October 22, 2021 • 38 mins
Nearly 50 percent of marriages end in divorce, so what can you do to protect your assets if your marriage comes to an untimely end? This week David is joined by Judith Weigle to discuss the amicable divorce strategies that can help you keep your money. Judith is a divorce mediator and host of THE Amicable Divorce Expert podcast. Judith Weigle shares her insights and experiences in divorce mediation and communication, helping thousands of couples accomplish the near impossible, amicable divorces.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm David Grosso and you're listening to Follow the Profit.
Today we're going to cover a touchy subject, but an
important one. It's said that couples in the US unfortunately
eventually get divorced. And since this is a money podcast,
we can't ignore the fact that finances are one of
(00:22):
the top three reasons couples divorce, and it's often the
top reason. So how can you protect yourself and your
money from a messy breakup? Joining us is Judith Weigel.
She's a divorce mediator and the host of the amical
Divorce Expert podcast. I'm David Grosso and you're listening to
Follow the Profit. So, Judith, how are you doing today?
(00:44):
I'm doing really well. But let me just extend those
numbers you just gave, because this becomes even more interesting. David,
So not only do fifty you are absolutely correct in
that number of first marriages end in divorce, sixty percent
of second marriages and seventy percent of third marriages and
(01:07):
in divorce. And I can attest to the national average
because I get repeat business. Wow, so by the time
the probability of getting divorce goes up in every round.
That's something I did not know. So what about people?
So doesn't this doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in
a growing percentage of the population that is living single. Well,
(01:32):
what it says is we we repeat the mistakes of
the past. So when you get divorced the first time,
you really need to use it as a learning and
growth experience and you need to look at, well, a
what were my criterion choosing the spouse I chose? Maybe
(01:52):
I chosen correctly for me, So you really have to
go internal and look at that. When people start dating
immediately even before the divorce is final, or when people
jump into another relationship quickly after the divorce is final,
they may not have given themselves enough time. True, really
(02:12):
use divorce as uh an issue of learning more about
self awareness and our choices so that we cannot repeat
the decisions of the past. And people don't really know
that because people who get married like to be in couples.
It's comforting and I get that, but you have to
(02:33):
allow some time in space because, as you appropriately said
into your introduction, divorce is an issue of money. That's
all it's about is money, and you're gonna just you're
you're going to keep getting into very difficult financial situations
if you're not clear the second time around. So is
(02:54):
there such thing as an amical divorce? Because it seems
like you're a mediator A lot of times you have
to play psychologists, like what what are the things if
you are planning on getting divorce that you go in
to try to make it amicable? Okay, I have three steps.
These are my three steps after almost ten years of
working as a divorce mediator in order to make it amicable.
(03:16):
The very first step, and it's the most important step.
You can't get around this. You have to go through
what I call the emotional juggling match, the emotional divorce
before you enter the legal divorce. The legal juggling match.
So you've heard of Elizabeth Coobler Ross's five steps of
five stages of grief. When somebody dies, there are two
(03:39):
more stages in divorce because the person isn't dead. The
person you're divorcing is alive and well, and you may
have to deal with that person if you have children.
So you have to go through all the emotions that
are present when the decision to get divorced comes up.
(04:03):
Once you go through those stages of grief, then you
could start the filing process. You're still going to become emotional,
but far less. And your your decisions are really important.
Your legal decisions, your financial decisions have lifelong impact, so
you need to be emotionally clear before you make legal decisions.
(04:25):
The second step is and I have a circus background.
My first big job was with the circus years ago
as a marketing director, and circus metaphors are so appropriate
to you. So my second step is keep your head
out of the lion's mouth. By the words you choose
and the tone of voice you use when you're communicating
(04:48):
with your spouse. That changes the entire trajectory of the settlement.
And you can only do that if you go through
the emotional divorce first. And number three, people fear the future,
and that's what holds them back from getting divorced or
that's what keeps them in the divorce process longer than
(05:08):
maybe they should be there. So I say, let change
be your graceful high wire act, meaning have a vision
for the future. How are you going to use divorce
as a growth opportunity? If you can see a positive
outcome for yourself, you're a completely different person during the divorce.
And those three steps will create an amicable divorce. So
(05:32):
I'm happily married, but I'm surrounded by people who have
been divorced, and we kind of all live divorce, even
though maybe my parents aren't divorced, right my I'm not divorced,
but it's kind of all around us, right, And a
lot of times people who are going through divorce want
to talk about it. What's the best way for someone
who's not going through a divorce to talk to someone
(05:53):
who is well? Just lending in a listening ear sometimes
all they want a lot of times people aren't looking
for answers, And if you've never been divorced and you're
not a child of divorce, you have no answers for them.
And the best you can do is I hear you,
(06:15):
I hear you. This is very difficult. Who do you
have as a professional next to you that can guide
you through either the emotions you're experiencing or have you
checked in with a lawyer yet? Are you being represented
by a lawyer or are you going to somebody like
Judy who is a paralegal and a mediator. I can
(06:36):
file for divorces, but I don't give legal advice. I
give human advice. I talk to people about how to
communicate with one another, because I know communication is the
key in working out settlement terms. So just ask them
those questions. Do they have good professionals in their corner
(06:57):
that are not going to inflame the situa ouation, but
tone it down so that they can calmly think through, Um,
what's coming up? So one percentage of people when they're
going to get divorced, just come up and say, you
know what, fifty no problem? Is that uncommon or is
that more common than we think? Well, it's more common
(07:19):
in my experience because I'm not an attorney, I'm not
a litigator, So I get people who think they're ready
for this process. Judy were totally amicable. Um, we have
no kids, no property. That should be easy. Okay, that
remains to be seen because just because you have no
kids or no property, are you able to communicate with
(07:42):
one another? Well, you know it's really difficult. Okay. You
have to be able to communicate with one another in
order to make decisions. Well, can't you do that for us? No,
in a mediation, I can sit with you and make
sure your conversation is folks, is on the decisions. You
have to make Maybe you don't have children in real estate,
(08:04):
but you have investments generally. I mean, if people have
absolutely nothing, that does become kind of easy. But you know,
it's so funny, David. If they can't talk to one another,
they they also probably are reluctant to do their end
of the paperwork. And so for me, I need people
(08:25):
that are able to communicate with one another and people
who are ready to do some of the paperwork or
everything gets stalled. So again we go back to have
you gone through the emotional divorce? Are you actually ready
to do these steps? They're not that complicated, but our
emotions blind us. Our emotions prevent us from doing the
(08:48):
simplest things. Yeah, I guess a lot of times there's infidelity,
there's financial secrets, there's some sort of episode that precipitated
this divorce. It's kind of like watching a movie. There's
a care after, there's a plot, there's a challenge. You know.
One of the most common themes you see that lead
to break up a lot of it is money and infidelity,
isn't it? Those are the top two. Money comes first,
(09:11):
infidelity a second. Money is the top reason why people
break up. First of all, you need money to live.
So if both people aren't able to consistently hold down
a job and have enough money that together they can
sustain a decent lifestyle, they're going to break up. If
(09:34):
people are not forthcoming about money, I mean, you get
another nail on that, And that is what if people
don't really share their financial information. I just got a
call last week by the wife who said, I simply
have to get divorced. I have no idea what he's earning.
I have no idea what if there are any investments
(09:55):
and I can't live with somebody who's not um financially earthcoming.
It's called financial infidelity. There's actually a term for it.
So when people aren't forthcoming about what they make and
how they spend money, financial infidelity is committed. Then we
transition to sexual infidelity. That's number two. And you know,
(10:21):
I interviewed a gentleman about a year and a half
ago on the best worst thing that can happen to
you infidelity because it really makes you review your relationship
and review your marriage. And it doesn't mean that a
marriage can't sustain infidelity. It makes it really hard to
(10:43):
do it because there's you know, when we do our
love our our wedding vowels. It's all about trust, right.
And I used to produce entertainment for private events in
Los Angeles and on the West Side, weddings were huge
money makers. People are very wealthy on the West side
of Los Angeles, and they'll spend unbelievable amounts of money
(11:04):
on entertainment for their weddings. And so I would stand
there while I was listening to the musicians play the wedding,
and there they are doing the vows, and I would
say to myself, I would rewrite those vows. If they
asked me to rewrite the vows, I would change the
whole idea of trust, because what are you trusting? You
(11:24):
have to acknowledge that people are human and people make mistakes.
What type of mistakes are you willing to accept in
your marriage? That's really the issue. So with infidelity, if
you want to attempt to keep the relationship together, that's great,
(11:46):
but then you have to go back to and and
you know you need a therapist involved. Why did the
infidelity take place in the first place. And it may
not mean that your spouse doesn't work, you know, it's
(12:06):
one of those things that a lot of times in relationships,
how do you pay what money was made to whom?
And who was you know, an unpaid caregiver to children,
and who was supporting you know, the other partner in
their career endeavors. How do you determine that when you
go to split up? Isn't that a very murky process?
It comes up in mediation. Everything you just named is
(12:28):
so important and so spot on. It all comes up
in mediation and it factors into the settlement. Um, childcare.
Was there a conversation when you initially got married and
decided you wanted to raise a family, have a family.
Was one spouse making enough money and the projection for
(12:50):
money getting better to the point where the other spouse
generally the woman, or now we have gay marriages, the
other spouse, whoever it is, man or woman. Was there
a decision cooperatively made that honey, you're going to stay
home and take care of the kids. I'll go out
and earn a living. If that was the conversation and
(13:12):
you go to get divorced, absolutely, um, you know, jumping
back into the job market if you were the spouse
taking care of the children is a non starter. That
person's industry maybe has gone away, maybe they need more education,
and so there is going to be spousal support. Alimony
in some states, spousal support in other states. California is
(13:35):
spousal support. It's all the same concept. The higher wage
journer pays the lower wage journer money until that person
can get on their feet, and you discuss a certain
period of time. Um, what were the other examples that
you gave David other than childcare? You know, supporting someone else, Like,
for instance, right now, I just moved my whole life
(13:57):
to Los Angeles for my husband, who's a PhD student
at U C l A. How do you quantify that? Right,
I'm happy to be here in LA is wonderful. But
maybe someone else moved to a place that you know
it wasn't didn't behoove their career very much. Okay, this
is where the law isn't fair. But mediation um moves
(14:17):
the law aside so that you can look at these
very important real life examples that you just gave that
come up all the time. So you either change your
career or change your city in order to accommodate your
spouse who needs that change in order to develop their
(14:38):
career and potentially bring in more dollars so that you
both flourish financially. So that's a very important conversation to have.
What if you spent you were the money earner so
that your spouse could go to school and get more
education for a while. Um, And there was no move,
(15:01):
but it was just honey, you go ahead, go back
to school. I'm going to support us. And UM, now
that now you're getting divorced, it all comes up because
it's significant. So the law isn't perfect, and the law
is different in every state. Sometimes mediation will will address
(15:24):
those real life situations that one spouse wants to have considered,
and it should be you know, tragically, if you go
to trial, judges have to go with what the law says,
and the law is gray in a lot of instances.
So maybe there's no actual law about I supported you
(15:46):
so you could go to school. Now you have the
fabulous job. Now you met somebody else who want to
divorce me. Maybe the law doesn't address this, but it'll
address it on the spouse will support end. So tell
me about celebrity because that's mostly how we see divorce. Right,
they seem we have divorced more often than the general population,
and of course there's a lot of money involved. We
(16:08):
saw recently Dr Dre and Kelly Clarkson had to pay
their ex spouses two hundred thousand dollars a month, and
I'm guessing that's in California or New York. That was Kelly.
I just did well. I have a celebrity divorce series
the last Wednesday of every month on my podcast because
people learned through celebrities, and I just thought it would
(16:28):
make it just a little more interesting to look at
what the celebrities are going through in the very same
aspects of divorce that we go through. They're just bigger dollars,
and um, they're a little more complicated. First of all,
just to address that Drey was around fifty five or
sixty thousand a month to Nicole, and Kelly went from
(16:50):
two hundred thousand temporary down to around a hundred forty
six permanent a month for spousal I mean numbers are
astonishing permanent so forever well, no permanent, for however long
the term was in their settlement agreement, got it, that's
the number that can How long is that typically, Judith?
(17:12):
How long is alimonia? Well, it's it's two things, and
every state has their um, their their formula for the
length of time for spousal California's formula is twofold. If
you're married under ten years, spousal support is half the
length of the marriage. So everybody in the divorce arena
(17:32):
loves when we get divorces under ten years. Easy, that's
the formula. Let's go from there. If it's over ten years,
it's so gray. So if what if it's over ten
years by a month? Over ten years says forever at
its ultimate. Now, if you're married five years and the
(17:54):
stay at home spouse never worked because they raised the children,
and there's plenty of money to go around, it's going
to be until one of one of you dies. I
guarantee it will be forever. And wow, that's that's a
long time. Now, if it's slightly over ten years a
year or two over ten years, three, you negotiate. You
(18:15):
negotiate generally for the exact length of the marriage or
something a little less. There's all the there's also this
thing called a lump sum payment. Now, spousal support is
the link that keeps you connected. And nobody, especially the
pay or of spousal support, wants to be connected. Right,
(18:37):
you're getting divorced. You want it to be over. So
there's this option called a lump sum payment. And you
look at what a a lump sum would be based on, Well,
what would the monthly payments look like? Then? How does
that compute to a year? Now, how does that compute
to X number of years? That would maybe be the
(18:57):
time frame we would agree on. Now, a lump sum
would not be that exact number monthly times the number
of years, but it would be It would be less
than that, but it would be large enough that a
you can cut that check and move on and be
the recipient. Can do a lot more with a lump sum.
(19:20):
You can invest it. You don't have to wait every month.
And this is where going through the emotional divorce is important,
because when I've sat with spouses who said no, I
just want him or hard to live in pain and
pay me a monthly check, I'm like, that person is
going to go to court and this is gonna bite you.
That is the wrong attitude. You apparently have not gone
(19:43):
through the emotional divorce and done forgiveness so that you
can think logically that lump sum is your saving grace.
If it's large enough it I mean largest relative David right,
based on what refused to living on and making. But
lump sums are our savior because they allow So we
(20:09):
live in an era though, Judith that even though you
might be a high income earner, you also might have
a lot of debt. So what happens in those cases,
which I imagine are increasingly common in an era of
low interest rates? Everyone has debt and a lot of
times the spouses are unaware of how big their mortgages,
their credit card debt, their auto loans, maybe some investments
that they owe money on. You know, businesses that are indebted.
(20:33):
How do you how do you separate? You know, Wow,
look this man or woman is making a lot of
money every year, but they're in the whole for millions
of dollars in debt. That has to be divided as well.
That debt is divided as well, debt debt created for
the health and welfare of the family. We call it
(20:55):
the community. In California, we're a community property state. But
even in equitable division of assets states, it kind of
works the same way. So there are these things called
disclosure forms. That's part of the paperwork of the divorce
filing process, and it's there to share with each other
(21:16):
what you each have, either with both of your names
on it or just your individual name, and what you owe.
I cannot tell you the divorces that I've worked with
where one spouse had no clue how much debt there was,
and then when that debt was listed, there's no money
(21:37):
when you when you look at it. When when we
looked at all that debt and we looked at what
those minimum payments were, there's no money left for spousal
support or child support. What do you do? You declare bankruptcy.
That's the that's the worst case scenario. You declare bankruptcy
because you've got to take care of your children, if
there are children. But if you have other assets, like
(21:59):
if you have real estate and you're in an equity
position with real estate, um, maybe you have to sell
the house. But instead of paying yourselves, you know your
portion of the equity, you pay off those debts. You
put all those debts in the escrow. Because when you send,
when you when you open escrow, when you're selling a house,
(22:21):
you accept an offer and you open escrow, escrow really
asks do you owe any money against the house. Do
you want to pay anything off with the available equity
before we cut you a check. That's a way of
getting rid of the debt. Otherwise you have to divide
the debt and you each take on certain debt and
(22:42):
interesting this question. That's my episode this week. On Wednesday,
I'm talking to an attorney who deals with debt all
the time, debt consolidation, and he said something so important,
and he said, whatever is written in the settlement agreement
about some by be taking on the other person's debt
(23:02):
as part of the settlement. Have you called the credit
card companies and asked them if they will recognize that
new person. Have you called the lone consolidation, the mortgage company.
You have to call these people and say, listen, I'm
getting divorced and one spouse wants to take over my debt.
Are you going to allow it? Because they may not
(23:24):
allow it. They just want to go back to the source.
Or what if one spouse opened to credit card and
what they charged was not for the health and welfare
of the family. What if it was online gambling, a
visa card, online gambling and it was created during the marriage.
(23:47):
Credit card company doesn't care whether it was for the
health and welfare of the family or not. They just
know it's community debt. They're going to go after whoever
they can to pay for this debt even after your divorce. Shocking,
isn't it. I think one of the big issues these
(24:12):
days is real estate, though we've seen real estate prices
climbed so much in the past decade, and when couples separate,
it seems like the first and most important consideration is housing,
especially if you have kids, and a lot of times
that's also a family's biggest asset. Right they bought a
long time ago, they have some equity, and but in
a lot of cases, even if they sell that house,
(24:34):
they can't afford to set up two households. That's why
I think divorce is considered one of the greatest destructors
of wealth because you know, it doesn't as we notice
with grocery shopping, right, it doesn't really cost that much
more to shop for two people than it does for
one person. You know, I don't have to pay any
more rent because my husband lives with me. This is
a major problem and a major source of fear for
(24:55):
couples thinking about getting divorced without a doubt and you're
in California. We're both in California. Everybody knows what the
California a real estate market. It's insane, like, who can
afford these prices? These are crazy prices and for what
you get, it's ridiculous. And there are other states and
cities like this as well. California is not stand alone.
(25:18):
People are emotionally attached to the house. It's their memories,
it's they maybe somebody was the one designing it, and
it's very difficult for them to consider selling the house.
But sometimes it's the only thing that makes financial sense.
And at the end of the day, even if they
went to court, that's what the judge would more than
(25:40):
likely do, is order that the house be sold so
that you can clean up the rest of the settlement,
and so if go ahead. But here's the other side
of it. So let's just say the couple wants one
person to keep the house and the other person is
going to move out, and you can pay me my
(26:01):
community portion share later when you're able to refinance. The
one who's going to stay, well, the one who generally
wants to stay, not all the time, but generally is
the one who can't afford it. And it's for the kids.
We don't want to disrupt the kids. And I completely
get that argument, but the kids couldn't care less. The
(26:23):
kids did not buy the house. They don't have to
pay the mortgage, in the property taxes. They're used to
the house. But at the end of the day, all
kids want is for their parents to get along. They
want to keep their friends, they want to stay in
the same school if possible, and they just want their
parents to get along. So, if selling the house makes
(26:45):
the most financial sense, sell the house and then somewhere
else hopefully, sorry David, hopefully. Yeah, especially here on the
West side of l A. It is definitely bonkers. The
prices here need a million dollars to get something possible.
So if you were sitting with your clients and you
(27:05):
could go back in time, right, what do you think
they would change to prevent this all from happening. Let's
go down a template of your inner marriage. I don't
know if you're married, Judith, how do you keep your
you were, so you're a divorce and I naturally had
an amicable divorce, and I'm really proud of that. I
was in the entertainment industry at the time and Um,
(27:28):
we both met on the circus. He was he was
a musician and I was a marketing director. And this
wasn't exactly why he asked for a divorce. There were
many other issues, but he was having a relationship with
a Bemmon trainer, and so that was that was infidelity.
But honestly, I didn't get upset. I must be the
(27:50):
weirdest person walking the face of the earth. That was
merely a symptom to me. That wasn't for me to
focus on. Plus I liked her, she was really sweet.
I just looked at now, this is a sign the
marriage isn't working. I knew we had issues, surprised that
we weren't going to go to therapy first, But I
didn't get mad. I didn't try and prevent anything from happening.
(28:11):
I was enormously sad. I accepted my reality, and little
did I realize, I went through the emotional divorce first
before the filing, and so I could just go back
to I remember what that was like. It was hard.
The emotions were hard to process for so many different reasons.
(28:33):
But um, even though they are, and even though there
was infidelity, I still I didn't want to be horrible.
I wanted to be a nice person and and I'm
proud of that. So moving, so let's rewind. So, so
if if, if, maybe in your case or in your
(28:54):
client's case, if you could go back in time and
you had a healthy marriage, what are some steps you
would take to prevent a lot of the rabbit holes
that you see your clients going into. There's a thing
called discernment counseling, and you discern whether this is the
right step for you or not, and you it's it's
couples counseling, but with a very specific point to it.
(29:16):
And the point is one of us wants to get
divorced and the other doesn't. That's generally the situation. If
both people want to get divorced, then great, you know,
then it's fine, it'll be it'll be maybe an amicable
divorce if they're both into it. But this is generally
one person doesn't want to be thinks they're kind of
(29:36):
blind sided, but nobody's really that blind sided. You're just
not picking up on queues generally. Generally, Um, So there's
discernment counseling where you go to a therapist and you
work through why one person wants to be divorced and
the other person doesn't to see if there can be
(29:57):
a union going forward, and if they're can be great.
Now you know the things you have to do to
make it better the relationship. But if it can't be,
now you know the things you needed to learn so
that you don't make the same mistake in the next
relationship and so that you can be very accepting of
(30:17):
the divorce and have an amicable divorce. So how a
financial A little checklist before I leave you? What should
you be sharing with your partner? Get your finances and order.
So let's assume you're living in the same house, and
because you can't live in two different places, you've had
the divorce talk, but you have to stay in the
(30:39):
same house until you get professionals involved on some level
me as a mediator, an attorney. Somehow you get legal
professionals on board to help you understand the decisions you
have to make going forward. So you're living in separate rooms.
And one of the disclosure forms is a fine financial
(31:00):
disclosure form, and that is very helpful in organizing what
your budget is going to be separately going forward. It
looks like it looks at what you're each making for
a living. If only one of you is working the
other isn't. Now you're you have a budget going forward
to tell you what you have to make now if
(31:23):
there's going to be spousal support as part of your
um financial package. Maybe spousal support isn't enough for you
to pay your bills on this projected budget, but you
at least have a framework to operate in, so now
you know what you have to make to compensate for
(31:43):
what you need if spousal support isn't going to be helpful.
The hardest part is when people have separate households radically
different incomes. Maybe they both work, but it's radically different incomes,
but they've already have separate households, and one person is
paying not only their new bills, but most of the
(32:06):
bills on the house they just left. And there's children.
I mean this, let's just compound this. Well, that person
is not creating debt in the interim until they get
professionals on board to help sort things out, and then
the reality just becomes Okay. The person who's going to
(32:26):
be getting child and or re spousal support really does
have to look at changing their jobs. That is their
reality because this other the person supporting all of this.
It's not gonna last forever. They can't keep going into debt.
So these are very important but tough conversations, and it's
all about you both have your monthly budgets going forward, okay,
(32:51):
And I want to leave with the kids, because this
is often a big question right when you separate, And
this is everyone's biggest fear, of course, is do most
states still prefer the mother and hoterosexual relationships? Is that
how it works or is that changed? Nope, that has
definitely changed. Most of the courts look at both people
being capable of being with their children and taking care
(33:13):
of them, and it's the phrase is called best interest
of the child, And what the court systems have felt
over the last years is the best interest of the
child is to have both parents. Even in a gay couple.
It doesn't matter because both parents aren't the same. They
don't express themselves in exactly the same way. They bring
(33:35):
different philosophies and experiences to their children's lives, and so
children need, if possible, children need a balance of both parents. Plus,
kids get attached to their parents and and gender doesn't
matter anymore. They just get attached to their parents and
want to see both of their parents. So I don't
(33:56):
want men in heterosexual relationship to worry that the court
still looks at women to be the primary caregivers. They
do not. They really look at it as an equal
division of time. Well, that's a big relief to a
lot of men out there. I have one last question.
(34:17):
I see a lot of ads that say men only
divorce law firm or women only divorce law firm. What
do I need to know about that, Judith, Well, there
is a gentleman who's doing a podcast called Divorce Shield.
He started as a divorce attorney, so he's still an attorney.
(34:38):
He got tired of litigating and he wanted to be
a divorce coach and a mediator, so he has a
men only uh divorce coaching business because he felt men
were underserved and men have fears that are different than
women's fears. And I also think men are an underserved
(34:58):
community in the divorce world, that everything was heavy on women. Um,
but but that's not so. Women have a plethora of coaches.
But when you see divorce attorney specializing in men, I
get scared. That's what fears, which makes me afraid divorce
(35:21):
coach for men. I think they're important. Women have that
had the coaches for years because women look for services
like that, and women have gotten into the coaching business
far more than men. But I don't see divorce attorneys
skewed for women. I only see some divorce attorneys skewed
for men. That scares me because the divorce the male
(35:47):
divorce attorneys specializing in men seem to be the angriest
people I have ever met. And when the divorce attorney
is naturally an angry person, you're gonna spend a ton
of money thinking you're represented by somebody who who who
(36:08):
will help turn the court around. The court doesn't need
to be turned around anymore. The court is. It is
there for the fairness, especially when children are concerned. Um,
they're there for both spouses for their children. Um. But
but interview attorneys, not all attorneys are created equal. Interview attorneys,
(36:30):
you never know who you're going to feel connected to
the best, and you have to connect with them the best.
And remember this, you are in charge of your attorney.
Your attorney isn't in charge of you. Your attorney knows
what to do to file, but you are in charge
of the decisions. Do not let your attorney make decisions
(36:54):
for you, especially if your gut tells you they're wrong.
Follow your gut. Well, that's really good advice, Judith. I'll
have to check out your podcast, The Amical Divorce Expert Podcast. Judith,
thank you so much for taking the time to talk
to us today. It was a pleasure. Thank you for
asking me, and I love your podcast by the way,
I have listened to episodes. I think this is a
(37:16):
great service you do. Thank you, David. Well. That was
a lot of really important information about getting divorce, something
I hope I never have to experience. Fortunately, so far
I've been able to avoid that. Divorce is something that
touches us all and right now I have several friends
(37:36):
who are going through divorce. So thanks to Judith for
giving us all these tips. There's something that's definitely going
to go into the file for future use. And I
want to thank my team up producers Rob and Scott,
as well as Cheyenne and my executive producers nuking Rich
and Debbie Myers. If you're enjoying follow the profit, give
us five stars so that others can learn about the podcast.
(37:58):
And we actually read those views so that we can
learn what we can do better. Follow The profit is
a production of ging Which I heart Radio. For more
podcasts like this one, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Part of
the ging Which network
I'm David Grosso and you're listening to Follow the Profit.
Today we're going to cover a touchy subject, but an
important one. It's said that couples in the US unfortunately
eventually get divorced. And since this is a money podcast,
we can't ignore the fact that finances are one of
(00:22):
the top three reasons couples divorce, and it's often the
top reason. So how can you protect yourself and your
money from a messy breakup? Joining us is Judith Weigel.
She's a divorce mediator and the host of the amical
Divorce Expert podcast. I'm David Grosso and you're listening to
Follow the Profit. So, Judith, how are you doing today?
(00:44):
I'm doing really well. But let me just extend those
numbers you just gave, because this becomes even more interesting. David,
So not only do fifty you are absolutely correct in
that number of first marriages end in divorce, sixty percent
of second marriages and seventy percent of third marriages and
(01:07):
in divorce. And I can attest to the national average
because I get repeat business. Wow, so by the time
the probability of getting divorce goes up in every round.
That's something I did not know. So what about people?
So doesn't this doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in
a growing percentage of the population that is living single. Well,
(01:32):
what it says is we we repeat the mistakes of
the past. So when you get divorced the first time,
you really need to use it as a learning and
growth experience and you need to look at, well, a
what were my criterion choosing the spouse I chose? Maybe
(01:52):
I chosen correctly for me, So you really have to
go internal and look at that. When people start dating
immediately even before the divorce is final, or when people
jump into another relationship quickly after the divorce is final,
they may not have given themselves enough time. True, really
(02:12):
use divorce as uh an issue of learning more about
self awareness and our choices so that we cannot repeat
the decisions of the past. And people don't really know
that because people who get married like to be in couples.
It's comforting and I get that, but you have to
(02:33):
allow some time in space because, as you appropriately said
into your introduction, divorce is an issue of money. That's
all it's about is money, and you're gonna just you're
you're going to keep getting into very difficult financial situations
if you're not clear the second time around. So is
(02:54):
there such thing as an amical divorce? Because it seems
like you're a mediator A lot of times you have
to play psychologists, like what what are the things if
you are planning on getting divorce that you go in
to try to make it amicable? Okay, I have three steps.
These are my three steps after almost ten years of
working as a divorce mediator in order to make it amicable.
(03:16):
The very first step, and it's the most important step.
You can't get around this. You have to go through
what I call the emotional juggling match, the emotional divorce
before you enter the legal divorce. The legal juggling match.
So you've heard of Elizabeth Coobler Ross's five steps of
five stages of grief. When somebody dies, there are two
(03:39):
more stages in divorce because the person isn't dead. The
person you're divorcing is alive and well, and you may
have to deal with that person if you have children.
So you have to go through all the emotions that
are present when the decision to get divorced comes up.
(04:03):
Once you go through those stages of grief, then you
could start the filing process. You're still going to become emotional,
but far less. And your your decisions are really important.
Your legal decisions, your financial decisions have lifelong impact, so
you need to be emotionally clear before you make legal decisions.
(04:25):
The second step is and I have a circus background.
My first big job was with the circus years ago
as a marketing director, and circus metaphors are so appropriate
to you. So my second step is keep your head
out of the lion's mouth. By the words you choose
and the tone of voice you use when you're communicating
(04:48):
with your spouse. That changes the entire trajectory of the settlement.
And you can only do that if you go through
the emotional divorce first. And number three, people fear the future,
and that's what holds them back from getting divorced or
that's what keeps them in the divorce process longer than
(05:08):
maybe they should be there. So I say, let change
be your graceful high wire act, meaning have a vision
for the future. How are you going to use divorce
as a growth opportunity? If you can see a positive
outcome for yourself, you're a completely different person during the divorce.
And those three steps will create an amicable divorce. So
(05:32):
I'm happily married, but I'm surrounded by people who have
been divorced, and we kind of all live divorce, even
though maybe my parents aren't divorced, right my I'm not divorced,
but it's kind of all around us, right, And a
lot of times people who are going through divorce want
to talk about it. What's the best way for someone
who's not going through a divorce to talk to someone
(05:53):
who is well? Just lending in a listening ear sometimes
all they want a lot of times people aren't looking
for answers, And if you've never been divorced and you're
not a child of divorce, you have no answers for them.
And the best you can do is I hear you,
(06:15):
I hear you. This is very difficult. Who do you
have as a professional next to you that can guide
you through either the emotions you're experiencing or have you
checked in with a lawyer yet? Are you being represented
by a lawyer or are you going to somebody like
Judy who is a paralegal and a mediator. I can
(06:36):
file for divorces, but I don't give legal advice. I
give human advice. I talk to people about how to
communicate with one another, because I know communication is the
key in working out settlement terms. So just ask them
those questions. Do they have good professionals in their corner
(06:57):
that are not going to inflame the situa ouation, but
tone it down so that they can calmly think through, Um,
what's coming up? So one percentage of people when they're
going to get divorced, just come up and say, you
know what, fifty no problem? Is that uncommon or is
that more common than we think? Well, it's more common
(07:19):
in my experience because I'm not an attorney, I'm not
a litigator, So I get people who think they're ready
for this process. Judy were totally amicable. Um, we have
no kids, no property. That should be easy. Okay, that
remains to be seen because just because you have no
kids or no property, are you able to communicate with
(07:42):
one another? Well, you know it's really difficult. Okay. You
have to be able to communicate with one another in
order to make decisions. Well, can't you do that for us? No,
in a mediation, I can sit with you and make
sure your conversation is folks, is on the decisions. You
have to make Maybe you don't have children in real estate,
(08:04):
but you have investments generally. I mean, if people have
absolutely nothing, that does become kind of easy. But you know,
it's so funny, David. If they can't talk to one another,
they they also probably are reluctant to do their end
of the paperwork. And so for me, I need people
(08:25):
that are able to communicate with one another and people
who are ready to do some of the paperwork or
everything gets stalled. So again we go back to have
you gone through the emotional divorce? Are you actually ready
to do these steps? They're not that complicated, but our
emotions blind us. Our emotions prevent us from doing the
(08:48):
simplest things. Yeah, I guess a lot of times there's infidelity,
there's financial secrets, there's some sort of episode that precipitated
this divorce. It's kind of like watching a movie. There's
a care after, there's a plot, there's a challenge. You know.
One of the most common themes you see that lead
to break up a lot of it is money and infidelity,
isn't it? Those are the top two. Money comes first,
(09:11):
infidelity a second. Money is the top reason why people
break up. First of all, you need money to live.
So if both people aren't able to consistently hold down
a job and have enough money that together they can
sustain a decent lifestyle, they're going to break up. If
(09:34):
people are not forthcoming about money, I mean, you get
another nail on that, And that is what if people
don't really share their financial information. I just got a
call last week by the wife who said, I simply
have to get divorced. I have no idea what he's earning.
I have no idea what if there are any investments
(09:55):
and I can't live with somebody who's not um financially earthcoming.
It's called financial infidelity. There's actually a term for it.
So when people aren't forthcoming about what they make and
how they spend money, financial infidelity is committed. Then we
transition to sexual infidelity. That's number two. And you know,
(10:21):
I interviewed a gentleman about a year and a half
ago on the best worst thing that can happen to
you infidelity because it really makes you review your relationship
and review your marriage. And it doesn't mean that a
marriage can't sustain infidelity. It makes it really hard to
(10:43):
do it because there's you know, when we do our
love our our wedding vowels. It's all about trust, right.
And I used to produce entertainment for private events in
Los Angeles and on the West Side, weddings were huge
money makers. People are very wealthy on the West side
of Los Angeles, and they'll spend unbelievable amounts of money
(11:04):
on entertainment for their weddings. And so I would stand
there while I was listening to the musicians play the wedding,
and there they are doing the vows, and I would
say to myself, I would rewrite those vows. If they
asked me to rewrite the vows, I would change the
whole idea of trust, because what are you trusting? You
(11:24):
have to acknowledge that people are human and people make mistakes.
What type of mistakes are you willing to accept in
your marriage? That's really the issue. So with infidelity, if
you want to attempt to keep the relationship together, that's great,
(11:46):
but then you have to go back to and and
you know you need a therapist involved. Why did the
infidelity take place in the first place. And it may
not mean that your spouse doesn't work, you know, it's
(12:06):
one of those things that a lot of times in relationships,
how do you pay what money was made to whom?
And who was you know, an unpaid caregiver to children,
and who was supporting you know, the other partner in
their career endeavors. How do you determine that when you
go to split up? Isn't that a very murky process?
It comes up in mediation. Everything you just named is
(12:28):
so important and so spot on. It all comes up
in mediation and it factors into the settlement. Um, childcare.
Was there a conversation when you initially got married and
decided you wanted to raise a family, have a family.
Was one spouse making enough money and the projection for
(12:50):
money getting better to the point where the other spouse
generally the woman, or now we have gay marriages, the
other spouse, whoever it is, man or woman. Was there
a decision cooperatively made that honey, you're going to stay
home and take care of the kids. I'll go out
and earn a living. If that was the conversation and
(13:12):
you go to get divorced, absolutely, um, you know, jumping
back into the job market if you were the spouse
taking care of the children is a non starter. That
person's industry maybe has gone away, maybe they need more education,
and so there is going to be spousal support. Alimony
in some states, spousal support in other states. California is
(13:35):
spousal support. It's all the same concept. The higher wage
journer pays the lower wage journer money until that person
can get on their feet, and you discuss a certain
period of time. Um, what were the other examples that
you gave David other than childcare? You know, supporting someone else, Like,
for instance, right now, I just moved my whole life
(13:57):
to Los Angeles for my husband, who's a PhD student
at U C l A. How do you quantify that? Right,
I'm happy to be here in LA is wonderful. But
maybe someone else moved to a place that you know
it wasn't didn't behoove their career very much. Okay, this
is where the law isn't fair. But mediation um moves
(14:17):
the law aside so that you can look at these
very important real life examples that you just gave that
come up all the time. So you either change your
career or change your city in order to accommodate your
spouse who needs that change in order to develop their
(14:38):
career and potentially bring in more dollars so that you
both flourish financially. So that's a very important conversation to have.
What if you spent you were the money earner so
that your spouse could go to school and get more
education for a while. Um, And there was no move,
(15:01):
but it was just honey, you go ahead, go back
to school. I'm going to support us. And UM, now
that now you're getting divorced, it all comes up because
it's significant. So the law isn't perfect, and the law
is different in every state. Sometimes mediation will will address
(15:24):
those real life situations that one spouse wants to have considered,
and it should be you know, tragically, if you go
to trial, judges have to go with what the law says,
and the law is gray in a lot of instances.
So maybe there's no actual law about I supported you
(15:46):
so you could go to school. Now you have the
fabulous job. Now you met somebody else who want to
divorce me. Maybe the law doesn't address this, but it'll
address it on the spouse will support end. So tell
me about celebrity because that's mostly how we see divorce. Right,
they seem we have divorced more often than the general population,
and of course there's a lot of money involved. We
(16:08):
saw recently Dr Dre and Kelly Clarkson had to pay
their ex spouses two hundred thousand dollars a month, and
I'm guessing that's in California or New York. That was Kelly.
I just did well. I have a celebrity divorce series
the last Wednesday of every month on my podcast because
people learned through celebrities, and I just thought it would
(16:28):
make it just a little more interesting to look at
what the celebrities are going through in the very same
aspects of divorce that we go through. They're just bigger dollars,
and um, they're a little more complicated. First of all,
just to address that Drey was around fifty five or
sixty thousand a month to Nicole, and Kelly went from
(16:50):
two hundred thousand temporary down to around a hundred forty
six permanent a month for spousal I mean numbers are
astonishing permanent so forever well, no permanent, for however long
the term was in their settlement agreement, got it, that's
the number that can How long is that typically, Judith?
(17:12):
How long is alimonia? Well, it's it's two things, and
every state has their um, their their formula for the
length of time for spousal California's formula is twofold. If
you're married under ten years, spousal support is half the
length of the marriage. So everybody in the divorce arena
(17:32):
loves when we get divorces under ten years. Easy, that's
the formula. Let's go from there. If it's over ten years,
it's so gray. So if what if it's over ten
years by a month? Over ten years says forever at
its ultimate. Now, if you're married five years and the
(17:54):
stay at home spouse never worked because they raised the children,
and there's plenty of money to go around, it's going
to be until one of one of you dies. I
guarantee it will be forever. And wow, that's that's a
long time. Now, if it's slightly over ten years a
year or two over ten years, three, you negotiate. You
(18:15):
negotiate generally for the exact length of the marriage or
something a little less. There's all the there's also this
thing called a lump sum payment. Now, spousal support is
the link that keeps you connected. And nobody, especially the
pay or of spousal support, wants to be connected. Right,
(18:37):
you're getting divorced. You want it to be over. So
there's this option called a lump sum payment. And you
look at what a a lump sum would be based on, Well,
what would the monthly payments look like? Then? How does
that compute to a year? Now, how does that compute
to X number of years? That would maybe be the
(18:57):
time frame we would agree on. Now, a lump sum
would not be that exact number monthly times the number
of years, but it would be It would be less
than that, but it would be large enough that a
you can cut that check and move on and be
the recipient. Can do a lot more with a lump sum.
(19:20):
You can invest it. You don't have to wait every month.
And this is where going through the emotional divorce is important,
because when I've sat with spouses who said no, I
just want him or hard to live in pain and
pay me a monthly check, I'm like, that person is
going to go to court and this is gonna bite you.
That is the wrong attitude. You apparently have not gone
(19:43):
through the emotional divorce and done forgiveness so that you
can think logically that lump sum is your saving grace.
If it's large enough it I mean largest relative David right,
based on what refused to living on and making. But
lump sums are our savior because they allow So we
(20:09):
live in an era though, Judith that even though you
might be a high income earner, you also might have
a lot of debt. So what happens in those cases,
which I imagine are increasingly common in an era of
low interest rates? Everyone has debt and a lot of
times the spouses are unaware of how big their mortgages,
their credit card debt, their auto loans, maybe some investments
that they owe money on. You know, businesses that are indebted.
(20:33):
How do you how do you separate? You know, Wow,
look this man or woman is making a lot of
money every year, but they're in the whole for millions
of dollars in debt. That has to be divided as well.
That debt is divided as well, debt debt created for
the health and welfare of the family. We call it
(20:55):
the community. In California, we're a community property state. But
even in equitable division of assets states, it kind of
works the same way. So there are these things called
disclosure forms. That's part of the paperwork of the divorce
filing process, and it's there to share with each other
(21:16):
what you each have, either with both of your names
on it or just your individual name, and what you owe.
I cannot tell you the divorces that I've worked with
where one spouse had no clue how much debt there was,
and then when that debt was listed, there's no money
(21:37):
when you when you look at it. When when we
looked at all that debt and we looked at what
those minimum payments were, there's no money left for spousal
support or child support. What do you do? You declare bankruptcy.
That's the that's the worst case scenario. You declare bankruptcy
because you've got to take care of your children, if
there are children. But if you have other assets, like
(21:59):
if you have real estate and you're in an equity
position with real estate, um, maybe you have to sell
the house. But instead of paying yourselves, you know your
portion of the equity, you pay off those debts. You
put all those debts in the escrow. Because when you send,
when you when you open escrow, when you're selling a house,
(22:21):
you accept an offer and you open escrow, escrow really
asks do you owe any money against the house. Do
you want to pay anything off with the available equity
before we cut you a check. That's a way of
getting rid of the debt. Otherwise you have to divide
the debt and you each take on certain debt and
(22:42):
interesting this question. That's my episode this week. On Wednesday,
I'm talking to an attorney who deals with debt all
the time, debt consolidation, and he said something so important,
and he said, whatever is written in the settlement agreement
about some by be taking on the other person's debt
(23:02):
as part of the settlement. Have you called the credit
card companies and asked them if they will recognize that
new person. Have you called the lone consolidation, the mortgage company.
You have to call these people and say, listen, I'm
getting divorced and one spouse wants to take over my debt.
Are you going to allow it? Because they may not
(23:24):
allow it. They just want to go back to the source.
Or what if one spouse opened to credit card and
what they charged was not for the health and welfare
of the family. What if it was online gambling, a
visa card, online gambling and it was created during the marriage.
(23:47):
Credit card company doesn't care whether it was for the
health and welfare of the family or not. They just
know it's community debt. They're going to go after whoever
they can to pay for this debt even after your divorce. Shocking,
isn't it. I think one of the big issues these
(24:12):
days is real estate, though we've seen real estate prices
climbed so much in the past decade, and when couples separate,
it seems like the first and most important consideration is housing,
especially if you have kids, and a lot of times
that's also a family's biggest asset. Right they bought a
long time ago, they have some equity, and but in
a lot of cases, even if they sell that house,
(24:34):
they can't afford to set up two households. That's why
I think divorce is considered one of the greatest destructors
of wealth because you know, it doesn't as we notice
with grocery shopping, right, it doesn't really cost that much
more to shop for two people than it does for
one person. You know, I don't have to pay any
more rent because my husband lives with me. This is
a major problem and a major source of fear for
(24:55):
couples thinking about getting divorced without a doubt and you're
in California. We're both in California. Everybody knows what the
California a real estate market. It's insane, like, who can
afford these prices? These are crazy prices and for what
you get, it's ridiculous. And there are other states and
cities like this as well. California is not stand alone.
(25:18):
People are emotionally attached to the house. It's their memories,
it's they maybe somebody was the one designing it, and
it's very difficult for them to consider selling the house.
But sometimes it's the only thing that makes financial sense.
And at the end of the day, even if they
went to court, that's what the judge would more than
(25:40):
likely do, is order that the house be sold so
that you can clean up the rest of the settlement,
and so if go ahead. But here's the other side
of it. So let's just say the couple wants one
person to keep the house and the other person is
going to move out, and you can pay me my
(26:01):
community portion share later when you're able to refinance. The
one who's going to stay, well, the one who generally
wants to stay, not all the time, but generally is
the one who can't afford it. And it's for the kids.
We don't want to disrupt the kids. And I completely
get that argument, but the kids couldn't care less. The
(26:23):
kids did not buy the house. They don't have to
pay the mortgage, in the property taxes. They're used to
the house. But at the end of the day, all
kids want is for their parents to get along. They
want to keep their friends, they want to stay in
the same school if possible, and they just want their
parents to get along. So, if selling the house makes
(26:45):
the most financial sense, sell the house and then somewhere
else hopefully, sorry David, hopefully. Yeah, especially here on the
West side of l A. It is definitely bonkers. The
prices here need a million dollars to get something possible.
So if you were sitting with your clients and you
(27:05):
could go back in time, right, what do you think
they would change to prevent this all from happening. Let's
go down a template of your inner marriage. I don't
know if you're married, Judith, how do you keep your
you were, so you're a divorce and I naturally had
an amicable divorce, and I'm really proud of that. I
was in the entertainment industry at the time and Um,
(27:28):
we both met on the circus. He was he was
a musician and I was a marketing director. And this
wasn't exactly why he asked for a divorce. There were
many other issues, but he was having a relationship with
a Bemmon trainer, and so that was that was infidelity.
But honestly, I didn't get upset. I must be the
(27:50):
weirdest person walking the face of the earth. That was
merely a symptom to me. That wasn't for me to
focus on. Plus I liked her, she was really sweet.
I just looked at now, this is a sign the
marriage isn't working. I knew we had issues, surprised that
we weren't going to go to therapy first, But I
didn't get mad. I didn't try and prevent anything from happening.
(28:11):
I was enormously sad. I accepted my reality, and little
did I realize, I went through the emotional divorce first
before the filing, and so I could just go back
to I remember what that was like. It was hard.
The emotions were hard to process for so many different reasons.
(28:33):
But um, even though they are, and even though there
was infidelity, I still I didn't want to be horrible.
I wanted to be a nice person and and I'm
proud of that. So moving, so let's rewind. So, so
if if, if, maybe in your case or in your
(28:54):
client's case, if you could go back in time and
you had a healthy marriage, what are some steps you
would take to prevent a lot of the rabbit holes
that you see your clients going into. There's a thing
called discernment counseling, and you discern whether this is the
right step for you or not, and you it's it's
couples counseling, but with a very specific point to it.
(29:16):
And the point is one of us wants to get
divorced and the other doesn't. That's generally the situation. If
both people want to get divorced, then great, you know,
then it's fine, it'll be it'll be maybe an amicable
divorce if they're both into it. But this is generally
one person doesn't want to be thinks they're kind of
(29:36):
blind sided, but nobody's really that blind sided. You're just
not picking up on queues generally. Generally, Um, So there's
discernment counseling where you go to a therapist and you
work through why one person wants to be divorced and
the other person doesn't to see if there can be
(29:57):
a union going forward, and if they're can be great.
Now you know the things you have to do to
make it better the relationship. But if it can't be,
now you know the things you needed to learn so
that you don't make the same mistake in the next
relationship and so that you can be very accepting of
(30:17):
the divorce and have an amicable divorce. So how a
financial A little checklist before I leave you? What should
you be sharing with your partner? Get your finances and order.
So let's assume you're living in the same house, and
because you can't live in two different places, you've had
the divorce talk, but you have to stay in the
(30:39):
same house until you get professionals involved on some level
me as a mediator, an attorney. Somehow you get legal
professionals on board to help you understand the decisions you
have to make going forward. So you're living in separate rooms.
And one of the disclosure forms is a fine financial
(31:00):
disclosure form, and that is very helpful in organizing what
your budget is going to be separately going forward. It
looks like it looks at what you're each making for
a living. If only one of you is working the
other isn't. Now you're you have a budget going forward
to tell you what you have to make now if
(31:23):
there's going to be spousal support as part of your
um financial package. Maybe spousal support isn't enough for you
to pay your bills on this projected budget, but you
at least have a framework to operate in, so now
you know what you have to make to compensate for
(31:43):
what you need if spousal support isn't going to be helpful.
The hardest part is when people have separate households radically
different incomes. Maybe they both work, but it's radically different incomes,
but they've already have separate households, and one person is
paying not only their new bills, but most of the
(32:06):
bills on the house they just left. And there's children.
I mean this, let's just compound this. Well, that person
is not creating debt in the interim until they get
professionals on board to help sort things out, and then
the reality just becomes Okay. The person who's going to
(32:26):
be getting child and or re spousal support really does
have to look at changing their jobs. That is their
reality because this other the person supporting all of this.
It's not gonna last forever. They can't keep going into debt.
So these are very important but tough conversations, and it's
all about you both have your monthly budgets going forward, okay,
(32:51):
And I want to leave with the kids, because this
is often a big question right when you separate, And
this is everyone's biggest fear, of course, is do most
states still prefer the mother and hoterosexual relationships? Is that
how it works or is that changed? Nope, that has
definitely changed. Most of the courts look at both people
being capable of being with their children and taking care
(33:13):
of them, and it's the phrase is called best interest
of the child, And what the court systems have felt
over the last years is the best interest of the
child is to have both parents. Even in a gay couple.
It doesn't matter because both parents aren't the same. They
don't express themselves in exactly the same way. They bring
(33:35):
different philosophies and experiences to their children's lives, and so
children need, if possible, children need a balance of both parents. Plus,
kids get attached to their parents and and gender doesn't
matter anymore. They just get attached to their parents and
want to see both of their parents. So I don't
(33:56):
want men in heterosexual relationship to worry that the court
still looks at women to be the primary caregivers. They
do not. They really look at it as an equal
division of time. Well, that's a big relief to a
lot of men out there. I have one last question.
(34:17):
I see a lot of ads that say men only
divorce law firm or women only divorce law firm. What
do I need to know about that, Judith, Well, there
is a gentleman who's doing a podcast called Divorce Shield.
He started as a divorce attorney, so he's still an attorney.
(34:38):
He got tired of litigating and he wanted to be
a divorce coach and a mediator, so he has a
men only uh divorce coaching business because he felt men
were underserved and men have fears that are different than
women's fears. And I also think men are an underserved
(34:58):
community in the divorce world, that everything was heavy on women. Um,
but but that's not so. Women have a plethora of coaches.
But when you see divorce attorney specializing in men, I
get scared. That's what fears, which makes me afraid divorce
(35:21):
coach for men. I think they're important. Women have that
had the coaches for years because women look for services
like that, and women have gotten into the coaching business
far more than men. But I don't see divorce attorneys
skewed for women. I only see some divorce attorneys skewed
for men. That scares me because the divorce the male
(35:47):
divorce attorneys specializing in men seem to be the angriest
people I have ever met. And when the divorce attorney
is naturally an angry person, you're gonna spend a ton
of money thinking you're represented by somebody who who who
(36:08):
will help turn the court around. The court doesn't need
to be turned around anymore. The court is. It is
there for the fairness, especially when children are concerned. Um,
they're there for both spouses for their children. Um. But
but interview attorneys, not all attorneys are created equal. Interview attorneys,
(36:30):
you never know who you're going to feel connected to
the best, and you have to connect with them the best.
And remember this, you are in charge of your attorney.
Your attorney isn't in charge of you. Your attorney knows
what to do to file, but you are in charge
of the decisions. Do not let your attorney make decisions
(36:54):
for you, especially if your gut tells you they're wrong.
Follow your gut. Well, that's really good advice, Judith. I'll
have to check out your podcast, The Amical Divorce Expert Podcast. Judith,
thank you so much for taking the time to talk
to us today. It was a pleasure. Thank you for
asking me, and I love your podcast by the way,
I have listened to episodes. I think this is a
(37:16):
great service you do. Thank you, David. Well. That was
a lot of really important information about getting divorce, something
I hope I never have to experience. Fortunately, so far
I've been able to avoid that. Divorce is something that
touches us all and right now I have several friends
(37:36):
who are going through divorce. So thanks to Judith for
giving us all these tips. There's something that's definitely going
to go into the file for future use. And I
want to thank my team up producers Rob and Scott,
as well as Cheyenne and my executive producers nuking Rich
and Debbie Myers. If you're enjoying follow the profit, give
us five stars so that others can learn about the podcast.
(37:58):
And we actually read those views so that we can
learn what we can do better. Follow The profit is
a production of ging Which I heart Radio. For more
podcasts like this one, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Part of
the ging Which network
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