The Smart Divorce Podcast

A week in the life of a Mediator and Supervisor

• Tamsin Caine • Season 9 • Episode 7

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In this episode, Tamsin is joined by Elaine Richardson, who is a family lawyer and mediator, to talk about her work and what she gets up to when she’s not with clients.

Elaine Richardson

"I am a family law solicitor, collaborative lawyer and accredited child inclusive Hybrid mediator.  I supervise other mediators as their Professional Practice Consultant (PPC) and I supervise family lawyers as their Family Law Supervisor.  

I am a trainer and presenter specialising in domestic abuse, safeguarding, trauma and high conflict.  I run my own business called Richardson Family Law.    I am a member of the national non-court dispute resolution committee for Resolution.  I’ve been a member of Resolution for over 25 years.  Resolution is a community of family justice professionals who work with families and individuals to resolve issues in a constructive way.  We have a membership of about 6,500.  I was recognised nationally as the winner of the prestigious John Cornwell Award in 2019 by Resolution.    

I have been trained by the High Conflict Institute of America to conduct mediations involving high conflict and I have also been trained by the HCI as a mediation coach to prepare and support people going into the mediation process (NCDR?).  I work for the charity shared parenting Scotland in this role.      I am a trauma informed and skilled lawyer trained by The Scottish Law Society."

https://richardsonfamilylaw.co.uk/

Tamsin Caine

Tamsin is a Chartered Financial Planner with over 20 years experience. She works with couples and individuals who are at the end of a relationship and want agree how to divide their assets FAIRLY without a fight.

You can contact Tamsin at tamsin@smartdivorce.co.uk or arrange a free initial meeting using https://bit.ly/SmDiv15min. She is also part of the team running Facebook group Separation, Divorce and Dissolution UK

Tamsin Caine MSc., FPFS
Chartered Financial Planner
Smart Divorce Ltd
https://smartdivorce.co.uk

P.S. I am the co-author of “My Divorce Handbook – It’s What You Do Next That Counts”, written by divorce specialists and lawyers writing about their area of expertise to help walk you through the divorce process. You can buy it here https://yourdivorcehandbook.co.uk/buy-the-book/

 

 

To learn more about our podcast sponsor Ampla Finance – access their product guide here: https://bit.ly/3Ieqmuc
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Tamsin Caine:

Hello and welcome to the Smart Divorce Podcast. This is series nine, and in this series we're going to explore what makes up the working week of various different professionals who work in the divorce world. You'll start to understand what they do, both during the time that you see them, how they prepare for meetings, and what work goes into the work of a divorce professional outside of the time that you spend with them. I'm really looking forward to some amazing clients in this series. We talked to a barrister, family solicitor, financial planner, divorce coach and really hoping that you're going to enjoy it and get a lot from it as well. Hello and welcome to the Smart Divorce Podcast. I'm really chuffed to be joined today by Elaine Richardson.

Tamsin Caine:

I have been badgering poor Elaine for months and months and months to get her on the podcast because I know she's going to be a fantastic guest. Let me tell you a bit about her. So she's been a family mediator since 2011. She's an experienced family solicitor and a collaborative lawyer. She's been involved in family law for over 30 years, and so that gives her a huge amount of experience, which I know that we'll all benefit from. She is a member of the Dispute Resolution Committee at Resolution and is a well-known speaker and presenter and trainer for Resolution. She's also heavily involved in Family Mediation Week and I know that what we're going to learn from Elaine today about how she spends her time in her week, you're not going to quite believe that she has only the same 24 hours in it that the rest of us have. Elaine, welcome and thank you for joining me.

Elaine Richardson:

Thank you so much for inviting me and I'm sorry I've been tricky to get pulled off.

Tamsin Caine:

Not at all, just very busy, lady. That's the thing, isn't it

Tamsin Caine:

Elaine Richardson Very busy portfolio career,

Tamsin Caine:

Tamsin Caine: Absolutely, absolutely. There's one thing that I've missed out of your long list of advocates that you have in your portfolio and I think that's the latest addition to your list, which is trauma informed. Now I don't remember what the end bit of it is. Can you tell us a bit more about that?

Elaine Richardson:

Yeah, that's the most recent bit of training that I've been doing.

Elaine Richardson:

I'm always learning, always very keen to learn, and don't have a problem with continuing professional development CPD points. So this is the Scottish Law Society's Trauma Informed Law, informed lawyer certification course that I've just completed and it's well. They're just such important messages and it's going to inform every aspect of my work, because I think that trauma really is everyone's business and all of us are at risk, because traumatic experiences are far more common than we previously believed. So, for example, we know that 29% of women across their lifespan suffer domestic abuse, which is an abuse of power in a relationship, and just to be aware that trauma and adversity have a huge lifelong impact. So the purpose of being trauma-informed is to avoid replicating experiences of abuse and inadvertently adding incidental trauma during the time that a client is working with you. And similarly, a trauma-informed organization is one which adjusts how it works with clients as a result of this knowledge. So, and I think the very positive aspect that people don't think about is, um, the key thing to build on resilience, both, uh, for your clients and for yourself.

Tamsin Caine:

That sounds that's why I'm I'm so interested in it that sounds like a I was not just a very useful piece of training, but actually an essential piece of training to be doing the kind of work that we do.

Elaine Richardson:

Yeah, I think so. It would be really good to introduce this more widely, and I'm really keen to get the message out. I think it's definitely going to be one of the topics that we cover at the Future Practice Conference, which is going to take place in Leeds in October this year, and we know that the five key principles of it are empowerment, choice, collaboration, safety and trust. And, of course, trust has to be earned and can't be assumed. And again, just by using these basic principles with everyone by default and treating new relationships, both personal and work related, upon the assumption that they have experienced trauma, I think it's really helpful. You can't go wrong with that really helpful.

Tamsin Caine:

You can't, you can't go wrong with that. Yeah, no, that sounds, that sounds incredibly useful. Um, something, I'll be, uh, going to look him into more after we've finished our conversation.

Elaine Richardson:

It's an amazingly popular course. I mean, I often think that the um, the scots are ahead of the game, uh, in various things, um, but there were people on my course from Australia, from Canada, so all over the world, because there's a lack of courses at the moment on this.

Tamsin Caine:

Yeah, that must be on your list. So I guess let's rewind a little bit. So your primary role from a divorce perspective I think I'm right in saying will perhaps be in mediation. Is that fair to say?

Elaine Richardson:

Yes, that's fair to say. I can say that I'm not in the litigation space anymore. So although I am a family solicitor, I'm still a family solicitor. I don't litigate. So I've done my time in court, and so my interest now really is working with a separating couple and to enable them to have those very often difficult conversations that need to take place when people are separating Absolutely.

Tamsin Caine:

So I'd love to talk to you a bit about how your week looks in terms of mediation, because I think there are some misunderstandings, I think I'm going to say, around mediation. So and this has even come up in the last few days in the work that I do with clients in that I have a client who I'm working with who has received a letter from a mediator, who has had a meeting with her ex-husband and she said well, I don't need to see a mediator because I've done that. And I sort of said, well, if your ex is now open to mediation which he perhaps wasn't at the stage that you went to see a mediator, might it be the case, then it might be worth revisiting that process and actually responding in a more positive way, being that both of them would like to avoid the court process. Is that situation something that you come across quite a lot? Where it's a? I need to go to a mediation information meeting purely to get a box ticked and a form signed and a certificate issued?

Elaine Richardson:

yes, yeah, so there's um mediation. Although it's brilliant and it's very flexible, it can be really confusing, I think, and sometimes it can be quite difficult to explain to clients because it's so different compared to going to court and people sort of know about court, don't they? And they know about court partly through the media. So when you look at the scripts for Coronation Street and EastEnders and whatever, there'll be far more about going to court than there would ever be about mediation. So I can really understand the confusion around it. But if I just say that it's split into two different types of meetings with mediation, the first one is the information and assessment meeting. So that's where you're giving information to the client, the client is giving you information and each of you, the mediator and the client is making an assessment about whether mediation is suitable for them. And part of my role as mediator is also as an educator, and so I really value that as a golden opportunity for me to to help educate um. But that's that's a different meeting, to a full mediation meeting where you would have the separating couple and the mediator, because everyone's assessed, it's suitable and so so you can go ahead.

Elaine Richardson:

So, in terms of client, let's look at what happened to your client. So your client might well have gone to a Miami as it's often known, a mediation information assessment meeting some time ago, and then the other person was invited by the mediator to attend and they chose not to do so at that point. But anyone can change their mind at any point in the future. That point, but anyone can change their mind at any point in the future. And, interestingly, mediation can take place at the same time as a court case, and a lot of people don't appreciate this. So that's what I say about the amazing flexibility of mediation compared with going to court. So I would be saying to your client oh, definitely go for it again, just because that second person wasn't ready first time round. They now are ready and that's brilliant. And I do think that I know that you're talking to Karen Walker recently about the new changes to the family procedure rules. I do think that that's having an impact. I certainly think so from the sharp end of things.

Tamsin Caine:

Yeah, it feels there's a bit of a bit more willingness to try other things and, yes, and, and, even if that's caused by the potential of the other party having to pay costs it. You know, sometimes that's what we need to for these things to to work. One thing that that I often hear clients say about about mediation who haven't experienced it. So people who experience mediation have a completely different viewpoint, but those who haven't experienced mediation, they don't wholly understand the role of the mediator. Could you explain your role when you're sitting?

Elaine Richardson:

down with a couple yeah, sure, so my role is to discussing options with them and, by encouraging them to adopt flexible thinking, to put their problem-solving hats on. It's my process, so I'm in charge of all the administration of it, if you like. But I set the meetings, I send out the Zoom invitations, so I'm in charge of the process and they're in charge of the decision-making. And I think that's an important difference to highlight, because lots of people think that because I'm a lawyer, in some way I'm going to be giving people individual legal advice, which I don't, that I'm somehow going to be making the decisions for them, which I never do and no mediator would ever do that.

Elaine Richardson:

I don't put them under any sort of pressure. So there's no pressure in terms of time or in terms of outcome, nothing like that at all. In fact, people are under their own pressures. So if I give you an example because very often it's interesting, isn't it, to talk about examples of clients so I've got a separating couple at the moment and the completion on the sale of their family home is due to take place next month. They still haven't really even properly started to agree the overall financial settlement, so they have their own time pressures. It's nothing that I'm not putting them under any pressure from my perspective, but they still have their own pressures. And there's a sweet spot as well between people going too fast and going too slow. It's very interesting this idea of somebody perhaps deliberately dragging their feet which scuppers the process, and then also somebody trying to rush through things. There's a sweet spot in the middle. So my job is again partly to do with pacing, to make sure the slowest are brought up to speed and the fastest are reined back a bit. Yeah, absolutely.

Tamsin Caine:

One thing that you've, I guess, a fear in mediation and you might say, well, if this is the case, it's not, it wouldn't be a suitable couple for that process but is around. Disclosure is around. Are they gonna tell me everything that you know? That's there. Are they going to fess up? That's the wrong word, but you know, disclose all the financials. Are they going to tell me up that's the wrong word, but you know, disclose all the financials. Are they going to tell me everything that I need to know? Because even in, sometimes in the most what have been relatively trusting marriages, there is still a level of distrust after separation because of other things that are going on. So it's not necessarily I think he's always been hiding money, but actually there's a distrust there because of the relationship breakdown and therefore that then becomes a distrust in lots of other areas. How do you deal with that in mediation?

Elaine Richardson:

I think you've picked up on a really important point, and I think we can assume that the trust is gone. Yeah, it would be very unusual for a separating couple to come and, in fact, those are the people that we don't see.

Tamsin Caine:

Because they've done it themselves.

Elaine Richardson:

Because they've done it themselves. So why would they need to see us so working on the basis that there is no trust and that you're having to build that back up? That's always the basis on which I proceed. But in terms of disclosure, that's an interesting one.

Elaine Richardson:

I personally, in my practice, use for me on a voluntary basis and I think a lot of other mediators do that, loads of solicitors do that. That can be a bit confusing as well for a client. You know so what you're using a court form. So to try. Client, you know so what you're using a court form. Um, so to try and explain to them I'm using a court form, but in a really nice way.

Elaine Richardson:

Um, I think, to start off with in terms of disclosure and I'm really fond of um, there's a wonderful advice now video, or that's on their website of a woman filling in a form E. I think that's very useful. My only word of caution is that she's completing it for court, of course, whereas when you're completing it on a voluntary basis, you do it slightly differently. So you don't, for example, fill in Section 5 at the back, because that's all to do with court orders, but anyway, so in terms of, I use form E. But I also am very keen on disclosure and I have a separate handout about it where I sort of read the Riot Act in a way, and so it's so vitally important that you do it and really don't imagine you can wriggle out of it, because whichever process you use, you will have to give full and frank disclosure, and the risk you run is that a consent order could be overturned, and as a litigator, as a lawyer, I have been involved in cases like that and they're extremely unpleasant and very expensive.

Tamsin Caine:

So it's just not worth it. Yeah, absolutely no, that's spot on. So, in terms of mediation, we've we've heard a bit about how it is for you in mediation, but what I'd love to know is what happens either side. So what happens when the clients aren't in front of you? So I'm I guess let's start first with what preparation do you need to do other than kind of arranging the time and sending the Zoom links? What preparation is there, both practically for arranging for the meeting, but also perhaps anything that you do personally? I know that certain people have a good shake or have a certain routine to get themselves in the, in the mindset for the meeting.

Elaine Richardson:

OK, I'm a I'm a great believer in breathing exercises and I do sometimes share that with clients. I think they might think I'm slightly bonkers, but I am. I just think that when all else fails, breathing exercises work and, very interestingly, I think you can often have a look at the way your client is breathing. So I know if somebody becomes really upset and they start taking those shallow breaths, you know from the top of their chest that you need to get them to try and slow that down and take deeper belly breaths. But that, of course, applies to me as well. So great performance of breathing and in order to get rid of the stress that my job sometimes causes me, I run. So I might just finish the session and run out to the front door.

Elaine Richardson:

After the clients yes, so, but in terms of preparation, so if we were talking about the prep outside the meetings, starting from the get-go, so somebody will make an inquiry and that will often come as the result of a referral from a solicitor or other family justice professional, or they might have found me directly on the internet a result of a referral from a solicitor or other family justice professional, or they might have found me directly on the internet. So I then send out basically it's all the information. I just send it as a handout and just encourage them to get back in touch with me. When they do so, I then make an appointment for a mediation information and assessment meeting so that we can have a chat, for a mediation information and assessment meeting so that we can have a chat. My pre-mediation meetings, as I also call them, are 90 minutes and I send out a preliminary information form. So I really really like the clients to complete that, because I always tailor make each process to suit the client and it helps me so much to know in advance what their situation is. And it doesn't have to be. It's not a long-winded essay or anything and what's happened to them, it's just some key points that I need. So that really helps.

Elaine Richardson:

You know, people sometimes have questions before the meeting which I try to answer, but, generally speaking, any questions that they have. That's the purpose of the meeting, that is the purpose of the 90 minute get together. So then, after that meeting, if it's assessed as suitable, then I will invite person to participant to do a pre-mediation meeting. If it's not suitable, for whatever reason, um, and this may be because of domestic abuse concerns then I have the discretion either to invite or not invite person to um under the under my professional guidance. But I'm very, very much aware of that. Obviously that's one of the main purposes of a pre-mediation meeting is to be aware and be alert to domestic abuse issues. So then invite person to and that often can be a bit tricky if it's coming out of the blue. It's like a bit of cold sales um technique, but I'm quite good at converting the second person, and so then I would have a meeting with them and then I have to um make the arrangements for a mediation meeting and it's suitable. So that means that both people have to sign my agreement to mediate, which is my contract beforehand, and then we set up a suitable meeting.

Elaine Richardson:

I always start my mediation meetings with people sitting in separate breakout rooms as a matter of course, because even if they've told me that they're happy to sit together, I need to find out how they're feeling in that moment on that day, and so then, if they decide that they want to sit together in a virtual room, that's a decision they both have to make and they both have to be in agreement.

Elaine Richardson:

So then, after the meeting, I will do a brief summary, and I do make the point that it's not a verbatim summary of the meeting. I will do a brief summary, and I do make the point that it's not a verbatim summary of the meeting, and I really concentrate on the proposals that people have made to each other. So they might be acceptable proposals, they might be unacceptable proposals, there might be counter proposals and and very often it may be that proposals have been made but no conclusion has been reached, and we need to pick it up again in the next mediation meeting yeah, okay, so everything you've just said sounds like all of your mediations are done online, is that?

Tamsin Caine:

is that the case? Yes, yes that's right. Yes, right, because they're not always. Not all mediators do even do online mediations from what I understand, is that the case?

Elaine Richardson:

yeah, so, um, when I first started as a mediator, it was almost frowned upon to do it, and then the pandemic struck and then the whole mediation community had to change their thinking about it and actually realize that it had some huge, huge benefits. So I think the furthest I've done so far in terms of mediation is China. I've had an inquiry just in the last few days from New Zealand because I've been having to work out in my head the 11 hour time difference Obviously the United States all over Europe. So it makes a huge difference to be able to do it online and it's just so convenient for everybody and it doesn't add in an extra layer of cost and time. But some people contact me and they want to do it in person, and that's fine, I'm just just so convenient for everybody and it doesn't add in an extra layer of cost and time. But some people contact me and they want to do it in person, and that's fine. I'm just not the mediator for them, but there's plenty of other mediators out there.

Tamsin Caine:

Yeah absolutely do you ever so occasionally I deal with um couples rather than rather than one or other of the spouses and and I've a few times had them sitting together in the same where they're together in the same room and I'm having the meeting virtually with them.

Elaine Richardson:

Yes, do you ever have that I've had that and how do you deal with that?

Tamsin Caine:

because that scuppers your idea of putting them in a virtual separate room, doesn't it?

Elaine Richardson:

I mean, very fortunately, when it's happened, it's happened, um, and I'm, having met them and assessed them and met them a few times, I'm quite content that they are sitting together. I'm not concerned. There are no abuse issues that I am aware of, obviously, um, but you know, some people have been been known to because I also mediate with people sitting in vehicles.

Elaine Richardson:

I do quite a lot of white vans, yeah, and of course, my IT department reliably tell me that the best way of of doing an online meeting is probably on your mobile phone rather than a laptop computer, because the mobile phone is more up to date in terms of the camera and the speakers. So yeah, that's interesting because sometimes, if I get a bad connection, I'll say can you change over to your phone? And it always improves things.

Tamsin Caine:

That's interesting to know, isn't it? Yeah, that is good. I'll bear that one in mind, because that happens all the time. So, in addition to mediation, you also provide supervision for family lawyers and for mediators. Can you explain a bit about what supervision means to those of us who don't have to have that as part of our working life?

Elaine Richardson:

Well, I think you're missing out if you don't have supervision. So I of course have supervision. I have a professional practice consultant PPC and in turn I'm a PPC to others. So to PPC, and in turn I'm a PPC to others. So under the our professional guidance as a mediator, you have to have a minimum of four hours professional supervision a year, and that's if you're accredited. So if I just go back a step and explain that, when the training to be a mediator, you do the foundation course, which is lengthy, and after you finish the course and you've successfully completed it, you're able to mediate. But at that stage you then start working towards your portfolio course and your portfolio is case studies that you have done as a mediator, and so that might take two or three years, possibly even slightly longer. Yeah, so at that point you're a mediator but you're not fully accredited, and so you become fully accredited once your portfolio has been submitted and you've passed that. So I'm an accredited mediator and that means that I can sign court forms, whereas the people who are not accredited yet have a mixture of mediators who are accredited and mediators who are not yet accredited but they're working towards accreditation. So that's the supervision and that's how much is required.

Elaine Richardson:

Most people who I supervise they go above and beyond the four hours and for the people who are working towards accreditation, they have to have additional time with me. So, for example, one of the things that they do is after their training course, there's a post-training review that I have with them, because this may be the first time that I've met that mediator and we have a couple of hours of chat and conversation about the direction of travel and what's happened so far. So that's all very handy and I just have that. I work with the most lovely people. It's one of the most glorious parts of my job actually is working with those people who I supervise.

Elaine Richardson:

And then, with a slightly different hat on, I also supervise family lawyers. So that's not an obligatory thing, it's a voluntary thing and it's definitely really taking off, I think, particularly with the younger lawyers who just think that it's such a good idea and have really adopted it wholeheartedly. And again, that's about spending maybe an hour a month, even an hour every couple of months, with the lawyer, who's able to talk to you about their caseload, about any stresses and strains they've got with the job, and again, it's to help them to manage their own well-being and then, in turn, they obviously give a better service to the client absolutely um, I think, I think that it's.

Tamsin Caine:

It's difficult to understand when you don't work in in our world, just how much of the trauma that other people have. That it's very easy to take on yourself. You know, despite trying to compartmentalize things, it's still very difficult. We meet people in in horrendous situations sometimes who you know. You mentioned domestic abuse before and I know that's one of the the things that's very close to your heart, very important to you to to make sure that that people who've been in domestic abuse situations are properly looked after. But you know, just speaking to people on a regular basis who have, who've been subject to those things, can be traumatic for the professional as well, and it is really important to have that space where you can download and and talk it through, if nothing else, isn't it?

Elaine Richardson:

yeah, definitely, and you know, we're designed as human beings, uh, to soak up emotions, and we're particularly good at soaking up negative emotions. Um, because it's all to do with our sort of reptilian brain looking out for signs of danger and protecting ourselves. So that's why we do it, from an evolutionary perspective. But that's where it makes us quite vulnerable as family law professionals, because of the trauma that we're witnessing on a daily basis absolutely.

Tamsin Caine:

It should be um supervision, should be something that's required for all. All professionals are working in this space. I think well, I believe so, but you're preaching to the converted there hello um, and as as a voluntary role, you also are very heavily involved in Resolution, which is the community for family justice professionals. Can you tell us a bit about your work with Resolution?

Elaine Richardson:

Oh yes, well, I'm very heavily involved with Resolution. In fact, I joined Resolution as a trainee many, many moons ago now. I joined Resolution as a trainee many, many moons ago now, and then in my time I've chaired a couple of local branches, because there's a national committee and national committees for various different subjects, but there are also regional branches. So I chaired a couple of branches and I'm now on the National Dispute Resolution Committee and of course, that's sort of is a really important committee, an important part of resolution, because one of the things that our code of practice, um as resolution members, encourages us to do is to reduce or manage conflict and confrontation, um supporting, obviously, families to put the best interests of children first, um, and so that's where the dispute, the non-court dispute resolution area of. You know my practice that's so dear to my heart. That's how it fits in with resolution membership.

Tamsin Caine:

Absolutely, and you do quite a lot of training for resolution as well as speaking at events and being part of the CR committee as well, don't you?

Elaine Richardson:

Yes, so I'm also a trainer for Resolution, so my specialist areas at the moment are domestic abuse safeguarding and high conflict, which are very interesting areas. So, outside of doing client work, I might be writing workshop proposals, I might be writing slides for presentations. So there's quite a lot of work involved in doing that. But again, that's a really interesting part of my portfolio career because I do get to meet an awful lot of people from across the country in our family law community, so that's such a benefit. Yeah absolutely.

Tamsin Caine:

I'm interested in what got you involved in the training side of things from the, from being a mediator. Was it something that you'd always done or is it? Is it a more recent addition to the portfolio?

Elaine Richardson:

it's. It's more recent. I think it probably follows on from the committee work because when I look back I've I've just a sort of committee person I I can remember when I was when I was, um, pregnant and had my children that I was involved with the National Childbirth Trust at that stage and again I was on the committee and so that sort of followed me through. Really I just enjoy it. Again, it's about the people, it's about getting things done, it's about new ideas and so the training really follows on from that. And it's what I was saying before about part of your role as a mediator is to be an educator, and so again it really fits in with that devoted to educating people about domestic abuse and safeguarding and being able to protect their clients.

Elaine Richardson:

It's such an important thing to do. Again, it's one of those essential items that we talked about of being a family lawyer, because we will see domestic abuse as a matter of course in our jobs. So I'm training on another domestic abuse course tomorrow. I'm very happy to say it's online. I think we've got 20 delegates, family lawyers from across the country, and it's a tough day. You know it's full on and it's a difficult subject, but you know people go away with a lot more information and they get the opportunity as well to talk to their colleagues and discuss their experiences and think about new ways of approaching things, so it's very positive absolutely.

Tamsin Caine:

I think I'm sure I've told this story before on the podcast, but I naively, when I came into doing this work, um was introduced to uh karen kipping, who you'll know.

Tamsin Caine:

Um, who's a who's a divorce coach, works, works with people who've been in domestic abuse situations and I was introduced to her by a fellow financial planner and I naively said to her back then well, I don't think I'll come across this uh, any clients.

Tamsin Caine:

I don't think I'll come across any clients who've uh who've had, who've been in domestic abuse situations, because really I'm looking for working with clients who are wanting to resolve things outside court and I speak to Karen quite a lot, as it goes and unfortunately, sadly, regularly work with people who've been victims or are survivors of domestic abuse and it's considerably more widespread than I had ever anticipated or, sadly, thought was possible. And I think you said before 29% of women through their lifetimes are likely to be victims of domestic abuse. I mean, that's a horrific statistic and of course, those people haven't necessarily escaped the relationship at that point. Those statistics will be many, many people who are still in the marriages or in the relationships, unfortunately. So I think you know anything that we can do to recognise that, and I think you've mentioned before that it's not always recognised by the people going through it until no, that's right.

Elaine Richardson:

So we can often describe ourselves as first notices, and so it happens to me regularly where I'm the first person that would be saying to somebody who's come to see me then what you've described to me is domestic abuse, and domestic abuse is always unacceptable, and that's the first time they've heard somebody describe to them that it is domestic abuse, and it's a big thing to get your head around. People, though, need to feel that their experience is validated by professionals. It's so important to do that. I met with a lovely guy a couple of weeks ago, and, of course, it's far more difficult for men generally to admit that they're victim survivors of abuse and that there's a female perpetrator of abuse. Probably the statistics belie how many men are actually victim survivors, because they feel so guilty, they feel so ashamed, and they often feel there's no one to talk to about it.

Elaine Richardson:

So, you know, on the courses that we run, we often say well, we talk about the victim survivors being female.

Elaine Richardson:

We do that because the statistics show us that the vast majority are, but that's not to say that we're ignoring at all male victim survivors of abuse, and I suppose I'm so deeply interested in this subject and I learn so much about it all the time, interested in this subject and I learn so much about it all the time, and I'm sure that Karen Kipping would agree with me that one of the leading experts is a Professor, jane Monckton-Smith, who I follow avidly.

Elaine Richardson:

In fact, I've just done one of her webinars and I'm about to do some more on a course that I've signed up to with her. I find it really interesting that her take on on abuse because, of course, when we look back historically, we used to call it domestic violence because that was what we could see, you know, the black eye, the broken arm. Um, then we, um, we changed it now to domestic abuse rather than violence, because we understand that the psychological aspect of it. Jane mcdonald smith goes one further and says that the whole framework of abuse is coercive and controlling behavior. So ccb is is at the heart of it and everything flows from that.

Tamsin Caine:

Yeah, I think that's. I think that's probably right to that subject. There is a plan for the podcast to have a series on domestic abuse and coercive and controlling behaviour, because it's so widespread and it's such an important topic that we want to cover.

Elaine Richardson:

That's really excellent. I'm so glad. I'm really glad.

Tamsin Caine:

Well, I'm hoping I'll be able to coerce you into coming back again, but we'll have to see, um, we're coming to the end of our time together and I wondered if there was anything that I should have asked you, that I haven't?

Elaine Richardson:

no, I don't think so. I think you're a really good interviewer, tamsin. Your questions are very thought-provoking and spot on, thank you.

Tamsin Caine:

Excellent. Well, thank you so very much for joining me. It's been an absolute privilege to speak to you this afternoon and thank you for listening. And if you have enjoyed today's podcast, please do leave us a lovely five-star rating so that we can get these episodes out to more people. Many thanks, hi, and I hope you enjoyed that episode of the Smart Divorce Podcast. If you would like to get in touch, please have a look in the show notes for our details or go onto the website, wwwsmartdivorcecouk. Also, if you are listening on apple podcasts or on spotify and you wouldn't mind leaving us a lovely five-star review, that would be fantastic.

Tamsin Caine:

I know that lots of our listeners are finding this is incredibly helpful in their journey through separation, divorce and dissolving a civil partnership. Also, if you would like some further support, we do have a Facebook group now. It's called Separation, divorce and Dissolution UK. Please do go on to Facebook, search up the group, and we'd be delighted to have you join us. The one thing I would say is please answer their membership questions. Okay, have a great day and take care.

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Tamsin Caine

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