Abby Tolchinsky

As a divorce mediator and lawyer, sometimes I feel like I've heard it all. I am terribly hard to shock. And yet, yesterday something shocked me: a divorce announcement via email. What's more, it was both thoughtful and tasteful.

The thrust of the email: We have been married a long...

While the world is preoccupied by the very public and briefest of celebrity marriages (think Kim and Kris) we family and divorce mediators see images of a prototypical young couple with no children, married for a short time, going through divorce -- every aspect of their lives important fodder for...

Holiday season and another new year often accompanies a good deal of soul-searching and taking stock on one's life. For some this leads to divorce, or contemplation of a divorce. While we would never want to minimize the pain and stress associated with divorce, there are definitely distinct approaches with...

From Paris to Albany, Washington to Sacramento, Masters golf courses to backstage after-parties, the world is abuzz with the shocking echoes of men in power behaving with recklessness, selfishness and disrespect, not to mention outright violence. The list is long and ever growing, Kennedy to Edwards, Gingrich to Vitter, Sanford...

It's the off-season and we miss Don Draper, not just the eye candy but also the charming, seductive bad boy who, when last we saw him, was about to marry his secretary. So we were relieved to see his off-screen self, Jon Hamm, featured smiling in the New York Times...

What are some of the latest tools parents are negotiating into their mediated agreements? Just like revolutionaries who are finding innovative ways to use technology in their quest for true freedom, so too can embattled parents find Twitter, Facebook, Skype, et. al. remarkably effective tools for connecting with children and...

If you have figured out that mediating is the least expensive, often least acrimonious way to get through a divorce, we offer you our primer for using attorneys to help support you as you negotiate the terms of your future.

But eyes wide open, mediating means you are taking on...

What is the "good divorce?" For each couple, indeed for each person, it may mean something different. But a generalization about divorcing parents in mediation: they want to remain, if not friends, at least communicative and civil as co-parents. One way of achieving this is to set down a detailed...

We've all had friends or family or celebrities we adore from afar, fight a custody battle worthy of the Sharks and the Jets. Not to mention the $100,000 plus price tag of these battles, unaffordable to most mortals. One of the most shocking things about Halle Berry's current custody battle...

We all know about the costly crystal smashing, bank account decimating divorces, not to mention the years of therapy for the kids to be able to look the both of you straight in the face. It's been all over TV, the movies and every celebrity magazine you've ever glanced through....