HOW WE HELP FAMILIES LIKE YOURS

Our process will generally involve all members of the family.

We will have individual sessions with each parent, to understand your perspective of the relationship and its challenges. With this knowledge, we can help you identify how to communicate with the other person in a way that is more likely to elicit a positive response.

With your consent, your children will then be interviewed by our child consultant so we can gain an insight into their view of the parental relationship.

Following this, and with your child's consent, we will share our learnings from the child interview in a joint parental feedback session, allowing you to understand how the changing nature of your relationship is being understood by your children. By placing the child at the heart of the process, and taking the time to understand both parents as individuals, we are able to support you in resolving your separation in a way that makes the whole family feel optimistic about the future.

Traditional, or solution focused mediation, as is routinely practised in the UK, can often lack an appreciation for the causes of relationship breakdown and instead focuses solely on resolving current issues of separation.

While this can be useful in the short term, our approach allows you to address the fundamental causes of relationship breakdown such as conflict and communication styles. This insight equips you with skills that allow you to establish and maintain a long-term co-parenting relationship that is amicable and collaborative. We understand that you don’t want to be in conflict with the other person and we will provide you with support and tools to separate in a positive way, settling your separation outside of court.

While we draw on counselling techniques, this process is not just solely driven by therapeutic principles. It is informed by over two decades of experience in counselling, family mediation and child consultation in a family law environment.

This allows us to help you get to the root of any problems quickly, to resolve your separation in an amicable way.

Our Civilised Separations service is often a quicker, kinder and more cost effective way to resolve your separation.

In the UK, a divorce settlement through the courts will usually take around six to eight months and will cost £15,000 on average.

Our process helps you to work together to find a resolution that works for the whole family, and can be concluded in as little as 4 weeks.

The amount of sessions required will be dependent on your specific family situation. Some are able to complete the process in as little as one session per individual, and one joint parent session, however others need several sessions over a longer period of time.

Most of the people we see have contacted us on the advice of their lawyer. We work collaboratively with these professionals, who are genuinely concerned about the potential collateral damage the legal process might cause to the families they are trying to help. We can work in tandem with a court focused process, or we will ensure that when, and if, you go back to your respective lawyers, you are dedicated to resolving your separation arrangements with new hope and goodwill.

Yes, we often work with individuals to help them through separation.

We allow you to see the relationship differently so that with our support, you can learn to approach your partner about settlements or co-parenting in a way that is more likely to lead to collaboration and cooperation.

We can certainly help you, whatever your situation might be. Our process can be adapted to help address any recurring or specific challenges you may be facing in your relationship.

We recommend getting in touch for a free consultation to discuss how we can best work together.

We help you to address the painful aspects of your relationship and learn how to view the other parent from a place of compassion. We take this approach as it has been shown to be vital and transformative when things are at a stalemate. We work with you as individuals, and with your children, so you can understand the impact of your relationship on them, allowing you to make decisions that are not only better for you, but for the whole family.

Our approach is flexible and effective at improving relationships, regardless of if you’ve already separated or are still together.

While our philosophy is based on child-inclusion and family repair, we recognise that all families look different and yours may not include children. If you think you could benefit from our support, please get in touch and we will do our best to help you.

Our Civilised Separation service has been designed with over 20 years experience working in family mediation and draws on research and legal precedent in other countries, such as Australia, which mandates child inclusive mediation for all separating couples. This approach is also beginning to be recommended within the UK legal system.

We believe that our approach will help ease the pain of separation for you and your children, by supporting you to create new relationships that suit the changing shape of your family.

The breakdown of the parental relationship can be a significant trauma for children and can profoundly impact on how they manage their future relationships. Our approach will allow you the opportunity to understand how your separation has impacted them, thereby informing your future parenting whilst you support them as they grow and mature.

We have been working with children as part of our Civilised Separation process for several years. Bella, our child consultant, is trained to adapt the process to suit the needs of the child. If a child shows any signs of distress, we immediately stop the process. Both Bella and Bill hold valid DBS checks for working with children.

We work with children as young as 5. Bella has a decade of experience working with young children, and will adjust the process to be age appropriate. There is strong evidence to support the inclusion of all children in mediation, which can act as a therapeutic outlet for the child as well as providing the parents with valuable insights into the mental wellbeing of their children.