Family Collaborative Law

It’s important to get legal advice in the period between the decision to separate and the actual separation.  Lots of mistakes are made by relying on the experiences of friends and relatives who may consider themselves experts on divorce.  Every situation is unique and must be addressed on its own set of facts.  Find a lawyer who is experienced and expect to pay for an hour consultation.  The “free” initial appointment some lawyers advertise  usually is limited to 10-15 minutes and is certainly not sufficient to understand the specifics of your situation.  Most experienced divorce lawyers do not offer a free consultation as they know how important it is to make the first appointment count.

If the parties have children, one of the worst things to do is to try to get them to side with one parent or the other.  Parental alienation is one of the factors a court will consider when it comes to a final award of custody.  It is always in the best interest of the children for the parents to talk to the children together about what is going on, assuring them that they both love them and will continue to have a family, just a family with a different structure.  Getting an appointment for both parents with a good child-oriented mental health professional will in the end benefit the whole family.

In the absence of legal advice is, if there is concern about the availability of funds, one party may be tempted to drain all the existing joint accounts and put all the funds in a separate account.  While it might be prudent to take some money out of a jointly held account and start a separate one, it would be unwise to drain all accounts.  Even though  perfectly legal, it would be extremely adversarial and might push the parties into court before there was an attempt to settle matters out of court. Continue reading →