Most parents who ask me about a possession schedule have already heard a version of it from a friend or a relative who divorced ten years ago. In that version, the parent who doesn’t have the children during the week gets every other weekend, Friday evening to Sunday evening, and that is the whole story. Then they ask what it takes to get more time than that.
For a lot of families in Collin, Dallas, and Denton counties, the answer since September 1, 2021 is that you may not have to ask at all.
The terms the court is actually using
A possession order is the part of your order that says which parent has the children on which days, and at what times. A possessory conservator is the parent who has the children on a set schedule rather than as their primary residence. Texas writes a default version of that schedule into the statute, called the standard possession order, and Texas Family Code section 153.252 says courts start with a rebuttable presumption that it is in the child’s best interest. Rebuttable means a parent can argue against it with evidence, not that it is optional.
For parents who live 100 miles or less apart, Texas Family Code section 153.312 sets that default. It gives the possessory conservator the first, third, and fifth weekends of each month, beginning at 6 p.m. Friday and ending at 6 p.m. Sunday. It adds Thursdays during the regular school term from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. It alternates the major holidays by year and gives 30 days in the summer.
What the expanded version changes
The expanded schedule does not add weekends. It changes when the weekends start and stop.
Instead of picking the children up at 6 p.m. Friday, the possessory conservator picks them up when school is dismissed that day. Instead of returning them at 6 p.m. Sunday, the parent keeps them until school resumes Monday morning. The Thursday period changes the same way, from a two hour dinner visit to an overnight that ends when school starts Friday.
The count of weekends is identical. The number of hours is not. A 6 p.m. Friday to 6 p.m. Sunday weekend is 48 hours. The same weekend, measured school bell to school bell, is closer to 66. That difference falls almost entirely on evenings and mornings, which is where the ordinary business of parenting happens. Homework, dinner, getting everyone out the door.
The 50 mile rule
This is the part people have not heard. Texas Family Code section 153.3171 took effect on September 1, 2021. If the possessory conservator lives not more than 50 miles from the child’s primary residence, the statute says the court shall alter the standard possession order to provide the expanded beginning and ending times, as though that parent had formally elected them.
Before 2021, a parent had to affirmatively ask, in a written document filed with the court or out loud on the record, before or at the time the order was rendered. If nobody raised it, the parent got the 6 p.m. version and generally lived with it. Now the longer schedule is the starting point, and the 50 miles is measured from that parent’s residence to the child’s primary residence.
What the 50 mile rule does not do
- It is not 50/50. The expanded schedule still runs on the first, third, and fifth weekends. It lengthens them. It does not equalize the calendar, and it is not joint custody by another name.
- It does not touch conservatorship. Who makes medical and education decisions, and which parent has the exclusive right to designate the child’s primary residence, are separate questions decided separately.
- It does not change child support. Support is calculated under its own chapter of the code and does not move because the weekends got longer.
- It does not rewrite an order you already have. If your order was signed before September 2021, it says what it says until a court changes it, and changing it is a modification with its own legal standard.
- It is not unconditional. Section 153.3171 lists its own exceptions, and they matter.
The expanded times do not apply automatically if the possessory conservator declines them, in writing or on the record. They do not apply where the court is denying, restricting, or limiting that parent’s possession in the child’s best interest because of a history of family violence or sexual abuse under section 153.004. And they do not apply where the court finds the expanded times are not in the child’s best interest, which the statute says can include a finding that the distance between the homes makes the schedule unworkable in practice, or that before the case was filed the parent had not frequently and continuously exercised the rights and duties of a parent. The statute also leaves the court room for any other reason it considers relevant.
One more limit: the standard possession order presumption does not apply to a child under three. For infants and toddlers the court builds a schedule on the facts instead.
Where this leaves you
If you are heading into a first order and you live inside that 50 mile radius, the longer schedule is your floor, not your reach. If you are looking at an older order and comparing it to what a neighbor got last year, the gap is probably the 2021 change, and the route to it is a modification rather than an assumption. Either way, the facts about distance, work schedules, and how involved each parent has actually been are what the court weighs. If a party asks, the court also has to make findings of fact about what it ordered under this section. Our child custody attorneys in Collin County work through this analysis with parents every week.
If your order is old, or you are not sure which version of the schedule you are living under, bring the order itself and we will read it with you.