I just had a very rough , rough divorce,my x husband & I have joint custody ,Im residential parent... however,he isn't practicing his rights to see our children (12 & 14 yrs old),he pays child support on time but says he is moving out of state to start a new job in his home town, what are the legal issues that I need to be aware of to protect myself,is this considered to be child abandonment? Thank you

It depends on your state. From my knowledge, most states consider a parent not seeing a child for at least 5 years as abandonment, however there are some that have different laws. You'll need to contact your local court house (or your lawyer if you have one) and get clarification on the laws.
Just because he's moving out of state does not make it abandonment. There are many people who do the bi-coastal custody thing, where one parent has them 6 months, the other has them the rest of the year.
Abandonment is often defined as not paying for child support, and not seeing or contacting the child for a specific amount of time (again determined by each states laws).
Hope this helps,

There is nothing you do to protect yourself, He may ask to have the child visit schedule modified to work with being out of state. But his contact is often considered his sending the check, he has not abandoned the child, since he is paying his support.

But it is normally a issue used in divorce if one party just left, and/or if the parent just left the child at the mall or on the side of the road.

Also seldom will they take away any rights if the parent does not see the child or even if they don't pay child support..

So basically what are you wanting to protect yourself from?

As noted he may want longer visits in the summer and so on