The most important cost, of course, goes way beyond money. Life events stress test consistently rank divorce second after the death of a spouse or child, as the most powerful loss one can experience. The emotional and psychological impact of a divorce creates anxiety, fear and stress and causes us to behave in ways we ordinarily would not. We all react in different ways, some striking out, some paralyzed and unable to act.

As difficult as divorce is for spouses, most of the powerful negative emotions experienced by parents are passed onto their children, who become confused, frightened and shaken. How children are told about the divorce is critical. Monitoring their emotional process before, during and after the divorce will help ensure their healthy adjustment through this period. Moreover each child's ability to form and maintain meaningful relationships throughout life will be impacted by the way each parent handles the divorce process.

DIVORCE CAN BE DONE RIGHT!
Of course you are concerned about the financial cost of divorce. You are worried about starting over, supporting yourself and your children. You would prefer to save your money for your children's college education, your retirement, the nest-egg for the new roof on the house, or a real estate deposit. You do not want to start over penniless.

There are three basic routes through the divorce process:

The Adversarial Litigation Process
In this process each party hires an individual lawyer to represent them. The lawyers make document requests, file motions, attend court if necessary and negotiate the various aspects of your divorce terms with each other. If agreement is not reached the court will schedule the matter for the Special Masters, a special court mediation program where two attorneys with expertise in family law meet with the parties and/or lawyers between 15 - 30 minutes and make a recommendation to the parties. If there is still disagreement the parties and lawyers go to court for a pretrial where the lawyers meet with a judge who will make a recommendation. Finally, if there is no settlement the court will schedule a trial. This process will generally take a minimum of one year.

Collaborative Process
In the Collaborative Process each party hires an individual lawyer to represent them throughout the process. Each spouse works individually with his or her own lawyer, and all settlement conferences are attended by the parties and both lawyers. The parties and their lawyers sign an agreement that they will work out all of the terms of the divorce without court involvement. Should the process break down the collaborative lawyers are not permitted to work further on the matter and each party must retain a new lawyer to represent them in the adversarial court process. This process is generally less costly than the adversarial process, with an average cost of between $20,000 - $30,000, per couple.

Mediation
Mediation is significantly less expensive than the other options and tends to cost approximately one-quarter of the adversarial process, with average costs being between $5,000 and $15,000, per couple, depending upon the complexity. Skilled mediators help the parties to have productive conversations about the changes necessitated by this transition, guarding against possible power imbalances in the relationship. The entire court process, all paperwork and the final agreement are handled by the attorney-mediator. Like the other processes, each party is encouraged to have the agreement reviewed by an individual family attorney before finalizing the divorce, a very limited role which generally takes between one and three hours.

A Free Initial Consultation
To help you decide if mediation is right for you, we offer an initial consultation at no cost to you. In that session we will explain our mediation process. During this time you are able to get a sense of how we work to determine if you would like to work with us. Because mediation is a process where couples make their own decisions, both parties must attend the initial consultation and all mediation sessions.