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The Divorced Dadvocate: Divorce Support For Dads
Dads face unique issues during and after divorce. We identify and address the issues relevant to divorced/divorcing dads and create an action plan to survive and thrive!
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The Divorced Dadvocate: Divorce Support For Dads
253 - Should You Welcome a Parental Coordinator or Decision Maker (PC/DM)?
If you're a divorced or divorcing dad, the idea of a "parental coordinator" (PC) or "decision maker" (DM) might feel like another loss of control. Courts sometimes assign one when parents are high-conflict or consistently stuck on big issues. It's normal to feel suspicious or defensive. But like everything in divorce, there's a mix of positives and negatives you need to know — with real-life examples to make it clear.
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Hello and welcome to the show. Thank you so much for tuning in this week and listening. I sincerely appreciate it. Today we're going to talk about whether or not you should welcome a parental coordinator or decision maker into your divorce or divorce case. Those are sometimes also called a PC slash DM, parental coordinator being the PC decision maker, being the DM, pc DM. We have lots of guys that talk about this as to whether it's a positive or negative in their case, and it came up again on our group call this weekend and also with another guy that's in our group as well. So I realized that I hadn't talked about this on the show and it's an important potential thing that could be beneficial or it could be negative.
Speaker 1:But before we jump into this in specific detail, let me just welcome our three new members to the Divorced Advocate community, that is, nate, jake and John. Welcome to the community and if you're not part of it yet, check out the Divorced Advocate website at thedivorcedadvocatecom. All kinds of resources, from free to paid, there to help you get through this difficult and challenging time. And if you find something, or if you're looking for something and you can't find it on a website, I would sincerely appreciate if you would reach out to me and let me know that it is something that you need, and perhaps it is a resource that I have in my back pocket or I haven't thought about and we need to get that up there and help out some other guys as well. So check out the website and jump in. Do not self-isolate through this. Listen to the podcast, reach out to other divorced dads, get the help that you deserve and need.
Speaker 1:All right, so should you welcome a parental coordinator or decision maker PCDM into your divorce? So the idea of one of these folks, a PCDM, might feel like a loss of controls, because sometimes courts will assign a PCDM to a case, especially when parents are in high conflict or they're consistently maybe stuck on a single big issue. Sometimes parties will agree to that because of a suggestion by their attorney or attorneys, so it's normal to feel suspicious or defensive about it. What I've found is that lots of guys don't really know the ins and outs of the PCDM and the consequences good and bad of that. So there's a mix of positives and negatives, and so we're going to talk about those today with some real-life examples to try to make it clear. It's going to be pretty short and sweet. There is not a ton of stuff to go over as far as positives and negatives, and they're mostly super surface level, really, and what I would say up front here is take a listen to these if you've got one or if your attorney is recommending one, but it is very nuanced to each individual divorce.
Speaker 1:Lots of things in divorce are nuanced to your specific and individual divorce, because no family is exactly like your family. This is, in particular and, with that said, I highly recommend that, before you make this decision, you talk to a divorce coach about whether this is a good idea or not, particularly because they're gonna be able to look at things from a more macro perspective and they're going to know a lot more about your case. The divorce coach is going to know a lot more about your ex and kind of the dynamic, and so they're going to help you to sort through whether or not it is a good decision or not. Again, the attorneys have a narrow perspective around this. Lots of them like it and we'll probably get into this a little bit but lots of them like it because it takes things out of their hands and keeps couples or ex-couples families from being back in their offices and in court. That's one of the reasons. Also, the courts like it, but, as we're going to talk about, it is not always necessarily the best thing for you and for your family or for your kiddos. So again, the courts, attorneys, everybody that is involved, has their narrow perspective around this. Before you decide, get with a divorce coach, chat with them about this as well as let them get to know your entire situation so that they can help you make a decision.
Speaker 1:Let's start with some of the positives. The first is that there's faster resolutions to fights and disagreements or where things just can't get worked out, and instead of sending emails back and forth or waiting for an extended period of time. Some courts are up to gosh. I've heard like up to a year to get a court date and get in front of a magistrate or a judge, and sometimes those even get extended. A PCDM can step in and solve the issues much quickly. Now, when a court appoints this or you agree to have the court appoint it, what they do, what the PCDM does, is they will listen to both sides of the party and then they will make a decision based on what they feel is the best interest of the kiddos in the situation and then you are typically bound to that decision.
Speaker 1:I will say that there are different ways that you can structure this. Again, this is why it's really important to talk to a divorce coach about this. There are different ways that you can structure your PCD. Most of them are not binding. So they can make a decision, they can reduce it to paper and submit it to the court, but it is not binding. You can make it binding. However, those have their own implications in and of itself. If you give binding authorization to a third party to make a decision then, as you can imagine, that can potentially lead to a loss of control or some real issues around not having enough opportunity to state your case or if it is a biased PCDM, then that could be a long-term problem for you.
Speaker 1:But in the best case scenario, if you've got a PCDM and both are willing to abide by the PCDM's decision, then it can solve your issues quicker than having to go to court. So say, your ex wants to enroll your child in a private school. You think the public school is just fine. Instead of having to pay the attorney to file the motion, go through the entire process of what a motion entails the mediation in most states and then all the pre-meetings and then the disclosure and discovery and all that stuff, and then if you still can't come to an agreement, then you're having to go to trial. A PCDM will just talk to both sides and then makes a call, hopefully within days, but probably usually not more than just a few weeks. So that makes resolution a lot quicker and a lot faster. And that's particularly the case if two parties are relatively reasonable and you hear me talk about this all the time. If you are amicable, if you are relatively reasonable and you just come to just a place where you cannot agree on something, this would probably work well. Pcdm would work well If you are involved with somebody who has some mental emotion issues and is just not going to agree.
Speaker 1:You've heard me describe it as negotiating with a terrorist. They are not going to agree. You've heard me describe it as negotiating with a terrorist. They are not going to agree. Pcdm may or may not be the best case scenario for you, as you can imagine. If that is the case, then we're going to talk about the negatives and the costs. You're going to be always there, which is going to be a cost, but it will definitely be cheaper than going to court and that's the next positive. So I'll pause some more of the negatives around being involved with a PCDM and somebody that is just not ever going to agree and has mental emotional issues and is going to keep things high conflict. But another positive is lower legal costs. As you probably know if you're listening to this, lawyers charge hundreds of dollars per hour and PCDMs usually cost significantly less than that and can solve your problems a lot quicker. Like I said, and I've worked with a dad that was constantly dragged into court over his daughter's soccer schedule. If you can imagine that, which if motion and then go to trial, it just costs a couple hundred bucks to have the PCADM listen to both sides.
Speaker 1:If you're fighting and you're going through that, your stress that's going to be felt in your environment, your excess stress that's going to be felt in her environment. Kids pick up on that. When fights get decided quicker without dragging everybody into court, then the kids are definitely going to benefit. They'll even start feeling hopefully they kids are definitely going to benefit. They could. They'll even start feeling hopefully they don't feel like pawns. But if they do feel like pawns, then they're going to stop feeling like pawns because you're not going to be arguing over stuff. So so reducing stress for the kids is definitely one, and reducing stress for yourself as well, because if you're going through this, it's stressful. If you're having to go to trials is stressful as well. So when you reduce your stress, the stress in your environment is less and your kids are not going to feel that energy out there.
Speaker 1:Your ex is manipulative or constantly twisting facts. A good PCDM can cut through that. They're trained to spot some of this BS and they're supposed to be focused on the kid's best interests and not the adult drama. Now, like I said, this is not necessarily always the case. Some of them are not very good, just like any profession. But also, if you're dealing with somebody that might have some personality disorder and they're able to sway this PCDM and make things more difficult for you, then you just have added a layer of somebody else into the equation that you have to deal with and have to mitigate your ex manipulating as well. So, again, this is very nuanced and, depending upon your specific situation and what you're going through, it is highly recommended to talk to somebody before just taking an attorney or an attorney's recommendation on this. Some of you might not have a choice in this because the court might just assign this. But tread cautiously is what I'm saying and I've said it five times now and I'm going to say it five more times, all right.
Speaker 1:The negatives on a PCDM is the first you give up some control. They can overrule you on parenting decisions. For example. One dad was fighting to keep his daughter off of social media until she was age 16, but the mom wanted to allow that and the PC decided to allow that, and so obviously he did not like that outcome but had no realistic way to fight it without an expensive appeal. Again, this does depend upon the structure that you have. If you have non-binding, then a PCDM can make a decision, and if you don't like it, you can then still proceed to court. Now, that kind of defeats the purpose of having a PCDM, but sometimes that again, like I said, if two parties are reasonable and will try to work things out, or can usually work most things out, but just have come to a halt on a specific, specific issue or decision, then that could work well. A PCDM that has final say then would be the person and then you would have to have a very big, long appeal process if you did not like the decision, if it was a binding decision. So the next negative about it is inconsistent quality. I alluded to this a little bit earlier.
Speaker 1:Not all PCDMs are good. We are all biased to some regard, and the courts are biased, for sure, to a large extent, and some PCDMs are biased. Some are just flat out lazy. I have run into that personally myself and didn't get their stuff done. Others are power hungry and want to be the ones running your life and so that, as you can imagine, turns into a nightmare. One one dad shared that his PCDM barely read the emails or facts he submitted instead, or instead just rubber stamping one, whatever the mom said.
Speaker 1:So if you are going to get into the agreement with a PCDM, vet them significantly, and maybe that would be another show that we can talk about. But your attorneys are going to recommend the PCMs that they work with. Your ex or soon to be exes are going to recommend the PCMs that they work with. Your ex or soon-to-be exes are going to recommend the PCDMs that they typically work with. If you haven't figured this out yet, family law court is a cottage industry and everybody knows everybody else. So it's not like any of these PCDMs are how would I phrase this in a nice way? They're not based upon any kind of performance rated criteria. That's the best way that I can put it. So just because your attorney recommends it doesn't mean that this is a terrific PCDM. Maybe they've had some good experiences with some of their clients, maybe they haven't.
Speaker 1:Even so, it's incumbent upon you just like I talk about all the time you are the coach of this divorce team to vet this PCDM. It would be the same as the episodes that I have talked about in how you vet your attorney. I would talk to the PCDMs before. I would get their take on their feelings around fatherhood and the importance of fathering, masculinity, etc. I would also ask them if they have any.
Speaker 1:If you're in high conflict and or you think that your ex is, you think, or your ex has been diagnosed with a personality disorder, talk with them about that and their abilities to handle situations like that, because that's a really, really big one. The probability is that you're going to be saddled with this person for multiple years in making decisions. So you want to make sure, as anybody that's going to be making decisions on behalf of your family, that you have vetted these people and that you feel incredibly comfortable in it. This was a mistake that I made. This is also a mistake that I've seen lots of guys make, which is just agree to one of them. Now you might not be able to get to do that because the court might just assign it and then you're stuck. But if you can, if you can vet, make sure to do it and go into detail with them.
Speaker 1:The next negative is that there is some added costs. While it's cheaper than court, pcdm fees aren't free. You're usually going to split the cost and it can add up. However, you can create this situation any way you like. One thing that I've seen some of the time is that if both parties will agree that if the PCM decides in the favor of one party or the other, then the other party has to pay the PCDM fee. Now what this does is it encourages people to negotiate and come to terms with things, but it also dissuades people from coming to the PCDM with an issue if they're just maybe being obstinate and don't have a really good argument, because if they lose that argument and the PC rules against them, they're going to have to pay those fees. So that's maybe a little check and balance that you can put in there. That might help you a little bit, especially if the finances are an issue and you want to make sure to do whatever you can to dissuade the other party from perpetually bringing stuff up and into the court and not coming to some sort of agreement. All right.
Speaker 1:The last negative on a PCDM is the potential for micromanagement. I mentioned the power-hungry ones earlier. A bad PC can start inserting themselves into everything that every parenting move that you've got going on. So imagine getting emails about bedtime disputes, or we can pick up locations. You can end up getting suffocated and resent, losing the freedom to parent your way. We have already, by just entering into family law courts, relinquished some of that freedom. So the less freedom that we relinquish the better, particularly considering the fact that there is a bias that is against us in the family law court.
Speaker 1:So that is a major, major consideration and I'll say it one more time that make sure to talk with somebody in intimate detail about whether or not this is a good decision. I've seen lots of guys get saddled with PCDMs that just end up being an absolute nightmare. I've experienced that myself as well that it was not a good experience and so. But I've also heard good experiences too. So the devil is in the details and while you're going through this your first time, you might not know what those details are. And again, find a divorce coach. That's going to help you with all of this, that's going to help you sort through it and look at things from a macro perspective.
Speaker 1:So having a parental coordinator or decision maker it can be a lifesaver or nightmare. It really depends on the professional assigned, how well both parents cooperate and how much you're willing to let go of maybe winning every battle. If you're considering or stuck with a PCDM, treat it like a business deal. Be as professional as you can. No, just be professional. Document everything, pick your battles, protect your relationship with your kids above all other things for sure, all right.
Speaker 1:Well, that's all I've got for the PCDM. Feel free to reach out to me at jude at thedivorcedadvocatecom, if you've got questions on this. Again, it is complex and nuanced and not something that everybody knows about, and attorneys like to recommend it often and it can be good, but it can also be a nightmare, so just beware. Hope you found some value in this topic today. If you did, please share it far and wide everywhere you can. Social media friends Get this help not only gets you, but everybody, every other dad out there the help and support that they need and deserve. Do me one solid and give me a star rating on whatever podcast platform you're listening, or give me a comment that helps other dads read that and want to tune in and get help for themselves as well. Thank you so much for listening this week. I sincerely appreciate it and God bless.
