When you enter into a Collaborative Law negotiation, you have a lawyer advocating on your behalf, and there's another lawyer advocating on the other party's behalf. Meetings involve you, the other party, and the respective lawyers, and the goal is to settle any outstanding issues outside of a courtroom setting. In the Collaborative Law process, the lawyers involved cannot go to court and litigate against each other or the parties. This accomplishes several things crucial to developing a … [Read more...]
Why Are Mental Health Professionals Part of the Collaborative Divorce Process?
If you visit the Collaborative Law Institute of Texas' website, you might notice that when looking up our members, mental health professionals are listed as well as lawyers. That portion of our member roster highlights something important about the collaborative law process: It's a process that has each participant's long-term well-being in concern. In divorce cases involving children, the parties involved typically don't stop interacting once the divorce is finalized, and the divorce doesn't … [Read more...]
Dividing the Family Business Without Destroying It
A nasty divorce resolved by a courthouse showdown can destroy the family, the family’s wealth and the family’s business. Sit down with any experienced family law trial lawyer, and he or she will be able to tell you war stories of courtroom shootouts where a warring family ended up destroying the very wealth they were trying to divide. The worst of these divorce war stories end with a business or personal bankruptcy, following a take no prisoners approach to a family’s divorce. There is a … [Read more...]
On Gay Marriage and Divorce in Texas
In the past week, Texas has unexpectedly become the epicenter for an interesting debate regarding gay marriage -- specifically, what happens when married same-sex couples want to divorce. In Judge Tena Callahan's view, a gay couple who was married in another state and now lives in Dallas has the right to get divorced. While the case brings up interesting issues around the Constitutionality of marriage bans and the growing number of states allowing for same-sex marriage, it also brings up a … [Read more...]
Child Custody Decisions
Divorce can be very difficult emotionally. Powerful feelings can get stirred up when discussing custody arrangements or a change in custody. Getting into a custody fight can be one of the most expensive, emotionally draining and destructive things someone can do. That’s true whether it is an initial custody determination or a subsequent modification or change of custody. A custody fight can be as damaging for the children as it is for the adults. For those who want a more civilized means of … [Read more...]
Is Collaborative Law Right for You?
Since Collaborative Law came to Texas in 2000, more and more people have heard about it and have used the process to resolve family law matters. As more lawyers, mental health professions and financial professionals have become involved in Collaborative Law, they are telling more and more potential clients about the new option that is available. People are also hearing about it from friends and discovering it on the Internet and occasionally in the news media. Because Collaborative Law is … [Read more...]
Myths About Collaborative Divorce
Although Collaborative Law can be considered a breath of fresh air in the legal system, it is still a relatively new process for resolving disputes in Texas. It’s not widely known, but more and more people are learning about it and requesting that it be used. As the public seeks to learn about the process, they sometimes encounter misinformation. To help them recognize the bad information, I will briefly mention some common misconceptions. These comments will refer primarily to divorces, but … [Read more...]
Helping Children Deal With the Grief of Divorce
Confronting the loss of the family system can be very difficult for children coping with divorce. Caring adults in these children’s lives may feel overwhelmed and helpless when faced with divorce and may feel unskilled in assisting children navigate this confusing time. These adults may want to help, but have no idea what to do. Being Supportive A grieving child needs supportive adult help to go through and complete the mourning process. Adults must take the initiative in offering help. The … [Read more...]
What Issues are Appropriate for Collaborative Law?
Many people think Collaborative Law is useful only in the easy cases where both parties are basically in agreement. They think that spouses or ex-spouses couldn't sit down together and have civilized negotiations on sensitive child custody or financial issues. Because couples sometimes get into arguments when they discuss emotional issues on their own, some think that Collaborative Law can't work in high conflict families or where there may have been infidelity or other misconduct. Actually, … [Read more...]
The Differences Between Collaboration and Litigation
One of the things we emphasize most in explaining Collaborative Law is that it's different from the traditional divorce process, which utilizes litigation. Here are some of what we call "process descriptors," which help establish the difference between litigation and Collaboration. In litigation: * Parties in disputes often feel intimidated, fearful, anxious, powerless, out gunned, and not in control. * The process is often focused on assigning blame or fault for problems. * The results … [Read more...]
