Anger is a normal feeling to have during a divorce. In fact, if you didn’t feel angry there would probably be something very wrong. Usually, one person has been unhappy for a period of time preceding the divorce.
Many people don’t know that about 98% of contested divorce and family court cases never appear before a judge in a trial and are settled by their attorneys out of court. The parties may meet the judge in a hearing or settlement conference (where you go into the judge’s chambers and get scolded for not reaching an agreement), but the judge will rarely, if ever, make decisions at time. For the most part, judges hate making decisions for families. Even though it's their job to do so, they can't give up hope that parents will find their higher selves and work out their issues around parenting. Most people prefer to make decisions for their kids rather than have a stranger in black robes tell them how to parent. After all, it doesn't matter to the judge if you want your kid to study ballet, play soccer, take piano, French or tennis lessons, but it probably matters quite a lot to you. Even around finances, which are thought to involve less emotion (though I question that) judges will want to defer to a divorce financial analyst or financial expert. The reality is that our court system is so backed up and slow to come to decisions, that attorneys at some point get real with each other and say 'look, you know what you're asking is not reasonable,’ and a compromise begins. As a trained mediator and collaborative attorney, I can be the first step, so your settlement negotiations involve focusing on your underlying interests and finding solutions that work for both of you and your kids.
Some couples who come to mediation are high conflict. No matter what they’re discussing, they take extreme positions. His position, he wants to pay zero. Her position, she wants 100. In many situations the cycle of fighting is covering underlying issues. All each person wants is for the other to understand their thoughts/needs/views. When we’re rigidly taking a stance unwilling to consider other options, negotiations are difficult, especially when children are involved. But people can change. One couple took a break from mediation as it was so full of conflict. When they returned, whenever the husband was argumentative, the wife would pause for a few seconds and then respond, not by telling him how wrong he was, but instead stating why she needed what she needed. After the session I asked her about this new behavior and she explained that she’d been learning how to self regulate. She knew their old way of communicating or not communicating, was hindering them moving forward, so decided to find a different way to deal with the situation. We were able to move forward with the mediation and they were each able to move into new chapters of their lives.
When people use the terms ‘sole custody’ or ‘joint custody’ what do they mean? I’ve found when people say they want sole custody, what they mean might not be what I mean, when using the term. In the context of a contested divorce, versus an uncontested divorce, they might mean they want their child to be with them full-time or they might be talking about who has the authority to make decisions about the child. There are two components of custody in New York: physical custody (also called residential custody), which is the schedule of the child for going back and forth between the parents’ homes (parenting time) and legal custody, which is the authority to make decisions for the child. Legal custody would apply only to major decisions that have long term effect on the child, such as religious education, choice of school and medical decisions. This wouldn’t apply to day-to-day decisions; Can I have a sleepover at Bo’s house on Saturday? Can I have candy after school? I had a case where the parents were fighting bitterly over sole custody. As it turned out no one had asked them what they meant by sole custody. One parent wanted the kids every other weekend because they were in middle school and high school and were busy all week with school and after-school activities. They wanted to be involved in making decisions. The other parent wanted the kids to spend weeknights in one home, to have consistent routines for getting ready for school, and every other weekend with each parent, and was happy for the co-parent to have sole decision making around medical questions, as they were a doctor, and shared decision making about everything else. It turned out that both parents could have what they wanted with sole custody.
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