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Every Child's Right
Child Support From the Beginning By Kelly Burgess
Much of the problems with late child support issues come from women who are worried that seeing a lawyer will make a relationship that is already rocky even worse. But Warren Hoffman, an attorney and expert on child support issues in New York, says that the courts are getting much better at separating the emotional from the financial.
"A breakup may be absolutely devastating to a family, and often it is, but the courts have to ignore the emotional side and just focus on the financial implications," says Hoffman. "They see it as the breakup of an economic partnership and you're compensated for your contribution by child support."
Furthermore, as Hoffman points out, early on in the breakup people tend to be a little more fair. Especially in the case of husbands and fathers, there is a guilt phase that keeps them willing to be involved. Then, the longer it takes, they become a little less involved, and their own expenses start coming up, and it becomes more of a battle.
Gross also notes that if a married woman is worried about seeing a lawyer because of the additional strain it may put on her marriage, then the simple answer is that her spouse doesn't need to know.
"There's always an emotional side and a legal side of divorce and what's important is to divide the emotional from the legal," says Gross. "For the legal issues go see a lawyer, and for the emotional issues you go to a marriage counselor. The lawyer can tell you what your options are – often they don't even charge for an initial consultation. Think of it as an educational process."
In Gross's opinion, most good family lawyers always discussthe possibility of counseling to try and reconcile rather than divorce. By the same token, Dr. Dorree Lynn
