Court Opinion

ID: 9684324
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:53:37.151997+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:54.924909
License: Public Domain

SACKETT, Presiding Judge,
specially concurring.
I concur with the majority opinion in all respects. I write separately because I think the time has come for the Iowa courts to reassess the presumption that after a dissolution, siblings be placed together. The need for sibling bonding should continue to be one of the factors the court must consider in making a custodial decision.
The presumption comes from an era when fathers were wage earners and mothers were given presumptions in favor of custody and stayed home with children. The divorced family of today generally does not fit that stereotype. Rather, both parents are employed outside the home in demanding jobs that limit the available time they have to spend with their children. This makes it difficult for a single parent with custody of a number of children to give all the children the individual parental attention each child needs and deserves.
*247I do not suggest bonding with siblings is not important. But, what we need to ask is if bonding with siblings is of greater importance than individual parental attention the children may be more likely to receive if custody is divided. I suggest, in many cases, the individual parental attention may be more important to the healthy development of the child than living with his or her siblings, particularly where the ages and interests of the children are not similar. I find that true here. Derrick, in staying with his father, will not have to compete with two younger siblings for parental attention from a mother employed full time outside the home and additionally taking business classes. Derrick will benefit from his father’s individual attention as well as his grandparents’ guidance. He will be with a parent who shares his interests. He also will stay in a school district where he is established.
I think in Derrick’s mother’s home he may well be cast in a role of substantial responsibility for his younger siblings rather than be offered the normal progressions of childhood. It is the need of these three children for individual parental attention that causes me to agree with the majority opinion. I do not consider this a gender issue.
I think the interests of children would be better served if the presumption of keeping siblings together lost its elevated position as a presumption, and we consider it one of the factors to be weighed in making custodial care decisions.