The possible social fallout can be one of the most stressful parts of a divorce, especially if you are a successful professional. You and your spouse probably share many friends, and some of those people will feel like they have to take sides in the divorce. You can expect that you will lose at least some of your shared social circle in a divorce.
The consequences of your divorce could have a ripple effect that even impacts your career. If stories about substance abuse or domestic violence reach your co-workers or boss, you could find yourself at risk of losing your job or at least of losing the opportunity for advancement.
How can you protect your privacy when you find yourself facing an imminent divorce in California?
Mediation can help you resolve your issues outside of court
The main reason that divorce damages reputations is the information that spouses share about one another in court. Outlining the details of someone’s substance abuse problem or cheating may be important to getting a fair outcome in the divorce, but it can also mean but there is a long-term public record about that misconduct.
Rather than litigating your divorce and needing to air all of your dirty laundry in front of a judge, you and your spouse might want to consider mediation. In a successful divorce mediation session, you will address all of the major issues from your marriage that could influence how you divide your property or shared custody of your children.
However, those conversations won’t become part of the public record because mediation is confidential under California state law. Provided that you can reach a workable settlement, your agreement after mediation can pave the way to a quick, uncontested divorce filing.
Uncontested divorce offers more benefits than just privacy
Being able to resolve all of your major disputes without talking about them in open court is absolutely beneficial, but mediation has much more to offer than just confidentiality.
You and your spouse are in a position of control, which means that you can set all of the terms for your own divorce rather than handing that authority over to a judge. If mediation is successful, the uncontested divorce that follows will typically be much faster than a litigated one and therefore much cheaper as well.
Learning about the various solutions available at the end of your marriage can help you find the best approach for your upcoming California divorce.