Despite your best intentions, your marriage may no longer work the way it once did. You and your spouse might constantly fight. You may have grown apart, or perhaps one of you has violated the trust of the other through infidelity or substance abuse.
Trying to separate your life from your spouse’s in a divorce is never easy. Complications and emotions can intensify when divorcing couples share children. Many couples choose mediation as a way to resolve some of their marital conflicts and pave the way for an uncontested divorce filing.
Why is mediation particularly useful for couples with children?
Mediation reduces the conflict of divorce
One of the most stressful things about divorce for children is bearing witness to the way their parents fight with one another and talk about one another. The contentious process of divorce litigation often intensifies disputes between divorcing parents rather than alleviating them.
Children are frequently aware of how unhappy or angry their parents are. Mediation requires that you work together. Not only do you set a great example about problem solving, but you also minimize how much stress and emotional pressure you have to endure during the divorce.
You can create a custom of arrangement without involving the kids
Sometimes, older children have to talk in court about their preferences or meet with a judge to discuss their custody wishes. Although a judge isn’t going to defer to a child, their opinion can matter. Feeling like they have to make a choice can be very stressful and damaging for children already in during the pressure of a parental divorce.
If you and your ex handle custody issues in mediation, your children won’t need to play a role at all. Additionally, you can create a parenting plan that really works for your family, rather than a generic plan drafted by a judge.
Mediation helps parents rebuild
You don’t just get to walk away from your marriage if you share children with your ex. Joint custody will mean that you continue to interact with one another for the rest of your life.
Mediation gives you an opportunity to start redeveloping and hearing your relationship. Maybe you won’t ever be best friends again, but you can be amicable toward one another. You might even reach a point where you can attend your children’s basketball games together and cheer them on as a unified team.
Keeping your kids as a top priority in your divorce might be a reason to try divorce mediation.