A friend asked me the other day what I though of family law mediation so I thought I would share my view. For those of you who don't know mediation generally works as follows: each party is in their own room with their attorney and the mediator goes back and forth between the rooms to try and facilitate an agreement between the parties.
Mediation is not necessarily about everyone getting what they want but it is about getting a deal that everyone can live with. That being said, I think it is great in a lot of family law cases. That is not to say it always works, but I believe it is better to try mediation before going to trial, especially where children are involved.
Parents going through a divorce are under a great deal of stress and it is imperative that they be able to move forward so that they can successfully co parent their children for the rest of their lives. A heated trial where "all the dirty laundry is aired" can take a long time for parties to recover from. In the alternative, in mediation the parties don't have to bring all of this out in open court, instead they stay in their own room, they don't even have to face the other party during negotiations.
In my opinion, in the majority of family law cases mediation should be tried before trial- it is worth it to try and protect the emotions and families to the fullest extent possible while still achieving a result that everyone can live with.
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