Collaborative Approaches Promote Child-Centered Divorce

Conventional Options to Address Concerns in Child Custody are Often Insufficient.

Collaborative divorce may facilitate a child-centered divorce (especially when parents have fitness concerns). Sometimes, during a free initial consultation with a potential client, I hear, "Sure, co-parenting is best, but my partner can't co-parent. They have a problem with drugs or they have an issue with alcohol or they have a mental illness that makes them unfit." What choice does this parent have to protect the child?  Try to get an emergency order after a 15 or 30 minute emergency hearing?  File a contested custody case and request that a lawyer be selected by the judge to meet the children, review evidence, and report to the judge?  Engage in a lengthy, sometimes multi-year process to try to get limits on the other parent's ability to have access to the child. And then, once getting a decision, prepare for the appeal and then the subsequent requests to modify the order?

There is another way! An option that might address matters when one parent has concerns about the fitness of the other is collaborative divorce. In collaborative divorce, the parties agree to participate in a process outside the courtroom involving experts at many levels. The process includes a series of meetings between the parties, their lawyers, and additional experts to help them create a parenting plan that will protect the children.

Collaborative divorce provides a team to address concerns about child safety during a divorce.

The professionals involved will include a conflict coach or coaches in many situations with significant conflict between the parties. The conflict coach is a trained mental health professional who works with the parents to address how to contain the conflict to minimize the impact on the resolution process and the outcome for the child. For example, suppose one parent is angry at the other over infidelity and can't stand to be in the same room with the other. In that case, the conflict coach may help find ways to address that anger and create ways to be nonetheless able to collaborate on a child-beneficial outcome. Sometimes, the collaborative divorce team will include two conflict coaches, one for each of the parents, and will meet with them separately and together to help create the best process for the family.

Collaborative divorce includes another team member that I find essential when a parent has a concern about the fitness of the other: a child specialist. This mental health professional has been specially trained to work with children who have parents who are divorcing. Bear in mind that these mental health professionals, both the coaches and the child specialist, are NOT going to provide therapy. The coaches are here to get the parties through the process, and the child specialist is there to learn about the children, what's going on,  and help the parents make decisions that will address all safety concerns.

When a parent is concerned about the other parent’s fitness, a collaborative divorce may be a good option.

For example, suppose parents are divorcing, and one parent has been diagnosed with severe depression but has been receiving treatment and seems to be doing pretty well. However, the other parent has seen that parent at their worst and is afraid of what will happen when they are living in separate residences. The child specialist may review records and talk with the parents and the team. Then, with the help of the specialist, the entire team will identify specific factors to watch for to ensure that the children are well cared for. They may create a safety plan that will include sufficient provisions the parents agree to so that the whole family feels safe. A similar process has been used in some of my cases where parents have concerns about the recreational use of drugs or excessive use of alcohol. Back when I litigated cases, we would address the issue of excessive use of alcohol by including a provision in the parenting plan that said no one should consume excessive (or any alcohol) during custodial time. However, that was difficult to enforce and usually did not give the other parent a sense of security. So, in collaboration, we often add provisions that are unique to each family to help monitor the use of alcohol in the home. For example, one parent might sign a release so that the other has access to medical or employment records. The parents might agree that there can't be any alcohol in the home. It will depend on each family, but having an open discourse and working to be sure that everyone feels like the children are safe in both homes is central to everything.

In conclusion, the team-based approach provides greater disclosures, more professional help, and wider options in addressing parent fitness and safety issues.  Perhaps one of the greatest benefits is the help of the child specialist. In my next post, I will further discuss collaborative divorce and explain the difference when parents have a safety or fitness concern between working with a child specialist and with a guardian ad litem.