The era of easy alienation of a non-custodial parent is coming to a close. Unfortuantely, closing that chapter in our culture, comes slowly. Nonetheless, in the past ten years, court records of cases in Indiana and other states indicate that divorced, non-custodial parents have become much more likely to see their children, even years after a divorce is final. Frequently this is occurring by the courts' will as much as it is by the actions of non-custodial parents themselves.
In states like Indiana where there are domestic relations counseling agencies in many counties, these agencies are making it a practice to recommend parenting time, therapy and other interventions that enable both parents to actively participate in their chidlren's lives.
While the data is enocuraging on its face, in no way should it be interpreted to mean that parents should minimize their activism in trying to imporve conditions for equal consideration for both parents.
For example, while the state agency in some counties will often recommend additonal parenting time for a father after a child reaches school age, the same agency will rarely recommend a garduated schedule of parenting time that increases a father's involvement when teh child is still an infant. Thus, a Dad may be forced to incur great expense to come back to court to get substantial parenting time, even though the agency could have acknoweldged this would be the likely outcome when it did an evaluation of the family years earlier.
The bottom line, however, is good news. The trend is in the right direction. But it is incumbent on concerned parents, grandparents, step-parents, etc. to continue to do the hard work of advocating for the parental rights of fathers and all non-custodial parents seeking to give the most they can to their own children.