“I also find that the Father’s access should be expanded to include regular overnight access. The AFCC-O Parenting Plan Guide (pages 18–19) provides helpful considerations for parents, mediators, lawyers and judges when they are developing parenting time schedules.
Schedules for pre-schoolers, aged 3 to 5 years: Preschoolers can tolerate longer absences from a parent, but a child’s temperament and the pre-separation parenting arrangements must be considered. Transitional objects, such as a favorite toy, stuffed animal or blanket, moving between the two homes can help a preschooler manage sadness and anxiety.
If one parent was primarily responsible for the child and the other parent had limited involvement with the child’s daily routine, the child should continue to reside with that parent, with a possible plan of step-up care to increase the involvement and skills of the other parent. This might start with two or three 4-hour blocks of parenting time per week, building up to one longer block (likely on a weekend) that may include an overnight. As a child becomes more comfortable moving between the two homes, one or two overnights a week might be added.
In this case the Father is an actively involved parent. Although he attributes blame to the Mother for the absence of regular overnight access to date, the current reality is that the child’s overnight routine is derived solely from her experiences sleeping at the Mother’s home. She needs time to transition to an overnight alternate weekend schedule. Since the three 8-hour blocks per week have proved successful, it is in the child’s best interests to move to overnight access.
In consideration of the animosity between the parties, transitioning to a schedule that provides for pick ups and drop offs at school is one way to protect K.N. from further conflict. The benefits are explained in the AFCC-Ontario Parenting Plan Guide (page 19).
If the parents have difficulty in communicating in person, it may be preferable to have as many exchanges of care as possible done by having one parent drop the child at day care and the other pick up the child at the end of the day. This would require shifting the schedule so that it starts on Monday; apart from holidays, transitions take place through daycare.”