Custody is not a word Colorado courts use anymore.

What replaced custody

In 1999, Colorado replaced custody and visitation with the allocation of parental responsibilities. That allocation has two parts.

Parenting time is the schedule: where the children live, and when each parent has them.

Decision-making responsibility is authority over the big questions: education, health care, religion, and other major choices. It can be shared, divided by topic, or held by one parent.

Why the words matter

The old vocabulary made the case sound like a prize fight: one parent wins custody, the other gets visits. The new framework asks a different question: how should the responsibilities of parenting be divided between two people who are no longer together?

That reframing is not just polite language. It is how judges actually think about these cases. Courts decide based on the best interests of the child, weighing factors like each parent's relationship with the child, the child's adjustment to home and school, the ability of the parents to cooperate, and the child's own wishes when they are mature enough to express them.

What this means for your case

Walking into a Colorado courtroom talking about winning custody signals that you are working from the old framework. Walking in with a realistic proposed parenting plan, one that shows you understand schedules, decision-making, and what your kids actually need, signals the opposite.

For the fuller picture of how these cases are decided, see our parenting time and decision-making page.