It’s common to think of divorce in terms of litigation, which often means conflict, court dates, hard feelings, and a great deal of money. There’s also mediation, which still tends to focus on there being a “winner” and a “loser.” However, there’s another option that many people might be unfamiliar with collaborative divorce, a process which avoids the court system entirely.
Collaborative divorce was introduced by Minnesota lawyer Stu Webb in 1990, and the Uniform Collaborative Law Act was adopted in Washington State in 2013, but lawyers who use it are still trying to spread the word about it.
“We know people can hire lawyers and go to court,” says Leslie Garrison of Schwarz-Garrison Law Firm in Bellingham, who works in family law. “We know parties can go to mediation, but people just aren’t aware of what collaborative divorce is or what that model looks like.”
Photograph courtesy of Leslie Garrison
The basics of collaborative divorce include a written agreement between all lawyers and clients to stay out of court (including a “disqualification clause” for the current lawyers if the case does go to court—which means both parties will need to hire new attorneys), the use of good-faith negotiation, and the employment of neutral experts.
In a collaborative divorce, both parties still have lawyers, but because of the participation agreement everyone involved can speak freely without the worry that what they say will be used against them in court. The agreement also lays down what Garrison calls “aspirational ground rules.”
“We’re asking a lot,” she says. “Sometimes we’re asking parties to behave towards each other in a way they haven’t been able to in their marriage.”
One of the biggest benefits of the collaborative process is the building of a neutral support team made up of coaches and specialists who are hired jointly by the clients to help with communication and education. Garrison likes to say that this approach levels the playing field. The support team can help address issues like economic security (if one partner has been out of the workforce), work out joint ownership of real estate, or create parenting plans that adjust as a child ages.
“Our job is to help you get the divorce as economically and efficiently and calmly as possible. And I think for most of us who do this work, at the end of the day, it’s because it’s better for the children,” says Garrison. “They’re finding now empirically that exposure to conflict for children is really detrimental, and this is a way to really keep the kids front and center in any divorce.”
The approach also works for pre-nuptial and post-nuptial agreements, which Garrison much prefers to the traditional method:
“I love it when we’re working with younger couples, because it gives them a really supported environment to have hard conversations that most of us should be having in our late twenties or early thirties with our partner before we get married, and most of us don’t.”
“Not everybody can be collaborative,” says Garrison. “I tell folks straight up that if you can’t bear seeing your spouse on a zoom screen or sitting in the same room, it’s probably not going to work. But that’s also going to impact your kids, right? If you can’t show up for your children at a life event, that’s really sad, and so we try to get them resources to prepare them for those meetings…99% of the time, people can work things out with the support they need.”
More information can be found at:
- International Academy of Collaborative Professionals, collaborativepractice.com.
- Collaborative Professionals Washington, collaborativeprofessionalsofwashington.org
- Whatcom Collaborative Law Professionals, whatcomcollaborativelaw.com
