We talked in our last blog post about the misperception that lingering in a bad marriage is a better decision in terms of one’s financial well-being than going ahead with a divorce. This may be due in part to the stereotype of a drawn-out courtroom battle in which bitter, resentful former partners litigate down to the last detail.
Now, granted, in some cases there are perfectly legitimate reasons to fight hard in a divorce, and many family law professionals will be willing to stand up for the rights of divorcing Dallas residents in court. But maybe you and your partner feel that it’s time to move on in separate directions, and you’d like to wrap up your affairs together efficiently and respectfully. You might even want to be friends again at some point down the road.
The fact is that more and more spouses have found themselves waking up to this realization in recent years. For them, the legal system has evolved an option we call collaborative law divorce.
In this process, each spouse works with his or her own legal counsel to settle all of the issues that must be resolved at the end of a marriage. They inform their representatives in advance that the goal is to work together towards mutually agreeable arrangements. Not only does this spare them from potentially painful litigation, but if the couple has children together, it can help safeguard them as well.
Now as many of our Dallas readers will recognize, collaborative law is by no means the right answer for everyone. Partners must be mutually trusting and respectful; if even one of them cannot work with the other in this way, a more traditional divorce will be a better alternative. Our collaborative law resources can provide more information for interested readers. As a firm with decades of experience in this field, we can also discuss whether this may be a worthwhile option in a specific situation.
