a clear memory of the returning parent. Family therapy can be an invaluable support during this period.
Military co-parenting requires planning, flexibility, and excellent communication — especially across long distances and time zones. CoParent.Help (https://www.coparent.help) is designed to help co-parents stay connected, share updates about the children, and maintain a clear record of agreements and parenting time, no matter where service takes you.
Source: CoParent.Help
