I can list plenty of good, solid reasons why people going through a divorce should mediate rather than
litigate: saves money, improves parenting relationships, faster, more control over outcomes… I could probably go on. All logical reasons that really can’t be disputed much. Yet, only a small number of people choose mediation when it comes down to it. Why? Believe me, this is a question I ask quite a bit.
Recently on a run with my friend Beth who is going through a challenging divorce, she unloaded her frustration and anger about her ex’s requests as we picked our way through the roots and rocks of the trail. Years of difficulty in their marriage had given her a hair -trigger for indignation, powerlessness, and injustice and his recent requests ignited all of those emotions. But when she shared with me the details of his “demands” I heard something completely different. I heard great opportunity. For example, he wants to only communicate through his attorney. She heard him disrespecting her. I heard she gets a break from the conflict that riddled their communication for the past 5 years. He wants to have their son stay with him twice a week. She heard a loss of her parenting time. I heard that she gets to have some time to herself again.
With roughly half of all marriages ending in divorce, transitioning from married to not-married has become a regular rite of passage. Unfortunately, many people are scarred from this experience. It’s never a picnic to end a committed relationship, divide up a shared lifestyle and develop new arrangements for your children, but some paths through that mess are easier than others. Most people begin their divorce process by contacting a lawyer. Legal advice is a critical step in the process, but not necessarily the best starting point, since who you see first likely frames the situation.
Someone recently asked me what made me go into mediation. I launched into a rather impassioned speech and at the end he asked if I had written about this. Evidently, I had more to say on the matter than I realized so I took his advice.
I became interested in mediation because I saw in my work with organizations and my observations about human nature that while our basic state involves a fair amount of discomfort or even suffering, we rarely make a change to relieve that suffering unless we are in crisis. Sometimes “bottoming out” is a solo experience, but more often it happens when two (or more) people face a conflict. That conflict may have been just beneath the surface for months or even years, but eventually something will happen that triggers an all-out crisis. Once that has occurred, it’s almost impossible to go back to the status quo.
Every so often in 
mediation I get a parenting pair that just can’t seem to seal the deal. Typically, they get stuck on a lot of relatively small issues, rather than the biggies. For example, they will disagree adamantly about who should drive for pick ups and drop offs or they squabble over four calendar days per month with the children. These parents are perfect candidates for Parenting Coordination. Parenting Coordinators serve as mediators and educators for high-conflict divorced or separating couples so that they can re-form their patterns to better support their children as a team.
