Grandparent Visitation and the limits on it.
Indiana grandparents can petition for visitation in three specific situations and no others. We handle both sides of these — and we will tell you honestly, on the first call, whether you have standing at all.
A grandparent may seek visitation only if a parent has died, the parents' marriage was dissolved in Indiana, or the child was born out of wedlock.
That list at Ind. Code § 31-17-5-1(a) is the whole door. If both parents are alive, married to each other, and object, there is no route in — the case ends at standing without ever reaching the child's best interest. And where standing does exist, the statute's plain "best interests" language badly understates the real burden. The Constitution puts a thumb firmly on the parent's side of the scale.
Standing first, everything else second.
Tell us which of the three circumstances applies, or which one the other side is claiming. That answer decides whether this is a case or a conversation, and it takes about five minutes.
The three circumstances, and the fourth that does not exist
Ind. Code § 31-17-5-1(a): "A child's grandparent may seek visitation rights if: (1) the child's parent is deceased; (2) the marriage of the child's parents has been dissolved in Indiana; or (3) subject to subsection (b), the child was born out of wedlock."
Note the words "in Indiana" in the second circumstance. An out-of-state dissolution is handled by a separate section, § 31-17-5-10, and a page that just says "the marriage was dissolved" is glossing over a real jurisdictional question.
The third circumstance carries a restriction. Under § 31-17-5-1(b), a court "may not grant visitation rights to a paternal grandparent of a child who is born out of wedlock" under that route "if the child's father has not established paternity." So for a paternal grandparent, the son's paternity is the gate.
Can a grandparent get visitation when both parents are alive, married to each other, and object? No. The three circumstances in § 31-17-5-1(a) are an exhaustive standing list, and an intact marriage of two living parents is none of them. The analysis stops there. That is a hard answer to hear, and it is better heard before you have spent money.
Why "best interests" is not the whole test
Read only the statute and you would think this is an ordinary best-interest case. § 31-17-5-2(a) says the court "may grant visitation rights if the court determines that visitation rights are in the best interests of the child." Subsection (b) adds that the court may consider whether a grandparent has had or attempted meaningful contact — permissive, not an element.
But the statute operates under a constitutional overlay. Troxel v. Granville, 530 U.S. 57 (2000), held that a fit parent's decisions about their child's associations get constitutional protection. Indiana implements that through a four-part framework that originated in McCune v. Frey, 783 N.E.2d 752 (Ind. Ct. App. 2003) and was adopted as the required approach by the Indiana Supreme Court in In re Visitation of M.L.B., 983 N.E.2d 583 (Ind. 2013).
Indiana courts do not treat a grandparent-visitation petition like an ordinary custody dispute. The court starts with the fit parent’s constitutional position, then asks whether the grandparent has carried the burden required to justify court-ordered visitation.
The presumption
A fit parent’s decision about grandparent visitation is presumed to be in the child’s best interests. The petitioning grandparent starts with the burden of overcoming that presumption.
Special weight
The parent’s decision receives “special weight.” The court cannot simply substitute its own preferred visitation arrangement for the decision of a fit parent.
Some visitation vs. none
The court considers whether the parent has allowed some contact or denied it entirely. A complete denial places the existence of the relationship at stake; otherwise the dispute may be about the amount of contact.
Best interests
The grandparent must still establish that court-ordered visitation is in the child’s best interests after the parent’s constitutional position is given the required weight.
M.L.B. also limits the amount. An order must contemplate "only occasional, temporary visitation that does not substantially infringe on a parent's fundamental right to control the upbringing, education, and religious training of their children." Grandparent visitation in Indiana is not a parenting time schedule, and a court that awards something resembling one is vulnerable on appeal.
The thing most pages get backward
You will read that adoption terminates grandparent visitation. That is not what the statute says. Ind. Code § 31-17-5-9 provides that visitation rights under section 1 or 10 "survive the adoption of the child" by a stepparent, or by a person biologically related to the child as a grandparent, sibling, aunt, uncle, niece, or nephew.
So a stepparent adoption — by far the most common kind — does not extinguish an existing grandparent visitation order. Adoption by someone outside that list is a different question, and the section does not preserve rights there.
This matters in both directions. A grandparent told their rights ended when the stepfather adopted has been told something wrong. A parent assuming the adoption solved the problem may be in for a surprise.
Some practitioner materials state that a visitation petition must be filed before the adoption decree is entered for the rights to survive. That requirement does not appear in the text of § 31-17-5-9 and we are not stating it as statute. If an adoption is pending and grandparent visitation matters to you, do not wait to find out which reading a court adopts — file.
What we do on each side
For a grandparent. Establish standing first, in writing, before anything else. Then build the record the four-part framework actually requires — a documented history of the relationship, the specific contact that has been denied, and a request modest enough to survive the M.L.B. limit on amount.
For a parent. Test standing before conceding anything. If it exists, the presumption is yours and the burden is theirs — and the most common error is arguing the merits so hard that the presumption gets lost. Fitness is not the issue unless you make it one.
For either. These cases are frequently really about something else — a death, an addiction, a divorce nobody has finished. The legal question is narrow. Whether litigation is the right tool is a separate conversation worth having honestly.
Frequently asked questions
01My daughter and her husband won't let me see my grandchild. Can I sue?
If they are both living and married to each other, no. Ind. Code § 31-17-5-1(a) lists three circumstances — a parent deceased, a dissolution in Indiana, or a child born out of wedlock — and an intact marriage is not one of them. The case would end at standing. We would rather identify that at the outset than litigate a case the statute does not allow.
02My son died. Do I have rights to see his child?
You have standing to ask, which is the first hurdle and you clear it. What you do not have is a presumption in your favor — the surviving parent gets that. You would need to rebut it under the four-part framework from McCune and M.L.B., and what you can document about the existing relationship is most of the case.
03How much visitation would I actually get?
Less than people hope. In re Visitation of M.L.B. limits orders to "only occasional, temporary visitation that does not substantially infringe on a parent's fundamental right to control the upbringing" of the child. This is not a parenting time schedule and asking for one tends to hurt the petition rather than help it.
04The stepfather is adopting. Does that end my visitation order?
No. § 31-17-5-9 says visitation rights survive adoption by a stepparent, and also by a grandparent, sibling, aunt, uncle, niece, or nephew. Adoption by someone outside that list is a different question. If you have heard that adoption automatically ends grandparent visitation, that is wrong for the most common type of adoption.
05I'm the father's mother and he was never married to the mother. Can I file?
Only if he has established paternity. § 31-17-5-1(b) bars a court from granting visitation to a paternal grandparent of a child born out of wedlock "if the child's father has not established paternity." If your son has not done that, that is the first problem to solve — and it is his to solve, not yours.
06I'm the parent. Do I have to prove I'm a good parent?
No, and do not volunteer to. The framework presumes a fit parent's decision is in the child's best interests and gives it special weight. The burden is on the grandparent to rebut that. The most common mistake we see parents make is litigating their own fitness when nobody had put it in issue.
Before you file — or respond — know what the law actually allows.
Tell us what has happened, what contact currently exists with the child, and whether anyone has already filed a petition. We can help you understand whether Indiana law provides a path forward, what burden applies, and what deserves attention next.
This page is general information about Indiana law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney–client relationship. Grandparent visitation is constrained by both statute and constitutional doctrine, and outcomes vary considerably by court and by facts. Statutes and case law change. Reviewed August 2026 against the 2026 edition of the Indiana Code. Attorney advertising.