Parents Agree to Keep Grandparents Away from Their Children

[motherwithconcerns]

My question involves grandparents rights in the State of: Pennsylvania

My husband and I both agree that we do not want his parents or grandparents to have visitation with our daughter.

The reason is because my mother in law has been trying to break up our marriage!! She told my husband that his marriage will end one way or another!! They come to our home and bang on the door until we answer at 6 am in the morning! They have harrassed me up at walmart and made a scene. They have said things about me to everyone in the family on my husbands side, so we never go to family reunions or family get togethers. They under mine me all the time when it comes to me telling the kids no. We have three boys that are from a previous marriage and they want nothing to do with them. They want thier son who is my husband to go visit them with our daughter, my husband will not because he doesn't want to leave his family.

Do his parents or grand parents have any legal rights to our daughter??

[LawResearcherMissy]

Do his parents or grand parents have any legal rights to our daughter??

Nope. If you and your husband agree that they're not going to see your children, then that is that.

Grandparents in Pennsylvania may petition the court for visitation only in certain narrowly defined circumstances, explained here. Outside of those circumstances, you don't have to allow anyone to see your children if you don't want them to. You don't even need a reason outside of "Because I said so."

[tigerdog]

Do his parents or grand parents have any legal rights to our daughter??

In a word, no.

The information I was able to find indicates that PA does have some grandparent's rights, but only under very specific circumstances. It doesn't sound like you fall into those circumstances, but here's the link to the website I got my information from...

http://www.lasp.org/file/grandparent...nnsylvania.pdf

And it appears Missy was a bit quicker than I.....

[motherwithconcerns]

She's also holding letters over our heads that i wrote her three years ago. I don't even remember what's in them. But she says that's how she'll get her visitation!! Is she bluffing or could there be things in there that could help her to get visitation?? And thank you for your quick response.

[LawResearcherMissy]

Is she bluffing or could there be things in there that could help her to get visitation??

Once again, if you and your husband say that she can't see the kids, then she can't see the kids. Period, end of story, no matter how loudly she yells or how hard she stamps her feet.

Go read the laws I pointed you to. Your circumstances don't fit them. Tell Grammy to cram it.

[BrandiN1131]

My husband and I have a similar situation. His mom does not treat our children equally. I have 2 from a prior marriage and he has 1 but there is a 2 year old that we have "together". Biologically she is not his but she does not know the difference nor do the other kids. To him and everyone other than his parents, that is his daughter. Anyway, his parents say that he only has one child and the other 3 will not be treated equally because they are not equal and the other kids are not their grandchildren. Not to mention his mom has to his daughter to "not tell me" certain things (which I teach them hiding the truth is the same as lying) and that the other kids should not be allowed to play with her toys. She also told my step daughter that her daddy and I blocked the grandma's number in the childs cell phone when it was actually the kids mom that did it. We have decided that if she cant treat them all the same that she will not see any of them. In the state of Louisiana, can she take us to court and get visitation with my step daughter?

[Dogmatique]

The short answer Brandi, is "yes" - grandparents also have standing to sue for visitation in Louisiana in certain circumstances:

A court may award visitation rights if the child's parent is deceased or declared legally incompetent, a grandparent is the parent of the deceased or incompetent parent to the grandchild, and visitation is in the child's best interest. Adoption cuts off the visitation rights of grandparents except in circumstances where the grandparents are the parents of a deceased party to the marriage or the parents of a party who has forfeited his or her rights to object to the child's adoption.

this site has a decent rundown of gpv state-wide

[BrandiN1131]

That is not what I wanted to hear but thanks. I dont know if she has filed anything yet but I do know that she is the type that would pay all that money rather than just treat the other kids equally. Is there any way around it? Is there any circumstances other than abuse or substance abuse that may make the courts not give her visitation?

and what if the parent is not deceased or incompetent?

[Dogmatique]

Then Granny doesn't generally have grounds to sue

The burden of proof would be on granny to show that it would be harmful to the child/ren if they didn't have regular visitation.

When both parents are adamantly against the idea, the chances of granny being successful drop from "slim at best" to "virtually 0%".