Psychological Custody & Co-parenting Mediation Methodology
PREMISE: Most divorces involving custody disputes are highly acrimonious and present many challenges to the parents following separation and divorce. Old Town Psychological Services offers a custody & co-parenting mediation service as a component to the custody evaluation service. It is our philosophy that a more humanistic and potentially logical solution can surface through a mediation process that involves the participation of both parents as opposed to a court imposed decision. We also strongly believe that a process that improves the environment for effective co-parenting is clearly in the best interests of the involved children.
COMPONENTS: The initial phases of this service center on comprehensive evaluation. The mediator must be apprised of all extenuating circumstances including the psychological status of both parents and the general condition of the respective home settings. The evaluator must also be familiar with the children involved including their psychological status and their personal views on the custody dispute and what they would like to see occur in the immediate and long range future.
The mediator will typically meet individually with the co-parents prior to meeting together. Each parent will be required to establish goals and outcomes for this process. In most cases spouses and/or significant others of the parents are not to be included in the initial phases of this service.
Court and attorneys are the typical referral resources for this program. However, we welcome referrals directly from motivated parents.
SPECIFIC TRAINING REQUIREMENTS: This program is operated by a licensed, doctoral level psychologist. It is critical for staff members of this program to be aware of a unique and vast range of information. Knowledge and familiarity of childhood development, divorce issues, co-parenting challenges in two home settings, conflict resolution, etc. are a just a few of the critical areas of expertise needed to provide an effective form of this mediation service.
OTPS staff takes pride in our vast experience in this area. Our clinic has been providing this type of service for over a ten year period. Our lead clinician in this program is a licensed doctoral level psychologist who specializes in helping to improve environments that involve high conflict divorce/custody dispute issues.
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