6 Reasons Why You Need a Divorce Support Team

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When going through a divorce, it’s essential to have a divorce support team to help you through what can ultimately be an exhausting process. Since getting a divorce affects multiple aspects of your life, it makes sense to have a variety of team members who can collaborate to help you create the most beneficial outcome for your divorce.

By compartmentalizing the divorce process into different roles, you can build a reliable network of people who will help you meet the obstacles you encounter when separating from your spouse. A divorce team includes your friends and family who can offer emotional support. It can also be constructive to receive psychological support from a professional therapist or counselor, so you don’t feel alone on your journey. Additionally, you will need the guidance of a mediator or an attorney-litigator for the legal side of things, a divorce financial advisor for financial support, and maybe a mortgage broker and real estate agent who specializes in divorce.

Family & Friends

Divorce is a roller coaster of emotions and the sense of being newly single can make you feel isolated; reaching out to friends and family members you can trust helps you feel like people are on your side.

It’s important to be discerning with whom you confide in for advice, though. Friends or relatives who encourage you to “take him for all he’s got” aren’t the ones you want to be listening to right now. The most beneficial approach is to find guidance from people who can help you think through everyday decisions, as well as to clarify what is most important to you in co-parenting. Be careful, however, not to overly rely on your family and friends, they’ve only got so much room for your woes.

Divorce Mediator or Attorney

For almost everyone, divorce is a complex and time-consuming process. Generally speaking, you should start by considering a mediator to help you reach a financial settlement and develop a parenting plan with your spouse. If that’s not possible, a divorce attorney may be necessary to help you navigate complicated paperwork, set terms for child support, negotiate your divorce settlement, and represent you in court. 


Especially if you are dealing with an abusive situation, having legal aid also makes it easier to obtain a restraining order. All in all, having a divorce attorney on your support team will make it easier to resolve disputes and ensure y

Divorce Coaches

A divorce coach will assist you with the inevitable transitions divorce comes within a goal-oriented process that is intended to give structural and emotional support to you and your family.

Separating requires disentangling complex social, financial, and emotional aspects from you and your spouse’s life. A divorce coach can motivate you to envision the life you want to eventually lead and layout pragmatic steps to guide you there. Coaches provide a more holistic service and encompasses helping you process the divorce on a full scale.

Financial Advisors

A financial advisor on your divorce support team will help provide a better understanding of your expenses before and after the divorce. It can obviously be difficult to make sound financial decisions when engulfed in emotional turmoil.

By consulting a CDFAⓒ (Certified Divorce Financial Advisor) to understand all of your financial assets, you can ensure you receive your fair share in the divorce and have a clear picture of your financial future. They also help you plan your long-term financial goals, like getting out of debt or preparing for your retirement. 

Mental Health Professionals

In some cases, even having all four of these members on your divorce support team will not be enough. It’s important to have multiple tools and practices in your wheelhouse that enable you psychologically cope with the divorce, and the most qualified person to help impart these strategies is a mental health professional.

There are various methods of therapy for how to cope with uncoupling, including individual therapy like CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) or family therapy where a third party guides sessions that collaborate with your spouse and/or your children.

Divorce can be traumatic, and if unmitigated, can affect your life for years to come. By designing a treatment plan that benefits you, a therapist formulates a mental health roadmap that will take you from feeling overwhelmed and erratic to calm and capable of handling the obstacles of your divorce. 

Divorce Support Groups & Meetups

It’s essential to make time for socializing during a divorce and connect with others who are going through the same thing. Meetups have become a popular option for divorce support groups online and provide an easily accessible platform for a wide range of support groups, free of charge.

If you belong to a church organization, you can find community-based groups that meet to work through divorce together. If going to your local church is not a safe option for you, your community library or coffee shop may offer monthly meetings where you can listen to others and share your experience in a judgment-free setting. 

Divorce Websites and Apps

When divorcing with children, some courts may order the use of an app for efficient co-parenting or support payment management. If you intend on raising your kids separately, OurFamilyWizard is an app designed by a divorced couple to make this a smoother journey. An interactive calendar allows you to plan schedules and also includes an expense log for tracking shared costs. 

The SupportPay app allows you to manage, track, and pay for child support or alimony, and doesn’t necessarily require both parents to use it. You can upload receipts and invoices, and see exactly what is being spent, presumably on your child. 

Vesta Divorce can help If you’re at the beginning of your divorce and aren’t sure where to begin building your divorce support team. They provide a tremendous resource for information and professionals.

TruNorth Divorce is on Your Team

Hopefully, this guide will assist you as you build your own divorce support team. As you go forward, it’s best to remember this isn’t all on you; you have people in your corner that you can turn to for practical, legal, or financial advice…or maybe when you just need a hug.  


In the meantime, you can find out more about the divorce process through my free downloadable ebook, or reach out to me on Facebook with your questions. TruNorth Divorce is here for your support.

Divorce: How to Keep Your Money

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As soon as you begin to contemplate divorce, the nauseating, panic-attack-inducing realization of losing half of your net worth kicks in. You find yourself wondering if it’s even worth it to consider leaving if you’re just going to end up broke and starving.

There are ways to ensure that your financial future is not destined for disaster. First and foremost, be sure you involve a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA®) or CDFA®-Mediator so that you will be fully informed of all the creative settlement possibilities that may be open to you. They are your best bet when you want to keep your money safe.

A couple married 24 years were referred together to a colleague for assistance with their divorce. They had gone to an attorney together and were completely amicable. The attorney made it clear that he could only do their document preparation since he was ethically bound to represent only one party. That was ok, but they asked how they would determine their property division. He responded,

“This is a community property state so we’ll just divide each asset and each debt exactly 50/50.”

The couple just didn’t feel like that was the smart thing to do. They were referred to the CDFA® to explore options.

After gathering all of their financial documents and completing the analysis, the CDFA® put together two reports for the clients. The first reflected an exact 50/50 split as the attorney had suggested. The second was a creative settlement solution that also resulted in a net 50/50 split but took into consideration tax planning and consequences as well as the needs of each party as they planned for the next phase of their lives.

This couple had less than $800k in total net worth and the creative settlement solution resulted in an additional $20,000 EACH to their bottom line just because some financial intelligence was used to determine their settlement. That’s real money! That’s how you keep your money! Needless to say, the couple was thrilled knowing that they saved $40,000!

Don’t go into this blind. There are so many ways to ensure that both of you get to keep more of your own money. Get the right experts on your team. We’d love to help you! Call us today.

Three Critical Financial Steps in Getting Through Your Divorce

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Divorce can make it really hard to think straight about what to do next when it comes to most things and especially financial planning. Believe me, I know. The intelligent, together person you are can turn into an emotional, brain-fogged, unorganized mess. You try really, really hard to keep it together but you know this will not go down as “the best of times.” You want to sit down and get it together and plan your future but feel paralyzed and surrounded by a pea-soup cloud of indecision. What’s a person to do to ensure they’re doing the right things to financially plan for your divorce?

Well first, let’s get real.

ADMIT WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW

When it comes to the finances, what’s your role? Do you handle the family’s finances and investments? Are you on top of your investment accounts, retirement plans, bank accounts, etc.? If you’re in the dark, you need someone to help you turn the lights on and fast!  Gather all your financial statements on your asset accounts and your most recent tax returns, then find a specialized divorce financial advisor to help you out and bring you up to speed.  A CDFA is specially trained in the financial aspects of divorce and will be your best friend in this process. If you and your spouse are able to cooperate, you can use a CDFA-Mediator who will educate you and your spouse on the realities of your financial health and what your future might look like under various settlement options.

START ENVISIONING YOUR FUTURE

Maybe you’ve already been fantasizing about your future life or perhaps this has all taken you by surprise. Regardless, it’s time to start really thinking about what the next phase of your life looks like. Unfortunately, this has to happen at the same time that you are grieving what you thought the next phase might look like. But if you allow yourself some space, it can actually be very productive. You now have the chance to start from scratch. What did you used to dream of doing that got lost while you were married? Is it time to go back to school? Maybe live on a sailboat for awhile or move closer to family? Whatever you dream of, you have to have your budget and financial picture top of mind. So the step above has to come first so your dreams don’t outsize your wallet! A financial advisor specializing in divorce would know how to set you up for future success.

BUILD A SINGLE IDENTITY

Often through marriage many of the credit cards, mortgages, loans, etc. are in the names of both spouses. All of those accounts will have to be closed or converted. After the marriage is over, your credit picture may not be nearly as strong, so you want to be sure to put some things in place while you’re still married. Immediately open a checking and savings account in your own name to begin the process of establishing your own financial identity. Get a credit report and start monitoring it. Track your expenses and create a budget for now and post-divorce. Find a good rewards credit card to apply for in your name alone so that you will be assured of having access to credit through the divorce and beyond.  

These steps seem small but are valuable first steps to get you thinking financially and looking out for your future. You can get through this with a little help from an experienced divorce financial advisor. Having the right professionals on your side will be of great benefit to you.

 

 

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