S4 E11 Rachel Kennedy Talks Mediation Tactics for High-Conflict Divorce Cases
Jun 19, 2024
Welcome back to The Crazy Ex-Wives Club! In this enlightening episode, host Erica Bennett sits down with Rachel Kennedy, an experienced family mediator with a deeply personal connection to her work. Together, Erica and Rachel unpack the intricacies of mediation, discussing its role in fostering communication and conflict resolution during divorce. They delve into the importance of understanding power dynamics, managing heightened emotions, and the value of taking time in the mediation process to avoid future legal pitfalls.
Rachel, drawing from her background as a therapist and her own challenging divorce, details how she stumbled upon her passion for mediation and emphasizes the restorative methods she employs, sharing examples as diverse as a couple navigating parenting time over the holiday season to another couple who resolved their divorce swiftly in one session. Erica adds insights from her own experiences, reflecting on her journey of separation and the emphasis on core values to guide decisions.
This episode is rich with advice, personal anecdotes, and practical tips for anyone navigating the emotional terrain of divorce, offering a compelling perspective on finding cooperative, respectful solutions outside the courtroom. So, grab a cup of coffee and join us for another transformative conversation on The Crazy Ex-Wives Club.
Learn more about this week’s guest Rachel Kennedy:
Rachel Kennedy transitioned from being a stay-at-home mom to a beacon of support for individuals navigating the tumultuous waters of divorce. Initially, she began offering informal assistance to those in abusive situations, driven by her own life experiences. This led to the official founding of Gathering Hope, Minnesota, in 2021, an organization dedicated to helping women — and occasionally men — through the challenging process of divorce. As her children grew older and she faced a major life shift, Rachel sought a deeper way to fulfill her passion for supporting others, deciding to return to graduate school to become a therapist. Her journey from informal aid to a structured support system highlights Rachel’s unwavering commitment to helping people rebuild their lives during one of their most difficult times.
Listener Offer: Anyone who books with Rachel and says they heard about her on the show will get 50% off their first session.
Rachel Kennedy Talks Mediation Tactics for High-Conflict Divorce Cases FULL TRANSCRIPTS
Erica Bennett [00:00:00]:
I think we've all heard of mediation. We probably have been through some sort of mediation. Today, we're going to do a deep dive into mediation because it can be such a valuable tool, you know? And even outside of the mediation process, learning how to communicate, how to mediate issues as they come up can be really valuable as you need to work with your ex or need to work with anybody in your life right now. So let's get started.
Erica Bennett [00:00:35]:
Welcome to the Crazy Ex Wives Club, a podcast dedicated to helping women navigate the emotional journey that is divorce. I'm your host, Erica. And if you're trying to figure out life after the big d, welcome to the club. Whether you're contemplating divorce or dealing with the aftermath or any of the many phases in between, the club has got you covered. Each week, you'll hear stories from women who have been in your shoes. This isn't about spilling tea and divorce details. This is about giving you the tools to take control of your own healing journey. Listen in weekly for advice, tips, and tools to help you move through each stage of the process.
Erica Bennett [00:01:15]:
Hey, guys, it's Erica and another episode of the Crazy Ex Wives Club. Today I have my guest, Rachel Kennedy with me. Not only is she also a fellow divorcee with children, but she's also a family mediator and the president of Gathering Hope, an organization that supports women and children coming out of domestic abuse. She has helped a lot of people navigate through all that uncertainty of finding their feet, of being able to move forward in a healthy manner. So welcome, Rachel. Excited to have you here today.
Rachel Kennedy [00:01:48]:
Thank you so much, Erica. I'm happy to be here.
Erica Bennett [00:01:50]:
Yeah, absolutely. And now I know how you landed in mediation was kind of in part from your divorce. So tell us a little bit about that.
Rachel Kennedy [00:01:59]:
Yeah. Funny enough, it's actually entirely because of my divorce. It was never on my radar before, but it's been about nine years for me that I've been out of my marriage. My divorce process took four years. It was all terrible. Every part of it was heartbreaking and scary and expensive and all of that. So probably about a year or so, probably less than a year after I got out of my marriage, people started coming to me, asking for support. My other friend is going through a divorce.
Rachel Kennedy [00:02:29]:
You know, can you help? Or they're in this abusive situation and all that. That's part of my story, too. So I started kind of unofficially helping people, and then back in 2021, we officially started gathering hope, Minnesota. So that was kind of my first unofficial and then official way of helping women as they were going through divorces. I was kind of in this major life shift. I had been a stay at home mom with my kids, and then I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do in life after, you know, they were getting older, and I was kind of just working part time jobs. But I had this passion inside of me to keep supporting women going through divorce, particularly, and men at times. But my original remedy to that deep calling I felt in my heart was to go back to grad school to become a therapist.
Rachel Kennedy [00:03:24]:
Absolutely loved that. Love school, love mental health. But it was taking a ton of time away from my kids. And I will say mediation was on my radar by that point. I thought, I'll just get through school, I'll be a therapist, then I'll become a mediator, because a lot of therapists are also mediators, and vice versa. Well, just totally, serendipitously, out of nowhere, I had the opportunity to take the state mediation training last year, and I loved it so much. And kind of at the same time, my school schedule was just really taking over all my time with my kids, which is already only 50/ 50, so, like, I already don't get to see them half the time. And then my school was at night, and I just wasn't seeing them.
Rachel Kennedy [00:04:11]:
And so I made the leap to drop out of school and pursue mediation full time.
Erica Bennett [00:04:18]:
Nice.
Rachel Kennedy [00:04:20]:
Yeah, I just. And I've heard some people do have good mediation experiences, but mine were so bad, scary, expensive, and I just was like, I'm pretty sure I can do better than that. So my whole mission as a mediator, at least in the divorce space, is to give families a better experience than what we had in our family. Yeah.
Erica Bennett [00:04:46]:
Yeah. And I think it's so common, too, that divorce. I mean, it creates a completely different person. So it's so normal that people shift careers. For me, it shifted what was really important. You know, I had always been a trainer. I'd always been a behavior specialist. 20 years of corporate behavior training. Trust me, I could get it down to the tiniest thing you need to do to be successful.
Erica Bennett [00:05:07]:
But I didn't want to talk about just that the mind was so much more important. I go, the mind is controlling everything we do. If we can rewire the mind, the behaviors will naturally change. So, like, why are we taking all this time to try and control behaviors when all we have to do is free the mind? So. I love that. So you wound up a mediation. Well, that's a bummer that your mediation was terrible. Mine was funny.
Erica Bennett [00:05:29]:
I guess it was. It was.
Rachel Kennedy [00:05:32]:
I've never heard that one before.
Erica Bennett [00:05:33]:
Right. I say it's funny because in the moment, it wasn't. So I ended up in mediation twice. But the first time we went to mediation, we had shown up, you know, the ex. And I will. The ex brought the fiance, and.
Rachel Kennedy [00:05:46]:
Okay.
Erica Bennett [00:05:47]:
She was not supposed to be in the main mediation room. Right. They have their own room. They can discuss every single topic. But at the table was, like, the two parents, the mediator, and if anybody brought lawyers, I did. He didn't have one. They refused. They were.
Erica Bennett [00:06:03]:
They were like, look, he's not going to make any decision without you. Like, you'll be in. He'll consult with you on everything. And she refused to allow us to be in the same room without her being present. So I said, peace out. We're not doing it. And they left. And they had to pay for the whole cost of the mediation because they walked out and refused to participate.
Erica Bennett [00:06:22]:
So that's why, like, it was super frustrating. Yeah. But it's also kind of funny because I was, like, in the. In the mediation company we use. Everyone just sat there, and they were like, we've never had this happen before.
Rachel Kennedy [00:06:37]:
Yeah, this isn't supposed to happen.
Erica Bennett [00:06:39]:
We don't really know what to say to you right now. We've. We've never seen somebody do this. So, anyways, so we did go back because things didn't get better. They continued to deteriorate. They continued like, it was like, okay, well, either I got to take you to court, or we got to actually try this. So. Ended up allowing her to have a seat at the table.
Erica Bennett [00:06:59]:
Brought a different lawyer, a fighting lawyer, instead of a collaborative divorce lawyer. I was like, look, we're on a different level now, and I'm done. I'm not messing around with this anymore. So we're here for everybody to learn their lanes. So. Yeah, but I found. And I don't know if you have the same thing, but before we could do mediation, we had to do a parenting class, and that was super, super helpful. And so I don't think that that's usually standard, either.
Erica Bennett [00:07:22]:
We had to do a parenting class, um, to. To understand what our child was going through. So before you even show up and try and re argue what's best for anybody, you got to go and really sit and think about, what is this doing to your kid, and what do you want to have happen for them?
Rachel Kennedy [00:07:41]:
So, I like that we didn't do that, I like, that though
Erica Bennett [00:07:45]:
and that really helped change a lot of things. Right. Because it put it. Went back and put the focus on what was important. Like, yes, I was angry that he wasn't cooperating and he wasn't communicating. And the new fiance felt that she was the supreme power in a lot of things, you know, like, a lot at their house. Right? Like, because she's the now the female of that house and felt like she got to create the rules. I get all that.
Erica Bennett [00:08:09]:
No hard feelings. But it was annoying, you know, I understood where she was coming from. But taking that parenting class really was a wake up call again, of, like, get real clear on what's important and have some compassion and have some understanding, because everybody is hurting, and it could get a lot worse. And I was like, I don't want it to get worse. I want to work together with them. So then I was like, all right, well, then let's let her have a seat. Let's try this again. Because that's why we had our divorce decree.
Erica Bennett [00:08:39]:
She said, I didn't write it, and I didn't agree to it, so I'm not following it. And that was a large part of our problem that landed us back in mediation, because she had decided there were new rules at her house. There were new rules, and these things weren't allowed. And so it's like, you know, what do you do? That's. That's the crappy part about the courts and the divorce system is like, you can be right. I was right. I had the legal document. It still cost me thousands of dollars because they wanted to fight everything, and there was no system.
Erica Bennett [00:09:08]:
It's not like you can send the police over, right? Like, there's no system that comes and gives them a little slap on the hand or a parent that tells them that they need to shape up, they're breaking the rules. It'd be me spending thousands and thousands and thousands and years dragging them back through the court, trying to get them to cooperate, which doesn't help anybody.
Rachel Kennedy [00:09:27]:
Was probably going to happen.
Erica Bennett [00:09:29]:
No, but mediation, one of the things that I wanted to actually talk about is you had mentioned restorative mediation, and so I think that it'd be really helpful for listeners to understand if there are different types. Kind of like, we all thought there's just divorce attorneys, but now we know there's collaborative divorce attorneys, and we know there's different types, and so talk to us a little bit that.
Rachel Kennedy [00:09:54]:
Yeah, so I love that you mentioned the collaborative attorneys. I know several of them. They are in the collective that I work with, kind of the group of mediators that I work with. Because the collaborative law area really meshes well with restorative mediation. So there's a lot of crossover there. I'm going to just take a step back and just kind of describe the typical mediation that most of us know, and then I'll go into talking about what restorative mediation is. So typically, we've got facilitative mediation. That was what I did.
Rachel Kennedy [00:10:27]:
It felt really scary to me, actually. I'll just say most of the parts of the divorce felt really scary because I'd never been there before, but it was skyscrapers in downtown, and you couldn't find the office buildings and the guys in suits, and it just was. It felt really intimidating. And then I felt that I was really pressured into agreeing to stuff that I really knew I didn't agree to, but everybody was kind of staring me down, and it just. It was a really uncomfortable experience. And they're very much kind of an extension of the courtroom, and it's meant to feel that way, so.
Erica Bennett [00:11:03]:
And that's when it can go so bad. Right. Because there's lots of very bad lawyers, lots of very bad court systems, lots of people, like, I've recently had a client dealing with somebody who was assigned to their case to help them come up with a third alternative who just did below the bare minimum. Yeah. And still sent the bill. And I'm like, what did this? What did this person even do? They literally did nothing but told you to go back and work with your ex. And that's the reason they're there, was because you couldn't work together.
Rachel Kennedy [00:11:33]:
Do you think we'd be here? Like, come on, now. I wanted to bang my head against a wall probably more than a few times. Like, if we were capable of working together nicely, we wouldn't be in your office. Thank you very much. So there's also transformative mediation, which is a little more people centered. Still not really my thing. And actually, that is primarily for workplaces, not as well studied in family cases, we'll say. Okay, so restorative family mediation is super exciting.
Rachel Kennedy [00:12:06]:
It's pioneered by my personal mentor, Lisa Walter. She's here in Minnesota as well. She teaches the classes. She coaches a lot of us. It's a pretty new form of mediation, and I just love that it's really collaborative. It's really respectful. It's really kind. I kind of say, when you come to my office, the vibe that I want is respect, autonomy, and cookies like that.
Rachel Kennedy [00:12:33]:
That's literally it. It's. We're respectful. Where I've got a comfy couch with fuzzy blankets and nice pillows, and I've got cookies, and I just. I want it to be. I mean, it's a big process. I'm a professional. It's not exactly like going to a friend's house, but I want it to feel more like going to a safe place to have a safe, respectful conversation rather than what I experienced.
Rachel Kennedy [00:13:01]:
And it sounds like maybe you experienced where it's just this scary.
Erica Bennett [00:13:05]:
The boardroom.
Rachel Kennedy [00:13:05]:
Yeah, yeah, the boardroom. And you feel like you have to wear your nice dress and heels because everybody else is, you know, and, like.
Erica Bennett [00:13:11]:
And I think because I worked in a corporate office and we were always in me, that was normal. You know what I mean? But I can see now, seeing from your side, if you're not. Like, we were in a conference room. I had meetings in conference rooms all day long. I worked in the beauty industry. I was always in heels. I was always dressed up and wearing all black. Like, that was my norm, so none of that fazed me.
Erica Bennett [00:13:32]:
But I can definitely see now. So thank you, my little light bulb. I'm like, oh, that's not that, That setup
Rachel Kennedy [00:13:38]:
that was not safe at all. I lived in the suburbs, had the, you know, three kids in the minivan and the white picket fence, and I was a stay at home mom, and we went to church, and we had playgroup, and, like, I mean, whatever. I look back at that now, and I'm like, that's not my life now, but that was my life then. So going into downtown and the big, scary parking garages and all the, you know, like that just. It all felt scary. I mean, in addition to the emotional and the mental and the financial and all the other areas where this divorce is so difficult, too, that just kind of added to the scary unknowns for me. So in restorative mediation, it's. It's legal, it's through the courts.
Rachel Kennedy [00:14:24]:
We're qualified through the courts, so we're on the same plane as the other mediators. But the way that our mediation looks is different. One way that's different is that we use a native, an old native american process called circle process. I don't know if you're familiar with that. Some people are from different areas.
Erica Bennett [00:14:44]:
I probably am, but I'm going to need you to explain it, because there has been lots of native american studies in crossing over in a couple of my careers.
Rachel Kennedy [00:14:53]:
Oh, I love that. Yeah. This was actually new to me as I was learning mediation, but now I'm learning that people use it in different areas of life. But basically, if you're in the same office, which we are. Sometimes I actually do more of my work on Zoom than in my office, but in person, we sit in a literal circle, not at a conference table. It's just. It's the couch, it's the coffee table. My office, honestly, kind of feels like a living room, just with a desk in it.
Rachel Kennedy [00:15:19]:
And we use what we call a talking piece, which can be anything. It used to be a feather. I've got some pretty shiny rocks in my office. We can use that. I mean, you could use a pen. It's more the physical representation of. When you have the talking piece, you have the opportunity to talk, and I have the opportunity to listen. I'm not trying to zone out.
Rachel Kennedy [00:15:41]:
I'm not trying to yell over you. We really try to see that as an opportunity to listen to what you're saying and try to internalize it and try to engage, and it really slows the process down, and it slows down people's emotions. I will often start out a session by, like, actually, I'm thinking back to when you were talking about. We just had to go back to what was most important. We had to remember our kid and our kid's best interests. Sometimes I'll even say, hey, guys, since the last time we met, can you each share your favorite thing that happened with your child? Okay, let's get in that mindset. Let's think about our cute little kids smile and what's in his best interest. As we're now launching into this conversation about parenting time, you know, and I.
Erica Bennett [00:16:30]:
Would say that was something I was not ready for. So we showed up, and I'm like, all business. I'm like, we're here to discuss the issues, so let's just get the list of issues out. And they kept being like, well, tell us about your child. And I'd be like, he likes, you know, a, B, and C, and he's this old, and da da da. Can we talk about the issues now? They would be like, no, hold on. Like, we need. So I think giving people that cue, you know, like, hey, let's first start and focus on what's really important.
Erica Bennett [00:16:59]:
So let's just have a conversation about your child or, you know, who's in the middle, that would have helped me, because I am real, like, all the business. Just get to the business. Let's just get this done. I was. I was ready to be done.
Rachel Kennedy [00:17:11]:
This is so funny. I'm learning a lot about you as a person, too, because, like me as a person, I'm really relational, which I think is why this restorative family mediation resonates with me personally. And I'm also the type of person where, professionally, my work has to align with my values. It has to feel meaningful and important to me. And this absolutely does. It just, it feels like what I tell some people are, like, restorative. Like, I'm not trying to restore this marriage. I'm trying to get divorced.
Rachel Kennedy [00:17:47]:
I'm like, okay, I know, I know. Like, I'm divorced to. I've been there. I get it. But what we're trying to restore is a sense of peace, a sense of cooperation, a sense of whatever got us to this point. We've got these kids in the middle, and how can we work together for what they need? And what I always tell people, too, is, especially when you have kids, which a lot of, not all my clients, but a lot of my clients do have minor kids still. This is not the end of this relationship. This is closing one chapter and writing a new chapter.
Rachel Kennedy [00:18:21]:
And so what we really work on in my office is, what is that next chapter going to look like? You guys get to write it. You've been writing the story of your family for quite a while now, often many years, even sometimes decades. You've been writing the story of your family now, again, whatever got us here, I don't know. That's not really my business. But we're turning the page. We're writing a new chapter. What's that going to look like? And I really want to give my clients the opportunity to write that chapter on their own, rather than handing everything over to a judge who has never met them, never met their kids, really doesn't care. The judge is just pushing papers across her desk.
Rachel Kennedy [00:19:03]:
She doesn't really care about the children in the middle of this whole situation.
Erica Bennett [00:19:07]:
Yeah, 100%. Because you're you. When you get divorced, everyone's like, great, it's over. No, it's not. Now that there are kids in there.
Rachel Kennedy [00:19:14]:
No, it's been nine years for me. And we still are in contact, I'd say at least a few times a week, because we still gets together well.
Erica Bennett [00:19:23]:
And then they're like, oh, when the kids get 18, then you don't have to know, because now you're dealing with if they go to college, after college, you're dealing with if they get married. If they get married, do they have grandbabies? Like, it's forever? It's not about. This is. Yeah, this is not now. Just done. It's, what does our new relationship look like? And so in that way, yes, you do want. You want. So you had a.
Erica Bennett [00:19:47]:
You had a loving relationship. You were married. It deteriorated to absolute nothingness, probably deteriorated to hatred, which is worse than nothingness. And now you're sitting in a restorative mediation to get it to come back to respectful and neutral. You're not trying to get it to be Kumbayasa in a circle. You're just trying to get it to be a place where, hey, I get what you're trying to say. I get why that affects you, okay? I can do this or I can do this to try and help it out. Like, you're just trying to get to neutral because you have dug it in a hole.
Erica Bennett [00:20:19]:
That's why you feel crazy, right? Your emotions are out of control. Big hurts. Big inner wounds are coming out. It's driving you to do things that you don't want to do, but then you do them, and mediation can be that. That thing. And I think what you said is so important, too. Or you leave it up to the courts.
Rachel Kennedy [00:20:35]:
Right, right.
Erica Bennett [00:20:36]:
And they're. And they're going to decide just based on what the average does. Right. You know, what's the average that's important? Kids should be in their school district. Kids should be where their primary caregiver lives. The mom might be more of a nurturing primary caregiver. Right. There's just some general, broad strokes that for most people may be kind of sort of true.
Erica Bennett [00:20:59]:
Like, you know, like, probably for the majority, yes. Your mom probably nurtured you more than your dad. I mean, my parents were married, and I'd still say my mom nurtured more than my dad. They had different roles. Okay. But that doesn't mean that when you're looking at each individual family, that's still the best option. And then it depends what state you're in because, good lord, some states are very, like, I got one story recently about a couple, married, no kids. He's taking all her money because she worked the big jobs and there's no kids.
Erica Bennett [00:21:30]:
And. But the state is, like, we're fair. Split it 50/ 50 even though she worked for it. Right. And then you've got other states where they've got kids and the. The mom has them, but isn't. Is refusing to work and the dad's having to cover all the costs. Like, it totally depends on the state, the judge you get.
Erica Bennett [00:21:51]:
So this is where taking the time, and I do mean time, you don't want to rush the mediation process. Give everybody the time they need to get through it.
Rachel Kennedy [00:22:00]:
Yep. Yeah.
Erica Bennett [00:22:06]:
Hey there, it's Erica, your companion on this journey at the Crazy Ex Wives Club. I want to make sure that you're aware of all the tools at your disposal as you navigate through this chapter of your life. First off, head over to the website thecrazyexwivesclub.com. take the finding your way forward quiz. It's designed to give you personalized insights, key behaviors you can start doing right now and it won't cost you a thing. Then, if you're looking for a bit more support, check out services. There are on demand resources, there are coaching programs, and there are other support options to help you in your healing process.
Erica Bennett [00:22:43]:
I value having you in this community, being a weekly listener and sharing it with those people in need. So thank you for walking this path with me together.
Rachel Kennedy [00:22:55]:
Yeah, I. I have one couple right now who has one child. And I want to say it took the first like seven sessions to get through talking about parenting time that is not normal, but for this family, and it happened over this past Christmas and stuff. So we had like two different meetings that were specifically like, it was their first Christmas apart. Their child is young, so they really wanted to take the time to figure out, when is he with mom? When is he with dad? Mom's, you know, side of grandparents are flying in, so how can we make sure he gets to spend time with them? Dad still side of the family is here. And I'm like, okay, if that's what we need to do to help you guys kind of move into this next chapter. And this is your first holiday season apart. I mean, it was a whole, I was meeting with them, you know, thanksgiving through the new year, and we're still meeting, but it was just a whole, you know, that time of year, the whole cascade of holidays.
Rachel Kennedy [00:23:53]:
And it was like, okay, it took a lot of work to figure out what that's going to look like. But I think we set a really good foundation for what their family can work through then next year and ongoing years. That's not typical. We don't really usually spend that many sessions talking about one child's parenting time, but for them, that was what they needed. And that's the beauty of this, is that we can just tailor it to whatever, whatever the couple needs. I had another couple who had no kids and they literally walked into my office. They said, we already figured everything out. We just need you to write up the paperwork for us.
Rachel Kennedy [00:24:27]:
And I was like, let's just talk. Like, did you talk about this? Yep. How about that? Yep. Well, is there anything at all that you guys didn't agree with or agree on? And they're like, no. I was like, okay, so my typical sessions are 2 hours long. They were out of my office in, like, 45 minutes, and I wrote up their paperwork, and that was the only time I met with them. So it's. It's kind of all over the board, but we can tailor it to whatever.
Rachel Kennedy [00:24:53]:
Whatever families need.
Erica Bennett [00:24:55]:
Yeah, and that's the thing. Like, your mediator is just that neutral party that's helping to balance the facts on both sides, the needs on both sides. You know, hey, they're. They're saying they need this so that it doesn't get into the emotional reaction. Because if. If it wasn't getting into an emotional reaction and both people were willing to show up and be respectful and own their part, then you probably would never land in mediation. Like, we wrote our own divorce decree. We decided what it was, we figured out what we wanted, how we were splitting everything, and that was fine.
Erica Bennett [00:25:27]:
Again, like I mentioned, until the fiance was like, I didn't do it, I didn't write it. And I was like, good lord. But I think that it's super important to talk about in any. In any time you're dealing with a big issue. Where you're standing on the other side from somebody else is to take your time on getting through it, because if you rush through it to just be like, I just want this to be over with. I just want this disagreement or this fight or this battle that we're in to be over with. And you try and rush to the finish line. A lot of times you agree to things that maybe you're not really lined up with, or, I'll figure it out later.
Erica Bennett [00:26:02]:
And then when later comes now, you have a bigger legal mess because you already had an agreement, and now you have to hire lawyers again and go through mediation again and go back through the courts again instead of taking the time right now to really look at each thing. So. So, okay, you had 45 minutes session, and you had seven plus sessions. How many times do you think people typically meet in mediation? What's an average?
Rachel Kennedy [00:26:25]:
I would say probably three to four, if they're pretty easy. Ten or twelve maybe. If there's a whole ton of issues. The ones who had seven just for the kid. We have quite a ways to go still, and we're probably at about ten sessions, and I bet we have probably at least five left. But like I said, that's not totally typical, so.
Erica Bennett [00:26:50]:
Right. And that actually sounds a lot like we had a collaborative divorce lawyer on. And that sounds a lot like what she was leading people through. You know, she's like, we're the lawyers, and we're going topic by topic, but we're bringing in who needs to be here now. Is it a financial advisor? Is it somebody to weigh in on childcare? Is it whatever? So bringing in those experts, and so you're kind of doing that same thing, but with them bringing the topics and being like, okay, here's the topic we need to decide today. Yeah. I think that mediation can be really helpful if. If you're at a place where you just don't trust that the other person is going to show up and really say what they need or want or that they're just going to fight you.
Erica Bennett [00:27:27]:
To fight you, or when you just become really polarized in what you think the right answer is. It can just be helpful to have somebody in the middle.
Rachel Kennedy [00:27:37]:
Yeah. Yeah. And I will say there are a lot of different ways that people get to mediation and a lot of different types of mediation. If you file first and you go the typical court route, you're going to probably be sent to the Enes, the social ene, the financial ene. That's an entirely different process. I would say when I'm working with divorce cases, and I do a lot of other family related stuff, too, but when I'm working with divorce cases, typically people that come to me have not filed yet. And I would say that's ideal, because the way that the process works often is that we work through all the issues. There's all the state statutes about all the different things you have to have in your decree.
Rachel Kennedy [00:28:24]:
We work through all those issues. I write up the memorandum of agreement, which says, these are all the things that you guys agreed to, whether they agreed to everything outside of my office, like the one couple, or whether we're going through topic by topic together, which is more typical, I write up that memorandum of agreement, I give it back to the couple, and then they can either, like you said, you wrote up your own stipulation. People can do that if they want. They can go through the county help desks to get assistance with that if they need it, or they can hire attorneys for kind of like a one off. The attorney will just look through the memorandum, like, go over everything with them, help write up the stipulation, but you don't have to actually, like, retain the attorney and pay them tens of thousands of dollars. Typically, they'll have kind of a flat fee to just look over the memorandum and help button up those details. I have some great attorneys that I work with. Many of them are collaborative attorneys.
Rachel Kennedy [00:29:20]:
People can use their own attorneys, whatever they want. If people, sometimes people hire attorneys outside, bring them into the mediation process, I would say most often people don't because they don't want attorneys involved. But if they do, that's fine, too. So there are a lot of different ways this can look, but that's kind of the typical progression of a divorce.
Erica Bennett [00:29:41]:
In my, so I am sure that in your sitting in the middle, then you have seen a wide range of the power dynamics and how they have played out. And I think that that's really the hardest part. Right. Because if you weren't hurting, if you weren't having your own reactions and triggers to what they were doing, you'd be able to come together and come up with your own agreements and, and that's not always the reality. In fact, that's the minority.
Rachel Kennedy [00:30:08]:
It's right.
Erica Bennett [00:30:09]:
Real low that, that somebody can walk away and own their feelings and come back and still work together. So how do you balance that?
Rachel Kennedy [00:30:16]:
That's a great question. I will say I see a lot of tears, a lot of yelling. Sometimes I have people that stomp out of the room, which is especially fun in a Zoom meeting. They just, like, close down their window without saying goodbye, and I'm like, okay, cool. I have special training in high conflict cases, actually, because there's a lot of crossover with my DV work. And so I haven't shared this yet, but I have a team of mediators that I've pulled together for high conflict cases, including domestic violence, but also just where there's exceptionally high conflict. And I've trained all of them in how to navigate these types of situations. The biggest part of our team is that we comediate.
Rachel Kennedy [00:31:02]:
Typically, I mediate on my own, but if there's just a major power dynamic like you're talking about, if there are safety concerns, that type of stuff, we comediate, which means there are two mediators and then the two parties. So that really helps to even out that power dynamic and helps keep the conversation safe for everybody. A lot of times in the domestic violence cases, we will have maybe a safe word where they can let us know. I'm not feeling comfortable. I need to take a break. We have different ways of meeting with people online or meeting with them in two different offices where we go back and forth. We can also do that by phone sometimes where there's, like a two hour appointment, but we'll do ten minute phone calls, like back and forth. And then I would be in between and help navigate that.
Erica Bennett [00:31:56]:
So when you said it that they have to feel safe, and even outside of domestic violence, conflict. Right. In any of these situations, as you're navigating through divorce, it is your feelings of safety that are under threat, and that's why you're reacting to them. So even if it's just arguing about where the money goes or how the house is split, that's still hitting all your feelings of safety. And so being able to be in a space where you're like, okay, I am safe. Like, they've. They've got it if I don't have it, have somebody to be able to rely on. Because when your sense of safety is triggered, that's when we have all the reactions.
Erica Bennett [00:32:34]:
That's when we really do the things that seem to be so far out of character because our nervous system, our survival mode, has kicked in, and we are going to do anything and everything to be able to survive. You know, logic. Logic has gone offline. There is no more logic happening. We are in our feeling side. We are in our reactive side. Like, you're not getting. You're in your reptilian brain, the old brain, the fight, flight, freeze fawn.
Erica Bennett [00:33:04]:
Right? You can't. You can't logically come up with a good solution. You're just going to dig in and fight.
Rachel Kennedy [00:33:10]:
You're speaking my language, man. I'm such a psych nerd. I love all this, which is why it's so fascinating to me to see it in my office when that kind of stuff happens and it feels like a challenge, like a puzzle for me, when I can recognize, okay, this person's not quite being logical. How can we explain this? You know, because I'm neutral, because I'm out. I don't have any skin in the game. Oftentimes when people are in a state like that, I'm able to listen to the proposal that the other party has made, make sense of it in my own brain, explain it in a little bit of a different way, and then they can hear it from me and be like, oh, yeah, that makes sense. Okay, yeah, I agree to that. No, I don't.
Rachel Kennedy [00:33:52]:
Or whatever, because oftentimes I am dealing with two people who are really activated and really just kind of trying to fight or, you know, just. Just not quite logical for whatever reason and in whatever way that manifests. And so that really brings me back to my psych training to be able to kind of untangle that and help make sense of where they're both coming from.
Erica Bennett [00:34:19]:
Yeah. Because anytime you guys, you find yourself in that heightened situation, could be a family conversation, could be a work conversation, could be, you know, a divorce conversation. There are things you can do, and they're not always easy. They're not. But when you feel like you've gotten triggered, when you feel like you're heightened, right, you now know that you're not arguing for what your goal is. You're arguing to hurt. You're arguing to retaliate. You're arguing to get retribution, okay? And you know it.
Erica Bennett [00:34:50]:
You do know when you're arguing for those things, you have to be the one that walks away. And so if you're not in a mediation situation but you're at home and you're trying to work with your ex or you're trying to work with your current partner, it is like a. Hold on. I'm. I'm getting really angry, and I'd like to take a break. I want to put some space in this. I want to calm down, and I want to come back to the conversation when I'm in it. Oh.
Erica Bennett [00:35:14]:
Place where I do want to work together, and I want to be logical, because, to be honest, you'll not be logical in that situation. And you can't talk yourself back into a logical solution. The. The moment you are triggered and reactive and the reptilian brain is running the show and you're fighting or you're flighting, right? You can't reach a logical brain. You first have to attune to and take care of your nervous system. Go for a walk, put on music that makes you happy. Do some eft tapping, which I like a lot, even just the karate chops. Point.
Erica Bennett [00:35:46]:
So, one hand is flat. One hand is kind of like in a ball. And you're tapping the side of your pinky finger, the fleshy part of your hand against your palm. Tapping, tapping, tapping. It hits an anxiety point in there, a safety point, right? Tap to move through it. Take a nap. Right. What you don't want to do is continue to aggravate the out of control emotions.
Erica Bennett [00:36:08]:
Don't call a friend and bitch about it. You could journal it out. You can journal. Why am I mad? What do I really want? What am I looking for? But it's got to get to the well. How do I want to work together? And that can feel so dang impossible when you are super heightened. But that's the only way that we were able to write that first decree together is because there were times when I was pissed, and all of a sudden, I started fighting just to fight, and I'd be like, I have to walk away. I got to go back and find me. Tune into my values, tune into my own goals, tune into how I saw this as, this is going to be fine for all parties.
Erica Bennett [00:36:44]:
This is going to be fine. We can come up with a win win solution that works for everybody because I don't want anybody to be ruined through divorce, you know, no matter what the other person does, you don't really want them ruined. I don't care how, you know, the betrayal, the whatever, the lies. Do you really want them ruined? Like, your kid still loves this person, and wouldn't you just rather, like, be free, be on with your own little life somewhere else and stop trying to piss on mine, which means you got to stop trying to piss on theirs. Like, have some boundaries, build a fence, but don't argue just for the sake of arguing. And that's a hard personal development to get to.
Rachel Kennedy [00:37:30]:
I love it for you that you were able to get to that point during your divorce. I was not. I would say I'm at that point now, but it took, like, years. Years, because I was so activated and just. I mean, I honestly feel like I was in fight or flight for years, like, the whole time of my divorce, really. And there was other stuff going on in my life, too. I was fighting with a lot of health issues and stuff. So it wasn't just that, but it was so hard for me, and that's why I'm so passionate now about trying to help people figure their shit out, like, way earlier in the process, like, you're talking about, like, you were able to do.
Rachel Kennedy [00:38:12]:
I think that's so great.
Erica Bennett [00:38:14]:
Yeah. And, you know, obviously, it didn't. It didn't make it perfect. We still had other things to learn, and that was part of, you know, because in that two year separation, one year wholeheartedly, my only option was to try and save this marriage because I was too afraid to look at any other possibilities. And then the second year, I was like, huh? But what if. And so to spend a year in a space of. I was in my house that I already knew how to pay for because I was. I had paid the mortgage since we bought the house, so I didn't have any money worries, right? My salary was the same.
Erica Bennett [00:38:46]:
My mortgage was the same. Okay. Safety met. I could sit in this space now. Okay. So then he had already moved out. Okay. I know I'm.
Erica Bennett [00:38:55]:
Now I'm alone. Like, can I deal with the feelings? Can I deal with the. Whatever else and so I spent an entire year really looking at, do I want to stay or do I want to go? What would it feel like if I left? And even before that, what do I want in my relationship? How do I want to feel? What are the images and the pictures and the memories that I see? How do I want to show up for a partner? How do I want a partner to show up for me? And I just visualized for a year, visualized and watched as I communicated, could he step into that role? Would he even want to step into that role? I learned how to speak up, and I was like, hey, I want a partner who does this. If you're not ready to do this, then I think we're good. Like, I've waited. I've given you time. You've had lots of time to choose to show up. And so that was a really good blessing to have a long separation because it enabled me to get my feet underneath me.
Erica Bennett [00:39:55]:
I still tripped a whole bunch after it was finally filed. So you guys don't think I'm over here, like, just doing it perfect? I did not. I tripped hardcore after it was filed. And then a couple years later at, like, year three, which I think, no, you're two. Year two after your divorce. Hate to break the secret to you guys, but a year two after your divorce, you're going to hit another little, like, trip and you're going to be like, I thought I was done with this, and I didn't think I was going to hurt ever again. And it's back, but you get through it.
Rachel Kennedy [00:40:25]:
Yeah.
Erica Bennett [00:40:25]:
Anyways, I digress. It's hard work, and it's really about finding your values. You know, my values are love, abundance, and grace. And I live that focus and I have to remind myself, but figure out, what are your values? What are your core values that you want to embrace and then line up your actions to them.
Rachel Kennedy [00:40:46]:
Yeah, I love that.
Erica Bennett [00:40:48]:
Yeah, I love that. Well, thank you, Rachel, so much for joining us today. I hope you guys enjoyed this deep dive into mediation. It can be such a powerful tool. It's not therapy. It's not therapy. I think some people probably are like, oh, is this like a. It's not a therapy thing.
Erica Bennett [00:41:04]:
It's with an end in mind of a legal document of trying to find the common ground for the issues that are happening. Random question. Do you ever do, like, couple mediation when they want to stay married? Yeah, like kind of like a therapy, but not like, hey, we just have these points that we're. We're contentious on and we want to figure out, and so they could go to, you go to mediator instead of a therapist to just have somebody help you communicate and figure out what is really important to each side, what you each want. And how can both of you work together to overcome the problem? The other person is not the problem. Problems in the middle. Two of you have to figure out how to work together on it.
Rachel Kennedy [00:41:46]:
Yeah. Yeah. And the circle process, like I was talking about, is a really great resource.
Erica Bennett [00:41:52]:
I have done the circle process. Yes. Because that's what I was like. Well, tell me a little more. I used to actually use it in some of our trainings, some of the things that we would teach. It would be valuable to give people the space. So thank you guys for tuning in to another great episode of the Crazy Ex Wives Club. Until next week, take a little self challenge and reflect on finding your core values.
Erica Bennett [00:42:15]:
Make a big list. Make a list of all the core values that you embody. All the values, the truth, the honesty, the love, the respect. Just make a big old list and then start organizing them in what's most important until you get to three. It's insanely hard. Start with a list of ten, then keep going. And this is the work, finding your core values. So thank you, guys.
Erica Bennett [00:42:38]:
We'll be back next week with more.
Erica Bennett [00:42:43]:
And that's it. Another great episode of the Crazy Ex Wives Club, a podcast for women learning how to heal from their divorce. Tune in next week for more advice and tips to help you figure out life after divorce. And until then, give yourself grace. Do the best you can and know that this is all part of the process.
