Child Custody and Mediation: Perfect Together

For many of you who regularly read the Equitable Mediation Services blog, you’ve seen me write about the many benefits of mediation including a less stressful and more humane process, significant cost savings of $20,000 or more and better results for you and your children and now it seems that the Supreme Court of New Jersey agrees with my assessment.

In a landmark ruling, the Supreme Court has ruled that issues of child custody can be decided directly with the help of a New Jersey mediator and that parents who disagree on their parenting plan or child custody issues can circumvent the courts and go directly to mediation to resolve the issues surrounding the physical and legal custody of their children.  This is a tremendous development in that it puts even more power in the hands of divorcing couples to control the outcome of their divorce because after all, it is both of you and your children who have to live with the result.  Not the courts, not the judge and certainly not your attorney.  Instead of taking each other to court to fight over your children and spend tens of thousands of dollars in the process (which by the way would be better spent on their college education or family vacations) you can go directly to mediation without having spend countless hours in court, waiting, arguing and worst of all, spend all that money on both of your attorneys to probably just sit there with you in the hallway while it’s your turn in court.

When you work with a mediation service to resolve your child custody issues, you collaborate instead of litigate, you reduce the number of professionals involved in the discussions from two to one and in turn, greatly reduce the cost.  Best of all, you control the outcome.  You see mediation allows for creative solutions that a cookie cutter court approach may not allow for.  Attorneys are trained as advocates and they will represent whatever position you want them to but are they really going to pull you aside and tell you they don’t agree with your approach?  Are they really trained in coming up with creative solutions to your parenting plan issues or child custody issues or are they trained to argue the law and try to win on your behalf no matter what the financial or emotional cost?.  Let’s face it: going to court is a destructive process and one not in the best interest of anyone, especially the children.

Mediation on the other hand is collaborative.  We work together instead of fighting against each other.  We keep the conversations focused squarely on your children and not on what a bad parent the other person is.  We recognize that you both have rights as parents because after all you are mom and dad and the more time the children spend with each of you, the better of they will be. Facing up to the fact that you are the adults and your children need you to act like it is a difficult message to get across when you’re in open court with the public watching your battle in plain view, your attorneys yelling at each other and you sitting on opposite sides of the room.  Imagine if your kids saw all that, would they really think you love them or would they think “I could be spending time with my parents instead of sitting here watching them scream at each other.”

Is that really how you’d want your children to think about you?  Think about it and let me know.

If you have any questions about divorce mediation or how mediation can benefit you, please feel free to contact us to schedule a free, no-obligation consultation in one of our six central New Jersey office locations where we will take some time to get to know more about you and your situation and see if mediation is right for you.  Of if you’re simply not ready yet, feel free to visit the Equitable Mediation Services website where you’ll find lots of great information about parenting plans, equitable distribution, NJ child support and spousal support / alimony and contact us when you’re ready.  We look forward to helping you get through your divorce peacefully, efficiently and with as little stress on you and your family as possible.