Louise cadman

WHY I MADE THE CHANGE? FAMILY SOLICITOR to MEDIATOR

“No one knows you better than you do”.

“If you cannot decide/agree yourselves then a stranger will make a decision about what is best for your child/children.”

“It is likely that the Judge will make an Order that none of you are happy with”.

These are just some of the things that I found myself saying to clients on a daily basis.

Why let somebody else decide your future?

Why let somebody who has never met your children decide what is best for them?

After finding myself saying the same things to clients everyday I started to wonder whether I was in the wrong job.

The role of a Solicitor is to fight your client’s corner to get the best possible deal for them and when both parties have Solicitors who are equally fighting for the absolute best outcome for their client it is often the case that the matter would inevitably end up before the Court, for a Judge to decide and often compromise the position.

Why cannot we just compromise the position without needed a Judge?

As a Solicitor it is often difficult to encourage a negotiation and compromise as there is a fear that your client will feel that you are not acting for them or that you are taking the other parties side.

“Why are you not fighting for me?”

“Why are taking their side?”

“They have won, they are going to win!” these are phrases that I often heard from clients when I was trying to suggest compromise and resolving things in children’s best interests to avoid the Court process. It was at this point I started to think am I in the wrong job?

I have often been the one that people have come to for advice when they have problems whether that be work related, relationship related or any other difficulties as I was always able to offer mutual independent advice and help friends and family see things from someone else’s point of view and resolve matters amicably.

Why could I not do this in my job ? The difference was that client’s expected you to win and put quite simply when it comes to Divorce and separation there are no winners.

As a working mother I often felt that I was fighting things that I did not personally agree with, having children myself and having been through separation I understand both professionally and personally the importance of co-parenting and separating as amicably as possible and had seen many times in my career the impact on children, where parties simply could not co -parent. I have been quoted numerous statistics over the years from Judges about the detrimental affect of Court proceedings on children later in life and have spent most of my career trying to relay this to parties simply wanted “their day in Court and the fight”.

I decided in early 2020 to retrain as a Family Law Mediator to see whether my skills would be better placed elsewhere rather than having the fight. I embarked upon the course confident that it would be easy given my 18 years experience as a Family Law Solicitor, I found the course a real eye-opener with a lot of focus on psychology and emotions and how that could impact on our decisions and our way of thinking. It gave me a whole new understanding of people’s reactions and emotions in particular during difficult times.

I recall one of my key memories from the course that resonated with me was how anger is not really anger. Anger masks other emotions which often hurt and upset. This gave me the ability to understand with parties that seemed angry where they were really coming from, it helped me to look behind the angry to see what emotions the parties were really feeling and often that was upset but also fear for the unknown and the changes that they are now experiencing.

I found as a Mediator I could help people, my role was suddenly different it was not to fight it was to resolve, it was to actually help people come through a difficult situation and out the other side, not as winners or losers but as people who were able to move things forward to get on with their lives without the acrimonious animosity that Court proceedings create.

Whilst sometimes the past cannot be forgotten there is only one way forward in this life and that is the future and by helping clients to move things forward, this helps everybody rebuild the future following on from the separation in particular the children. The children did not choose this life, the children did not choose for their parents to separate and with mediation the parties can learn to co-parent separately effectively.

I have the benefit of legal experience as a Solicitor, a personal separation and experience as a Family Law Mediator to bring to my role.