Divorce Warrior: Post-Apocalypse Survival Tips

(This article also appears on Huffington Post.)

You’ve made it through to the other side. Both you and your spouse signed the settlement agreement – it’s got those fancy notary stamps, and every page of every copy was properly initialed. The judge signed the final order or judgment, and the county clerk stamped it. Everything’s official.

That darn agreement took months, maybe years to negotiate and finalize. The court papers? They followed what feels like a lifetime of anguish. Yet, after all that, you’re not completely sure you know what you need to do next. The agreement is longer than The Bible, and full of legal gibberish. The court papers have the same problem.

You think of asking your lawyer to distill everything to its comprehensible essence, except you don’t want to prolong that relationship or add to the already ridiculously high legal fees, right?

I can’t say I blame you.

But after enduring and surviving the nightmare (see my recent blog post, Divorce Warrior Survival Tips, also published on HuffPo), you do not want to run the risk of violating what cost so much money, so much heartache, and so much energy to finalize. Your head might reeling, but it’s still on your neck. So let’s keep it there, okay?

Here are ways to sort through the mess, before you heave those nasty papers into your bottom drawer:

Parenting Time

Enter the days and times in your computer/phone calendar as far out as you can.

If you’re not a techie, buy a five-year planner and manually enter the dates.

The dates should include all ‘notify by’ dates.

Try color-coding your time versus your spouse’s/partner’s.

Include important school and camp dates as soon as they’re available (e.g., teacher conferences, plays, due dates for forms, parent events, etc.).

Forms

List every form that still needs to be exchanged, now or in the future.

Those could include medical information forms, educational and camp forms, passports, changes of address, insurance, and estate documents.

Notification Information

List all necessary addresses, telephone numbers and email contacts.

Those may include third parties like doctors, therapists, court officials, accountants, real estate brokers, and financial institutions.

Asset Transfers

Use your calendar to enter when and what remains to be done.

This could include dividing your bank accounts, notifying the human resources department about your pension and insurance information, advising account representatives to change the name on your accounts, working with your real estate broker to list your home, moving your personal property to the agreed-upon location, signing tax returns and tax refund checks, placing orders to exercise stock options, and paying or receiving funds.

Support

Calendar/list the amount of spousal support to be paid, specifying the starting and ending dates.

Same for child support.

Same for tuition, extra-curriculars and camp.

Note the percentages to be paid or received for medical, dental and professional fees.

*You may be unhappy with the award or agreement – in fact, it could infuriate you -- but until it’s changed by court order or agreement, it is binding.

The above is by no means comprehensive, but I hope it provides useful ideas for regaining control over your life.

Your agreement or decree is complicated -- I confess that most of mine have been guilty of both complexity and length. Lawyers on both sides of your case probably insisted on language, or litigated issues, that may still seem ridiculous to you; indeed, they may have been, although only those in the trenches of your case can opine on that.

But you’re done now. Really, you are. Don’t go back if you can help it. Your sanity -- what’s left of it -- depends on it, along with your remaining miniscule funds, and the two or three people who are still speaking to you. If your ex forces your case back to the lawyers and the courts, at least you’ll have a better handle on the results of Round One…

If all this is too overwhelming, you may well need to hold your nose and yank out your checkbook (again), to ask your lawyer or other professional for help in organizing the life ahead of you.

And then? Breathe, and live.

When I Say I'm A Divorce Lawyer

Gloves off.

These are the reactions I get when I tell people I'm a divorce lawyer:

1. Shudders and disdain: Usually that's the response from my corporate brethren and sistern, you know, the tax lawyers, commercial litigators, mergers & acquisitions specialists, intellectual property gurus -- virtually all lawyers except personal injury and criminal lawyers. Because their rep (that of the PI and criminal bar) is as bad as ours, maybe worse. They get down and dirty, too, just like we do: Sex, drugs, violence...  : )

2. Pity: Usually from the corporate crew. Because they assume divorce lawyers are too stupid to go into the more high-falutin' areas of the law. Revealing I'm a Georgetown Law alum, and a former Morgan, Lewis & Bockius lawyer, usually shuts that one down fairly quickly. Along with asking the M&A lawyer if s/he knows what a QDRO is. See, most other specialities don't realize that matrimonial law requires a breadth of knowledge. In order to be any good at it, we need to know a lot about contracts, tax, real property, pensions, and estate law. As well as how to get down and dirty, of course. ; )

3. Requests for advice: Because everybody has either had a divorce, or post-divorce issues, or their brother or sister or cousin or best friend is in a pickle. And I'm, like, do I really want to give free advice on a case I know absolutely nothing about, second-guessing the lawyers in the trenches? On the other hand, can I stop myself from butting in and pontificating? Sigh.

4. TMI: That's short for 'too much information.'  A whoosh of disclosures about the person's personal life comes flying at me. It's as if I were sitting next to a stranger on a plane who has to unload on somebody and that somebody is lucky me. It usually takes me a good fifteen minutes to extricate myself. I don't want to be rude, ya know? And the thing is, the person is usually not a stranger. So repeat encounters and additional disclosures are likely. I learned a long time ago: It comes with the territory.

5. Hostility: Okay, I saved this for last because it crosses age, gender, religion, race, occupation and socio-economics. And how can I respond when I'm barraged with what creeps divorce lawyers are?How we should be ejected from the planet, or banished to the swamps of Borneo without mosquito nets? I AGREE. Because if it weren't for the damn dabblers out there - the lawyers who toss 'divorce' on their list of practice areas (along with traffic tickets, wills, worker's comp, accidents, house closings, bankruptcy and criminal defense) on their website or on those paper placements in the local diner - the world would be a better place. My internist shouldn't attempt brain surgery. Not that divorce lawyers are the equivalent of neurosurgeons, but you get my drift. Dabblers make me soooo mad. Grrrr.

Being a divorce lawyer was my choice. No one forced me into it, and honestly? It has had more than its fair share of stressors and hassles.

But it has also been intensely gratifying. Like helping someone move on with his/her life to a far more positive place; getting kids to live with the parent who is providing them with a stable, safe home and learning, years later, that the kids are now successful and happy adults; unraveling the mess in someone's life efficiently and with a minimum of anger; cleaning up a post-divorce disaster so there's no room for future uncertainty; closing a deal that provides financial security and logical parenting arrangements in a nice, tight  agreement...

Granted, the good moments occur less frequently than the grueling ones, but when they do? Ain't nothin' like it.

The Confusion About Separation Agreements

Been so busy polishing my novel, Client Relations (coming along nicely, I think, I hope), that I've been neglectful of B to C.

I'm thinking of doing another HuffPo entry on separation agreements - how they're really negotiated, how they're really written. It seems many people mistakenly think we use simple forms all the time - bless those Legal Zoom people, they REALLY know what they're doing (right), including fill-in-the-blank form separation agreements.

NOT.

Anyway, while I pull the energy together for that article, which I'll post here, of course, I thought I'd re-post a related item that I wrote early on in the life of B to C last year.

And I wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!

***

Eight Emotions During and After The 'Closing'
In no particular order:

1. Exhaustion (from: negotiations, legal fees, pressure from spouse and family, emotional turmoil)
2. Relief (because the parentheticals in #1 are over)
3. Anxiety (about: financial future, ability to survive and bounce back emotionally, children where applicable)
4. Anger (i.e., why the hell did s/he have to put me/us through this?)
5. Sadness (about: the end of the marital relationship or the strains placed on it)
6. Guilt (that the relationship required a formal agreement in the first place)
7. Joy (that the parentheticals in #1 are over)
8. Emptiness

Girl Lawyer and Fathers' Rights Advocate

When I was in my 20's, my father used to call me a "girl-lawyer" just to see if he could get a rise out of me, which, of course, he did. By the time I was in my 30's, cranking out the hours at BigLaw, the ranks of women lawyers had swelled so much no one paid much attention to gender - except for the proverbial "glass ceiling." And after I'd been a divorce lawyer for roughly a decade, I'd grown tired of being asked by men if it was "better" for them to hire a woman lawyer; I'd also grown accustomed to women who were clearly more comfortable confiding in a female lawyer, while others were happier to be represented by more testosterone than I'd ever have.

Then I found myself tossed onto a few websites, defining me as a fathers' rights advocate. I had some women calling me a woman-hater, and some men saying, yeah, Terri gets it, unlike all those feminist b****s.

Okay, let me set the record straight.

First, I suppose I am something of a feminist, if that's what you call a woman who firmly believes woman and men have the same rights to citizenship, educational and career opportunities, personal choices, etc. I hardly consider that an extreme position. I was raised on the notion that girls could do anything boys did, and I focused on getting a kick-ass education so that I could, in fact, do whatever I wanted. (Being a divorce lawyer wasn't my childhood dream, though, in all honesty...) As a teenager, my views were shaped, reinforced and supported at my all-girls' high school, where I'm pleased to say Sen. Gillibrand (class of '84) is returning to give the commencement address this weekend.

Second, I have, in fact, won many bitter custody battles for male clients, where the kids ended up living with their fathers. Translation: I have represented men who were, I believe, deprived or about be to deprived of access to their kids, to the severe detriment of the kids. And in those cases, the judge agreed with our presentation of the evidence that the father provided the better living environment for the kids for a variety of reasons, usually centering around emotional/psychiatric issues.

Third, I have negotiated many deals (lost count a long time ago) for male clients, where the terms included shared parenting (decision-making and access time) between both moms and dads. In those cases, both parties agreed that the kids would live fuller, happier and better lives, and receive the maximum emotional, educational and personal advantage by having significant access to both their parents.

Fourth, I've done the same thing for female clients over the years. I've also helped - dads, don't gasp - women to relocate with the kids, where courts have accepted the evidence presented that the kids would thrive in that new place with their mom. That the move was not being done to punish the dad, that the move was reasonable and necessary, that adjustments during weekends, vacations and summers could accommodate the need for parenting time with the dad, etc. etc.

Fifth, I loathe beyond words the abuse of legal process, the gamesmanship and the bull***t that preludes and accompanies most custody battles. It happens on both sides - men and women. The way people drag friends and family in to take sides against their spouse, the PR (formal, when it's a high-profile matter, and informal, where people notify their surrounding communities of their private issues). The way people, mostly women - sorry, that's been my experience, ladies - obtain bogus ex parte orders to throw their spouses out of the house and cut off all access to the kids. How child protective service agencies get contacted - again, mostly by the women, in my experience, to bust into homes and grill often-clueless kids about their parents' manner of showing affection. How one or both parents are so fixated on hating the other that they ignore the radioactive damage they're inflicting on their hapless, helpless kids.

So does all this make this "girl" (not so much now, at my age) lawyer a fathers' rights advocate? No. The concept of furthering the rights of one gender over another is an anathema to everything I believe in. I never saw any of my custody cases as a battle between the sexes. To me, it's been a battle between parents - my client (whom I believed in and advocated for as the better, more nurturing parent) and the opposing party - with the ultimate goal of doing the best thing for the kids rather than assuaging the ego of the father or the mother. And if my client - man or woman - was more interested in his/her ego than what was best for the kids, I wouldn't be representing him/her.

Eight Emotions During and After The 'Closing'

In no particular order:

1. Exhaustion (from: negotiations, legal fees, pressure from spouse and family, emotional turmoil)
2. Relief (because the parentheticals in #1 are over)
3. Anxiety (about: financial future, ability to survive and bounce back emotionally, children where applicable)
4. Anger (i.e., why the hell did s/he have to put me/us through this?)
5. Sadness (about: the end of the marital relationship or the strains placed on it)
6. Guilt (that the relationship required a formal agreement in the first place)
7. Joy (that the parentheticals in #1 are over)
8. Emptiness