Collaborative Divorce—

Spelling Divorce: ‘R-E-S-P-E-C-T’

By Nancy K. Crevier

Compassion. Empathy. Wisdom. Understanding. Reason. Satisfaction. They are not words usually associated with divorce, but the goal of Collaborative Divorce Team of Connecticut is to make those words ring true for divorcing couples.

Collaborative divorce is a new process in Connecticut in which a team of trained professionals made up of a financial specialist, divorce coaches, lawyers, and a child specialist if needed, work in a nonadversarial manner to help couple dissolve their marriages with dignity. Collaborative divorce provides out of court support and resolution for the many divorce issues that can become battlegrounds in court. By working as a team, experts are able to provide efficient aid to divorcing couples, hoping for a peaceful settlement that is fair to all and maintains the essence of the family, particularly when children are involved.

Collaborative divorce is substantially different from divorce mediation, said Bill Donaldson, a local financial planner who has undergone training and is a team member of regional Collaborative Divorce programs. “Mediation involves just one neutral facilitator to help a couple negotiate a divorce. In a collaborative case, the divorce parties aren’t sitting alone. They each have lawyers to guide them through the process. They have support present and they have received emotional support from divorce coaches outside of the meeting,” he explained.

What is critical in collaborative divorce, said Mr Donaldson, is that each of the parties must sign a collaborative agreement stating that they will not go to trial under any circumstance. “There is no option for a trial, and that changes the tone of the negotiations,” said Mr Donaldson. The penalty for withdrawing from the collaborative agreement is that all of the trained professionals withdraw from the case, none of the paperwork or professional statements is transferable, and the couple must start over. “If they don’t resolve the divorce in collaborative divorce, the cost of what they have spent is lost and they will incur all new costs plus court costs. It’s very expensive,” Mr Donaldson said.

It would seem that having to pay a team of professionals to navigate the waters of a divorce would be more costly, but that is not usually the case, Mr Donaldson said. “Collaborative divorce is more time efficient. There aren’t separate lawyers stalling or trying to get hold of each other,” he gave as an example of a benefit. In litigation, a lawyer from each side handles all legal, financial, and emotional issues, all at a higher legal fee. When a lawyer works with a collaborative team, the less costly financial planner and counselors are utilized to handle those specific issues, thus reducing the number of costly legal fees for which the divorcing couple would be charged.

Bill Donaldson first heard of collaborative divorce when going through training to become a financial divorce analyst. “I learned about the various divorce options and collaborative divorce seemed so logical. It makes sense to have experts in each area working together.” Having done divorce mediation, he knew that powerful emotions could get in the way of making decisions in a divorce. In January 2005, Mr Donaldson underwent collaborative divorce training in Phoenix, Ariz. “I want to be involved in this program. I think it is the divorce process that makes the most sense in dealing with divorce and families.”

Litigation Can Be Destructive

A former Connecticut State Trooper and a divorcé himself, Mr Donaldson has dealt with family issues and knows how court litigation tears families apart. “The divorce system is broken the way it is. Collaborative divorce focuses on keeping families working together, not driving them apart, or making them adversarial,” he said. “I guess I have always been involved in mediating to some extent, and collaborative divorce is a process that brings all of my work skills together.”

Being part of a team that shares information can help him to better guide clients as they try to reach resolution in financial issues of divorce. Working together with lawyers and counselors helps diffuse the many emotional situations that come up, he said. “The couple is actually less apt to get emotionally charged at the meeting with me because they have been meeting with a counselor prior to this meeting. The other great part is that there is a lawyer present to handle legal questions that come up. On my own, I can’t do that,” Mr Donaldson said.

He appreciates that with the collaborative divorce process each issue is addressed by the proper professional.

Financial issues are responsible for a lot of divorces, said Mr Donaldson, and if he can be a part of helping to get through addressing present and future financial needs, debt consolidation, the issues of joint credit cards and bank accounts, cash flow, health insurance and the tax consequences of divorce without a build up of animosity between the divorcing couple, he feels he has succeeded. Collaborative divorce, he said, is an excellent process to do just that.

“I’ve been practicing law for 22 years and I don’t even practice litigation divorce anymore,” said Lisa Cappalli, another collaborative divorce team member from Waterbury. “As a lawyer, collaborative divorce gives me tremendous satisfaction. I can still be a lawyer for someone, but in such a positive way.”

Whether opting for collaborative divorce, mediation, or litigation, there are certain steps required to obtain a divorce in Connecticut, Ms Cappalli explained. Divorce always involves a lawsuit, with a plaintiff and a defendant. Papers must be served. If children are involved, a six-hour mandatory parenting course must be taken. Every divorce results in a final hearing, but with collaborative divorce or mediation, when spouses go to court they already have an agreement and the judge often rules on it in just 10 or 15 minutes. Litigation can mean several trips to the courthouse. “When you litigate, the spouses control nothing; the court and the lawyers do. The spouses don’t control the process or the substance.”

It is the fact that the husband and wife control the timing and final agreement that results in a divorce that is respectful and creative with collaborative divorce, said Ms Cappalli. “These are concepts that keep animosity limited. Confusion and misunderstanding is avoided because the couple controls the outcome.”

Not For Everyone

Despite her high praise and commitment to the collaborative divorce process, Ms Cappalli said that there are cases in which the process is not the best option. “If you have a spouse whose sole objective is to ‘get’ the other one, clearly they are not able to commit to the collaborative process,” she said. It does not mean that all who choose the collaborative divorce process are friends, by any means, she said. “They don’t have to get along well, they can even hate each other, but they have agreed to be respectful to come to an agreement, and this is when it works,” said Ms Cappalli.

Collaborative divorce presents some challenges for lawyers, said Ms Cappalli. The collaborative divorce agreement demands full disclosure of information from all involved. But even so, there is still the lawyer/client privilege. “We are still prohibited from discussing anything with the team that a client requests we withhold,” she said. It is rare, but should a client insist that the lawyer not disclose information that the lawyer deems pertinent to the team, the lawyer must withdraw from the case. As with client withdrawal from the agreement, this sends the process back to square one, and can be costly.

Overall, though, Ms Cappalli finds collaboration to be a “far superior” choice to litigation or mediation for anyone who must seek a divorce. “When the team model works really well, there is so much more value to the client,” she said.

Patient/doctor confidentiality would be an issue for psychotherapists in this process, said Dr Thomas Condon, a clinical psychologist practicing in Brookfield and a member of the Greater Danbury Chapter Collaborative Divorce team, were it not for the critical difference between acting as a therapist and acting as a divorce counselor. “Psychotherapy would be about facilitating a behavioral change for an individual. The divorce coach role in collaborative divorce is to help make more efficient the divorce process for everybody involved, including the children,” he explained. Therapeutic things may happen in meeting with people involved in collaborative divorce, but he is not providing therapy.

What Dr Condon finds appealing about being a part of a collaborative divorce team are the benefits he sees to children in a divorce situation.

“Having worked with a lot of children and teenagers, I have seen children decimated by traditional litigation divorce, and I have seen parents who just wanted to get through the divorce and instead they end up in warfare. When Bill Donaldson contacted me and I learned more about collaborative divorce, I was very excited about being part of this. It put children first and most parents going through divorce want that. Parents want to be better co-parents for the next 20 years.”

Being able to utilize his skills as a mediator and work in a team situation to assist divorcing couples, especially those with children, to find a way to the best interests of everyone is extremely gratifying to Dr Condon.

Complicated Emotional Issues

Connecticut does mandate a program for divorcing couples with children, but it is very general, said Dr Condon. With collaborative divorce, his input is available to help determine the logistical nuts and bolts of day-to-day postdivorce parenting in a nonadversarial situation, resulting in the childrens’ needs being put ahead of the adults’ own needs.

Parents may not even be aware of the distress children are undergoing when divorce looms, he said, and having a coach who has met with parents and children can aid everyone on the team to understand enough of each situation to pursue the best interests of the family.

There are many intense, emotional issues with which couples going through divorce must wrestle, and having a coach makes it possible for emotional information to be used to better proceed in the divorce process. “Grief and loss are the big issues that come up for adults,” said Dr Condon. “It is rare that both adults are evolving in the relationship at the same time, meaning that one may be ready for divorce before the other,” he said.

With children, emotional issues surrounding divorce are more complicated. “Children experience stress. Their security is challenged; there is anxiety, guilt, and fear. And all of these are processed through different developmental lenses, differing by age,” Dr Condon said.

What divorce coaches offer, said Dr Condon, are skills that can be used to provide a more competent parenting team or amicable divorce between two people. And that, he said, is not something commonly seen in divorce litigation.

Every now and then, collaborative divorce does not work — in a positive way. A Shelton resident, who preferred to remain anonymous, had the unconventional result in that he and his wife ended up reconciling after beginning the collaborative divorce process.

“We had come to a point in our marriage when we weren’t getting what we needed from marriage. We saw a divorce workshop advertised in a local paper and it was there that we heard about collaborative divorce,” said J.W. The couple met with lawyers who were part of a collaborative team, met with coaches, and as parents of two children, met with a child advocate counselor.

“That was the turning point. Once we met with the child expert, we realized the impact divorce would have on the children. And we realized we had not tried everything we could to save our marriage,” said J.W.

The couple opted to undergo therapy outside the collaborative team and realized they did not want to go down the path of divorce.

“In the traditional divorce method, I think, you hire a lawyer, the other person hires a lawyer, and you go to battle. Collaborative divorce never steers you down that path. I think if we had gone to litigation, we would be divorced now. The money we spent on the collaborative divorce team was well spent. We didn’t rip apart our family,” J.W. said.

Most couples will not reconcile, whether they choose mediation, collaborative efforts, or litigation, said these experts, but they are committed to the idea that divorce can happen in an environment that is less emotionally charged, less expensive, less time-consuming, and that can achieve positive results for all involved.

To find out more about collaborative divorce, visit collaborativedivorceteamct.com. “We’re all here to help,” said Dr Condon.