It was another very painful lesson for one of my clients. Even seasoned lawyers don’t get it. High Conflict divorce is a different game. Chaos and confusion are rampant. Normal processes don’t work in these cases. Chaos is the main tool that is used in these cases. Not only by the difficult ex-spouse, but by their attorneys to deflect from the real issues at hand and throw off everyone, including the judge. My client learned from her lawyer’s glaring mistakes that he had no idea what her ex (and his lawyer) were capable of in this battle. Perhaps she should have gone Pro Se? In this case, I believe that she would have been better off on her own. At least then there would not have been “pre-trial” meetings with the judge without her and of which she was given no real information about what her lawyer presented- or did

The third piece of advice is that if you are in a divorce with a difficult or High Conflict spouse, your lawyer MUST understand High Conflict personalities and what they are capable of doing to derail your case. To illustrate, in my client’s recent post-divorce case after 8 months of back and forth, she found out (while in a court hearing) that her lawyer was unaware that he had missed a clause that her ex’s lawyer had added to the bottom of a court order after one of our previous status court dates.  «Discovery closed.» was scribbled at the bottom of the court order.  Her lawyer had missed it and signed off on the fact that he could no longer ask for or give any more evidence in our case. So, when she went to a hearing (of course she did because that way the lawyers make more money, silly)

The Guardian Ad Litem (GAL) made time to call and interview all the people on Kari’s list of character witnesses. The GAL interviewed the children with Kari and not Tom. She called no one on Tom’s list of character witnesses and family members nor made ny effort, when asked by Tom to do so, to follow up with them. Tom was in disbelief that the GAL seemed to believe all of Kari’s lies and her belief that Tom was the less capable parent. Her subsequent report and suggestion to the court was that Tom only have visitation one night per week for 2 hours and every other weekend with the children ending on Sunday evening at 6pm. Also, that Tom pay child support to the mother based on the increased parenting time with Mom. Kari and Tom both have similar incomes and there was never a question as to the

A few days before the final hearing date, my ex’s lawyer sent an email to my real estate agent informing her that my ex had a tax lien on the house for over $600,000 so the sale would not go through. That was it. No explanation for why this information was not brought forward to the court when it had been placed on the home six months earlier. His lawyer just emailed my realtor. No letter to the court. So, on the hearing date, his lawyer calmly told the judge about the lien. Not before, just right there in court. That day is like a murky nightmare but I distinctly remember the judge leaning over and saying to me, “Well, the IRS wins, you lose.” I was pro se by that time and I just stood there numb. My husband never was held in contempt for not re-financing me off of the mortgage. My name was now on