I want to thank Ms. Lithwick for raising this issue and keeping it in the public eye. I am writing as both a stepmother and a child psychologist. My husband is an exceptional father, his only flaw was being a male in our family court system. Hence he was marginilized from his son's life, his ex wife moved his son away from him (he had to pick up an follow her once already), and of course a huge chunk of our income is turned over to her each month. My husband drives over 6 hours total to be able to see his son on the weekends. As he can see his son most weekends, we are considered 'lucky'.

As a clinical psychologist I regularly work with children in joint custody situations. Our current system of letting fathers see their children only a few days a month is cruel to all involved. I can not imagine how painful it would be to have someone take my own son from me and not to be able to hold him for 2 weeks. I have observed it for years--children and fathers in this situation are damaged by this infrequent contact. They can still function much of the time, true, but how sad to have to live like that.