## Facts

- Mark K. Sterbling (father) and Susan K. Sterbling, now known as Susan K. Berry (mother), ended their marriage by dissolution in 1979.
- The dissolution decree incorporated a separation agreement awarding custody of the parties’ young daughter to the mother and granting the father reasonable visitation.
- After years of post-decree conflict, the mother remarried and moved in 1985 from Kentucky to Ohio due to her new husband’s job change, increasing the travel required for visitation.
- On November 6, 1985, the parties entered an agreed court order setting a detailed visitation schedule (including weekends, holidays, summer, and telephone visitation) and requiring each parent to pay one-half of the child’s unreimbursed “medical, optical, dental, orthodontic, and prescription” expenses.
- Approximately one week later, the father moved to hold the mother in contempt for interfering with visitation and requested increased visitation.
- The mother responded by asserting the father had not paid one-half of the child’s psychological evaluation and counseling and asked the court to require the father to obtain counseling before visitation continued.
- A referee held a hearing at which the child’s psychologist testified that increased visitation should not occur until the father-daughter relationship improved through counseling, and that changes should be gradual.
- The referee recommended: no increase in visitation (but allowing make-up time for missed visits), no requirement that the father attend counseling as a condition of visitation (though counseling was encouraged), no order requiring the father to pay for the child’s counseling as a reimbursable “medical” expense, and an order requiring the mother to share transportation by picking the child up at the father’s home after visitation.
- The mother objected. The trial court overruled the objections except on counseling costs, ruling that psychological counseling qualified as a “medical” expense under the agreed entry and ordering the father to pay one-half of the unreimbursed counseling costs. The trial court otherwise adopted the referee’s recommendations.
- The father appealed the counseling-expense ruling; the mother cross-appealed the refusal to condition visitation on the father’s counseling and the transportation allocation.

## Issues

1. Whether the trial court erred by construing the parties’ agreement to share the child’s unreimbursed “medical” expenses to include psychological counseling, requiring the father to pay one-half of those costs.
2. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by continuing the father’s visitation without making his counseling a prerequisite, despite testimony that counseling would improve the father-child relationship.
3. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by ordering the mother to share transportation responsibilities for visitation by picking up the child at the father’s residence after visits.

## Decision

- The appellate court affirmed the trial court’s judgment in full.
- The court held it was reasonable to treat the child’s psychological counseling as a “medical” expense under the parties’ agreed entry and to require the father to pay one-half of the unreimbursed cost.
- The court held the trial court did not abuse its discretion by declining to condition the father’s visitation on his completing counseling, where the record did not show that continued reasonable visitation would harm the child.
- The court held the trial court did not abuse its discretion by requiring the mother to share transportation responsibilities, given the circumstances (including the increased travel resulting from the mother’s relocation).

## Legal Principles

- Where parents agree to share a child’s “medical expenses,” a trial court may reasonably interpret that term to include psychological treatment and counseling when the services address the child’s emotional problems connected to parental conflict.
- A noncustodial parent’s visitation is generally treated as a natural right; courts should restrict or deny visitation only in extraordinary circumstances, including a showing that visitation would harm the child.
- Decisions about visitation conditions and logistics are committed to the trial court’s discretion and are reviewed for abuse of discretion (i.e., whether the decision was unreasonable, arbitrary, or unconscionable).
- A trial court may rely on psychological testimony in setting visitation terms, while still retaining authority to decide whether counseling will be encouraged or required as a condition of visitation.
- Transportation obligations tied to visitation may be allocated equitably between parents, especially when changed circumstances (such as a move) increase the travel burden.

## Conclusion

Sterbling v. Sterbling affirmed a post-decree order that (1) required each parent to pay one-half of the child’s unreimbursed psychological counseling expenses under an agreed provision for shared “medical expenses,” (2) continued the father’s reasonable visitation without mandating his counseling as a precondition absent proof that visitation would harm the child, and (3) required the mother to share transportation responsibilities after her relocation increased the travel demands for visitation.


Sterbling v. Sterbling, 519 N.E.2d 673 (1987)