Tennessee decides custody by entering a parenting plan

Every final decree of divorce, legal separation, or annulment involving a minor child must include a permanent parenting plan. Under T.C.A. § 36-6-402(3), that is a written plan that allocates parenting responsibilities, sets a residential schedule, and provides for child support. It is a single document that answers the questions parents actually argue about.

A plan must do several things the statute specifically requires under T.C.A. § 36-6-404: allocate decision-making authority over education, health care, extracurricular activities, and religious upbringing; preserve each parent’s day-to-day decisions while the child is in their care; establish a dispute-resolution process to be used before going back to court, with an exception for situations requiring immediate protection; require the parent paying support to report income annually; and set a residential schedule that specifies where the child is every day of the year, holidays and vacations included.

If the parents cannot agree, the court may order alternative dispute resolution, and each parent must file a proposed parenting plan no later than forty-five days before trial. A parent who does not file one risks the court adopting the other parent’s plan.

The “primary residential parent” label means less than people think

The primary residential parent is the parent with whom the child lives more than fifty percent of the time, under T.C.A. § 36-6-402(4). Parents fight over that designation harder than almost anything else in a custody case, usually because they believe it confers authority.

It does not. T.C.A. § 36-6-410 states that the designation exists for the purposes of other state and federal statutes and insurance policies that require a custody determination, and that it “shall not affect either parent’s rights and responsibilities under the parenting plan.” Where parenting time is equal, parents may agree to a joint designation or to waive it entirely. If they cannot agree, the court must still name one.

What actually governs your relationship with your child is the decision-making allocation and the residential schedule. That is where the negotiating effort belongs.

The best-interest factors changed in 2025 and there are now seventeen

Courts decide what is in a child’s best interest using the factors in T.C.A. § 36-6-106(a). The list was expanded from fifteen factors to seventeen by 2025 Public Chapter 265, effective July 1, 2025. Any page or article you find that refers to fifteen factors is out of date.

Among the factors a Tennessee court weighs:

• The strength, nature, and stability of the child’s relationship with each parent, including which parent has performed the majority of parenting responsibilities
• Each parent’s willingness to facilitate and encourage a close relationship between the child and the other parent
• The degree to which a parent has been the primary caregiver, and the importance of continuity in a stable environment
• Evidence of physical or emotional abuse of the child, the other parent, or any other person, and the character of other people who live in or frequent the home
• The reasonable preference of a child twelve years of age or older
• Each parent’s employment schedule
• New in 2025: whether a parent previously had custody or parenting time reduced or restricted, and why
• New in 2025: whether a parent has failed to pay court-ordered child support. The earlier three-year nonpayment threshold was removed

A related point: refusal to attend the court-ordered parent education seminar may itself be considered evidence of a lack of good faith. The seminar is mandatory in any case where a parenting plan will be entered, runs a minimum of four hours, and should be completed as soon as possible after the complaint is filed. Fees can be waived for indigency.

Military families: deployment cannot be held against you

Tennessee adopted the Uniform Deployed Parents Custody and Visitation Act in 2014, codified at T.C.A. §§ 36-7-101 through 36-7-503. If you are reading an older article that cites T.C.A. § 36-6-113 for deployment, that statute was repealed by the same act. The current law is Chapter 7, and it is considerably more protective.

• Seven days to give notice. A deploying parent must notify the other parent within seven days of receiving deployment notice, or as soon as reasonably possible, and the parents then exchange proposed plans for custodial responsibility during the deployment.
• You can handle it by written agreement. Parents, and any non-parent taking on responsibility, may sign a written agreement covering the duration and location of the deployment, division of caretaking, decision-making, communication between the deployed parent and the child, and contact during leave. One limit: child support cannot be changed by the agreement.
• Caretaking authority can go to a family member. On the deploying parent’s motion, a court may grant caretaking authority to an adult family member if it serves the child. Absent the other parent’s agreement, that grant is capped at the amount of time the deploying parent had, plus travel time.
• You can appear remotely. Under T.C.A. § 36-7-304, the court must permit a party who is not reasonably available to appear in person to participate by electronic means.

The federal Servicemembers Civil Relief Act is also available. Under 50 U.S.C. § 3932, a servicemember who has notice of a proceeding may apply for a stay of at least ninety days, supported by two letters: one from the servicemember explaining how current duty materially affects the ability to appear and stating when they will be available, and one from the commanding officer confirming that duty prevents appearance and that leave is not authorized. Further stays can be requested, and if the court refuses an additional stay it must appoint counsel for the servicemember.

We will be straight with you about the limits of that: the SCRA is procedural. It can buy you time, but it does not supply a custody standard and it does not decide the merits. The substantive protections for a deployed Tennessee parent come from Chapter 7. Any firm that tells you the SCRA protects your custody rights on the merits is overstating it.

Relocation: sixty days of notice, and fifty miles counts

T.C.A. § 36-6-108, substantially rewritten effective July 1, 2018, governs what happens when a parent with parenting time wants to move. Notice is required if the move is outside Tennessee, or more than fifty miles from the other parent within Tennessee. Clarksville to Nashville sits right at that line, which makes this a live question here rather than a hypothetical one.

• Notice must be in writing, sent by registered or certified mail to the other parent’s last known address, at least sixty days before the move, unless the court excuses the timing for exigent circumstances
• The notice must state the intent to move, the new location, the reasons for the move, and that unless the other parent objects within thirty days of the date the notice was sent, the relocating parent will be permitted to move
• If a timely objection is filed, or no agreement is reached within thirty days, the relocating parent must petition for approval, and the other parent then has thirty days to respond in opposition
• The standard is simply the best interest of the child. The pre-2018 framework of reasonable purpose, vindictive motive, and specific serious harm, along with its presumption favoring the parent with more time, is gone

The statute lists its own relocation factors, including the feasibility of preserving the other parent’s relationship given logistics and finances, the child’s preference at twelve or older, whether the relocating parent has historically promoted or thwarted the other parent’s relationship, and whether the move will improve the quality of life for both the parent and the child. A court must also consider transportation costs and may deviate from the child support guidelines because of them.

The practical problem for a military family is obvious: a soldier who receives PCS orders rarely has sixty days of notice to give. The exigent-circumstances provision in subsection (a) is the mechanism for that, and it is worth getting in front of a lawyer as soon as orders come down rather than after the move is booked.

Changing an existing order: the bar is lower than you have been told

Almost every parent who calls us about modifying a parenting plan believes they have to prove the other parent is dangerous. That is not the law, and Tennessee actually has two different standards depending on what you are trying to change.

The statute’s own examples of a material change affecting a schedule include significant changes in the needs of the child over time, including changes relating to age, significant changes in a parent’s living or working conditions, and failure to adhere to the parenting plan. A child who was four when the plan was entered and is now eleven has different needs, and that alone can be enough to revisit the schedule.

Questions Clarksville parents ask

Is custody still decided in favor of mothers in Tennessee?

No. There is no maternal preference in Tennessee law. Courts apply the statutory best-interest factors, and one of those factors asks which parent has actually been performing the parenting responsibilities. That is a question about conduct, not about gender.

I just got PCS orders. Can I take my children with me?

Not unilaterally. If the move is out of state or more than fifty miles away, the relocation statute applies and you owe the other parent sixty days of written notice by certified mail. Orders rarely give you sixty days, which is why the exigent-circumstances provision exists. Call before you move, not after.

I am deploying in four months. Can my ex use that to take custody?

By statute, deployment alone cannot be used against you, and a court cannot enter a permanent order changing custodial responsibility without your consent while you are deployed. Any order entered has to be temporary and it ends when you return.

My son is thirteen and wants to live with me. Does the judge have to do what he says?

The reasonable preference of a child twelve or older is one of the seventeen best-interest factors, so the court must consider it. It is not controlling, and courts look closely at whether a preference is the child’s own or the product of pressure.

My ex keeps violating the parenting plan. Do I have to prove my children are in danger?

No. Failure to adhere to the parenting plan is one of the statutory examples of a material change, and for a change to the residential schedule the threshold is low by design. You do not have to prove a substantial risk of harm.

Do we both really have to take a four-hour class?

Yes, in any case where a permanent parenting plan will be entered. The fee can be waived for indigency and the requirement can be waived for good cause on motion, but refusing to attend can be treated as evidence of bad faith, so it is not a good place to make a stand.