Newsletters 

Briefs

by Tom Noble ¹

214-692-1888
fax: 692-8577
tnoble28@hotmail.com

A newsletter for attorneys, mediators, financial planners, mental health professionals, and wisdom seekers

4.4.99

Dallas Loses Mediation Giant
No matter how entrenched, no matter how unreasonable or heated the exchanges, no matter how slow the progress, he never lost patience, never flustered, never ran out of ideas. Dallas will sorely miss Peter Chantilis.

Mediating Temporary Orders
You get a lawyer; your spouse gets a lawyer. Are you in conflict yet? Do you have any disputes to resolve? If you employed someone to help you make peace as soon as possible, would that save you any money? What about wear and tear on your psyches?

Why do most local family lawyers believe mediation will only be productive after they have spent large sums of money on temporary hearings, discovery battles, depositions, and conference after conference? Mediation offers a better alternative to litigation when it produces a more satisfying resolution at lower cost to the parties. If it costs just as much to reach a mediated settlement as a litigated settlement, some will ask, "What's the point?"

Judge Dee Miller and Claudia Dixon from DMS deserve credit for instituting a new service at the courthouse for on-site mediation of temporary hearings.

Coming Events for Mediators
"Mediation and Marketing: Mystery or Magic" by Mary Louise Hopson on 4/22/99 at 7:30 a.m. at Belo for free.

"The Golden Dime: The Tenth Anniversary of the DBA Mediator Training Program" at Dick's Last Resort in the West End on 5/27/99 from 5:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. Schmooze until your heart's content with local judges and court coordinators.

Family Law Mediation Strides
In contradistinction to prior years, enough family law attorney-mediators showed for the Association of Attorney-Mediators Annual Convention to justify a room larger than an average walk-in closet.

Welcome New Dads!
Truman had wanted a child, a family, a white picket fence - nothing fancy, just the basics. Three years after they married, his wife gave him a son. Six months later she gave him notice that he was a total drag in stark contrast to a female co-worker with whom she was smitten.

Truman's divorce lawyer laughs when Truman tells him that he wants to see his son at least half of the time. After all, he lived for this kid. "Who has been breast feeding the child?" asks Lawyer. "Who took off from her job for maternity leave? Had you taken a leave of absence from your job and spent more time with your son than your wife did, you might call yourself a PRIMARY CARETAKER. But, since you didn't, you're SOL, buddy".

"That makes a lot of sense", thinks Truman. "Who would have made the money we needed for rent, groceries, and Pampers, not to mention the AOL subscription so that my wife can e-mail her lover at all hours?" Truman tries plan B: "So, I get every other weekend and Wednesday nights, right?"

"Negative," says Lawyer. "Because your kid is only six months old, the court will not let you have him for longer than a few hours at a time; and, it will certainly not let you have him overnight until he is on the cusp of the terrible twos."

Many divorcing fathers with children under the age of three find themselves in Truman's position. For years, mental health professionals have preached to family law judges that children must bond with a primary caretaker to assure proper development. Until fathers learn to breast-feed, they start out two rungs down the primary caretaker ladder. Local psychologist, Dr. Jan Dilepsy, stepped up to the plate at last year's State Bar Advanced Family Law Seminar and criticized this institutional exclusion of fathers from the parenting process, arguing that good parenting meant involving fathers rather than excluding them. Dr. Barbara Rila presented the counter-argument to the March meeting of the Dallas Bar Family Law Section, spiking her speech with tales of child murderers with whom she had personal experience and knew quite well to be the products of improper bonding. In a culture of dead-beat Dads who ignore children as well as child support obligations, should we discourage a motivated Dad who wants to spend time with kids, especially little kids whose parents are divorcing? While the experts decide, Truman will have to take what he can get and hope that less when it comes to kids is really more.

1. Not Certified by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization