Make Divorce Mediation NJ Work For You
June 30, 2011 by Joseph F Dillon · Comments Off
As a New Jersey divorce mediator, I wear multiple hats as divorce is a complex process encompassing legal, financial and emotional areas. With that in mind my reading list tends to be quite eclectic and can range from updates on NJ case law, housing market news or a self-help book on managing change. Today I read an interesting article entitled “Everyone Wants Better, No One Wants Change” and I got to thinking about how this post relates exactly to what some client couples go through during divorce mediation sessions.
In most divorce mediation NJ cases, there is one party that made the decision to divorce and while I can’t say they ever thought they would be sitting across from a New Jersey divorce mediator, there is a part of me that thinks they would drive the process a little more then they sometimes do. It seems they thought that somehow being divorced would be better than being married yet for some reason they don’t want to do what it takes to move the process forward. Is it they don’t want to acknowledge the failure of their marriage or they don’t have the emotional capacity to do what it takes to end things?
Most of the time it comes down to a general unwillingness to do what it takes to make it happen. As a New Jersey divorce mediator, I make it very clear to the couples sitting across from me what will be required of them in the form of discovery documentation, active participation in the divorce mediation NJ process and the review of various memoranda yet when it comes time to providing that documentation or giving feedback on that draft, there is silence, resistance or worse yet, hostility. Wasn’t it you who wanted this divorce? Didn’t I make it perfectly clear what was expected of you up front so there was no confusion? Did I not give you a complete list of everything I’d need and the date by which I’d need it by? Yet somehow there is confusion. Somehow there must be a better way, an easier way for us to get divorced without having to do all this work or read all this stuff.
As a New Jersey divorce mediator I can tell you there is a path forward which I will clearly lay out for you but you must be willing to do the work. If you think that the past 15 years of your married life will just get dissolved in an hour or two without you lifting a single finger, I have some bad news for you. But if you’re willing to actively participate in the divorce mediation NJ process and help design your own future, then things will go a lot smoother and with a little bit of effort and a lot of conversation and compromise, you’ll both leave the process far better off than if you hired an attorney or litigated. So before you pick up the phone to call me, remember: I’m counting on you just as much as you’re counting on me to help move things forward.
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Joseph Dillon is an Accredited Professional New Jersey divorce mediator and Managing Partner of Equitable Mediation Services a New Jersey divorce mediation practice with offices in: Morristown, Roseland (Livingston), Short Hills, Iselin (Metropark), Bedminster, Bridgewater, East Brunswick, Red Bank and Princeton. Mr. Dillon may be reached by calling (908) 864-2177.
Let’s Talk About Alimony
June 23, 2011 by Joseph F Dillon · Comments Off
One of the hardest conversation to have as a New Jersey divorce mediator is the one about alimony. It is the topic covered in divorce mediation sessions that no one likes to talk about. There are no formulas for calculating alimony, the payor doesn’t want to pay alimony and more often than not, the payee doesn’t want to receive alimony. Then there’s the “court of public opinion” that as a New Jersey divorce mediator I am always fighting against. I’m sure once you’ve told people you’re considering divorce mediation, you’ve heard the stories about someone’s friend, neighbor of relative who got [insert extremely unrealistic dollar figure here] in alimony and you shouldn’t settle for anything less. Or my personal favorite is this: “We don’t need to talk about it because I was on a website that helped me calculate how much alimony I am entitled to.” Calculated? Entitled? I think that website needs to be shut down…
The point is alimony is a conversation. It is not a formula, it is not intended to bankrupt one party while unduly enriching the other, it is not a penalty for being a bad spouse and it’s certainly not meant to be used as a weapon. You see alimony is not meant to be a substitute for self-reliance and cover 100% of your post-divorce mediation expenses. It is meant to help bring the parties’ post-divorce mediation lifestyle closer to each others, fully recognizing that each of your lifestyles will be lower than that while you were married. As part of the process in deciding to get divorced, on must think of all the downstream ramifications. Where are the children and I going to live, how am I going to save for retirement, what are we going to do with the house etc. But the one thing that I see time and time again get lost in the shuffle is the question of “how am I going to earn enough income so that I am not 100% reliant on alimony?” Even if you work part-time or take job training to start a new career, you must begin to think about how you can earn a living and make ends meet. Alimony usually has a duration and it’s not for as long as most people think. That means at some point in the future it’s going to end. Not today or tomorrow but sometime. Is the time to think about your career a month before your last alimony check is coming? No, it’s not. The time to think about it is the first day you start receiving it. By having a plan and being prepared for that day, you can make sure that when that day comes, you’re ready. Talk to a friend, talk to a career counselor or even a coach. By putting together a plan for a day that will eventually come, you’ll set yourself on a path to be financially solvent on your own terms and the sooner that happens, the better.
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Joseph Dillon is an Accredited Professional New Jersey divorce mediator and Managing Partner of Equitable Mediation Services a New Jersey divorce mediation practice with offices in: Morristown, Roseland (Livingston), Short Hills, Iselin (Metropark), Bedminster, Bridgewater, East Brunswick, Red Bank and Princeton. Mr. Dillon may be reached by calling (908) 864-2177.
Divorce Mediation NJ and College Costs
June 21, 2011 by Joseph F Dillon · Comments Off
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal spoke about the hidden cost of divorce and how children of divorce get less financial help with college costs even if their parents remarry. The article stated that those couples who remained married were able to take care of 77% of the tuition costs and gave their children about 8% of their total income towards college expenses while the divorced parents were able to manage to pay for 42% of the tuition and contribute about 6% of their incomes to college costs. With that in mind, it is critical as parents who are engaged in divorce mediation you remember your obligation to your children extends well beyond the years you were married and that with the help of a NJ divorce mediator, you put together a plan that is going to allow each of you to save as much as you can to help further your children’s education.
So why the disparity between married and divorce couples? Well for one, as any NJ divorce mediator will tell you it is more expensive to run two households than one so when it comes to life after divorce, you can expect each of your cost of living to increase while your standard of living will decrease. Also a factor is that if one or both of you gets remarried, you may decide to have children with your new spouse which in turns adds additional financial obligations to both your day-to-day living as well as potential college contributions. But there also seem to be some intangible factors at work which are difficult to quantify. Even divorced parents who remarry and whose family income rises or surpasses that of their previously married life still contribute less than their never-divorced peers, contributing 53% of the tuition and 5% of their income towards their needs. In cases where both parents remarry, as a NJ divorce mediator, I’ve seen an attitude of “let the other party take care of it” putting the child in the middle and shifting the burden to the other parent. I am no mental health professional but it’s not difficult to see how the hurt and anger that befell both parties carries forward even many years later. As adults, we need to step up and do the right thing regardless of what the Memorandum of Understanding of Property Settlement Agreement says and that is care for our children and give them every advantage we can in order to help them success and live well-adjusted lives. As a child of divorce myself, I’ve seen firsthand how the animosity between two people can spill over into a child’s life and impact them in ways neither party could ever have imagined. So when it comes to college costs, take it from me: do right by your children regardless of how the other party behaves because at the end of the day your children will know who took care of them, regardless of what you might think.
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Joseph Dillon is an Accredited Professional Divorce Mediator in NJ and Managing Partner of Equitable Mediation Services a New Jersey divorce mediation practice with offices in: Morristown, Roseland (Livingston), Short Hills, Iselin (Metropark), Bedminster, Bridgewater, East Brunswick, Red Bank and Princeton. Mr. Dillon may be reached by calling (908) 864-2177.
The research contained in the article was led by Ruth N. Lopez Turley, an associate professor of sociology at Rice University.
