Becoming a parent is a huge transition for any Carrollton resident. Even when an individual finds out about their pending pregnancy early on in the process and does everything that they can to ready their home and self for the arrival of their baby, they can never fully know what will be in store once they deliver.
Finding out that one is a parent near a baby’s delivery or even after a child is born can be a shocking and even difficult development in a man’s life.
It is obviously not as straightforward of a process to determine the father of a child as it is to determine a child’s mother. If marriage or another presumption does not identify a man as the child’s father then paternity may become an important issue in determining the child’s second parent.
Paternity is the establishment of a man as a child’s legal father. When there is a question regarding whether a man is related to a child, they may both have genetic or biological samples taken from their bodies to have compared. If the man and child share genetic material such as DNA and a link can be made, paternity may be established.
A paternal father may have rights to the custody and support of their child. They may be entitled to spend time with their son or daughter, and may be allowed to stay involved in the changes and decisions that will impact the child’s life. Paternity can be a critical component to the success of a man’s family law pursuits and lawyers in the field can support their clients to build strong paternity cases.