Relationship Mediation is the natural next step if counselling doesn’t succeed at improving your relationship.
When your relationship is really over, there are still so many things to negotiate – most importantly care of the children, and how you are going to provide for them financially. No matter whether you go to the Family Court self-represented or employ lawyers, the outcome will be the same. The first step that you will have to undergo, is a mediation type of process before the Family Court will allow the traumatic, costly and mostly damaging litigation process to begin. The Family Court is overloaded and tries to encourage more amicable resolution of decisions to minimise the trauma and relationship deterioration. Their main focus is the needs of the children. If you spend alot of money on lawyers, this reduces your financial resources to provide as well as possible for the children.
The same counsellor can help you through this process
A number of couples have continued their appointments with me to sort through these issues in a respectful and cooperative manner. Rather than “upping the anti”; using the counselling processes allows each party to be heard in a respectful way – which is so important to healing after a relationship breakdown. Using a lawyer to vent your anger, hurt and frustration only increases these feelings; and most people end up feeling even worse by proceeding through this process.
Not ready to deal with property settlement yet?
Usually one party is very anxious to settle the family assets; and the other is not.
There are two ways to deal with this – with the same outcome!
- Respectfully, give the one needing time some space and time to gather themself together, and then achieve the most amicable resolution; or
- Pursue litigation, and find the other digs their heels in, procrastinates, adjourns, and eventually all family members are more bruised and battered – AND recieve less money each because so much money has been spent on legal costs. Usually this option takes much longer.