People who have a level of fame or notoriety usually want to keep details of their divorce off TMZ, Twitter and social media.
However, many people who are not rich or famous also want to keep their divorce process private. For most people, this is a very personal and painful situation and they do not want to expose the details and eccentricities of their lives to the public.
There is more privacy using the Collaborative Team Divorce process because you and your attorney are not making court appearances.
You are not testifying to the judge about the other parent, flinging mud and exaggerating personal quirks. In a litigated or traditional divorce, the court reporter takes down every word said and anyone sitting in the courtroom will hear you as you air your dirty laundry because court proceedings are public matters.
Many attorneys in traditional litigated divorce aggressively try to make their client appear as a saint and the other party as the devil. If your attorney wants you to testify in a way that puts your spouse in a bad light, you can be sure your spouse’s attorney will do the same thing to you – each attorney trying to make the other spouse look bad to the judge. However, there is a saying in Family Law that “Mother Theresa does not marry Jack the Ripper” meaning neither clients is ‘all good’ or ‘all bad.’
People think going to court means the judge will listen to everything they have to say.
Usually they do not feel fulfilled after they testify because they do not get to tell the judge about all the things their spouse did wrong in the marriage. They believe that testifying that their spouse or partner is a “bad person” and the one “to blame” for the end of the marriage will convince the judge that they are right, and their spouse is wrong, and they will be vindicated. However, much of what you want to complain about to the judge is not relevant, is not evidence, is not admissible and will not be considered by the judge when making decisions in your case. For example, having an affair does not change the California Family Code provisions for dividing community property equally, 50/50.
In the Collaborative Divorce Team approach, if something from the marriage is still bothering you that you want to share, then the Collaborative Team will take the time to discuss that issue and try to resolve it for you – not in a public courtroom, not dependent upon whether it is evidence, and not left up to a judge’s decision. Your Collaborative Divorce Team will not care if your issue it is not admissible or important evidence to a judge. The Team cares that this is important to you. The Collaborative Divorce Team will work together with you, so you have the chance to express your feelings and have conflicts with your spouse resolved, rather than having them linger and fester like an open wound.
The privacy of the Collaborative Divorce process gives you a chance to discuss topics that you might not want to be brought up in a court.
For example, I worked on a Collaborative Divorce case where the husband had a sex addiction problem. They had a five-year-old daughter and they did not want to be talking about this situation in a public courtroom with a judge. They wanted a professional, collaborative team, including mental health professionals with child development expertise, to help them deal with that situation in the best way for their child and to keep it private.
Collaborative Divorce is also a good choice to maintain privacy if you have a complicated financial situation.
You may want your business operations kept secret from your competitors which is possible in the Collaborative Divorce process.
The goal of the Collaborative Divorce process is to provide the couple with a better, more fulfilling post-divorce life and avoid future conflict.
