149. Parenting Plans that work with Samantha Boss

0:01

Welcome to WeChat Divorce, hosted by Karen Chellew, Legal Liaison and Catherine Shanahan, CDFA.

Each episode we sit down with divorce professionals and industry experts to provide insights and frank discussions about real people, real situations, and real divorce to help you achieve your best life post divorce.

0:39

Welcome to WeChat Divorce, brought to you by My Divorce Solution.

Today, Catherine and I will be welcoming Samantha Boss to our podcast to discuss a parenting plan and why they’re so important.

Oh, my gosh.

Before we invite her in, Karen, let’s talk about that.

0:56

You know, a parenting plan is your plan, right?

You’re the parent.

And it always astonishes me that you hear attorneys or judges try to tell you how to raise your kids.

And I’m thinking of a judge that I knew.

1:12

And his wife desperately wanted a divorce.

And I used to watch him on the baseball fields.

And he was like dad of the year and he was a judge, and everyone loved that.

But then when I was behind the scenes with her and she would tell me the real dad stories and how he treated the kids, I was like, Oh my God.

1:29

And he’s actually telling people how to parent their children.

And I think that’s probably if you go in there unprepared, have a judge telling you.

Yeah, agreed.

And I think for a lot of people and for me as well, and I spent thousands and thousands of dollars on a parenting plan.

1:46

I thought it was who gets which weekends and what days and that it stopped at that and the holidays and, and my complete focus was on that.

But there’s so much more to a parenting plan.

You know it, it goes into decision making and you know the parents responsibilities, shared responsibilities.

2:09

It it goes so deep that your attorneys don’t go there with you unless you make an issue of it because they’ll tell you, well, it’s always modifiable.

Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, but having your family’s needs in place and how you and your spouse set out to parent together really needs to be addressed and discussed for sure.

2:33

Oh, so true.

You know, when I got divorced, my youngest was in high school, so it was kind of easy.

The templated language worked for me because I saw what it was like, ’cause I raised 3 stepchildren and I can remember reading the parenting plan that my ex had in his divorce degree.

2:52

I probably knew it better than he knew it because I was just like, OK, when do we have them?

When do we have them?

But everything that occurred from them, they were five years old and younger.

So everything that occurred by through their life was never even addressed in their parenting plan.

So when I went through my divorce, because he was older and we lived 3 miles apart, I was like, you know, I remember JT saying to me, Mom, you’re not going to tell me whose house I could sleep at.

3:15

I was like, OK, you know, ’cause I knew that wasn’t the priority in my life.

Let him sleep where he wants to sleep.

You know, I know he’s going to be my place all the time, which he was, except for when he wanted a more, little more leniency.

But I could see the difference when you have these young children and these old children.

3:33

How much in between you really have to think about?

You really do.

Yet my children were five and seven.

And so we went through all of the disagreements about, well, I didn’t agree for you to sign them up for that.

So I’m not taking them to that activity.

3:51

And it creates so much stress.

And even with medical appointments, you know, well, I, I didn’t agree to that.

And then calling the doctors and then, you know, the child is just left there with what?

I don’t know what’s going on and there must be something wrong with me and I must be creating this situation.

4:10

And so guess what?

I’m tapping out of my activities because I’m not dealing with this.

So the fact that someone like Samantha Boss is addressing these issues and helping parents think through these issues to a resolution, I think is really remarkable.

4:27

I agree.

So let’s let’s hear what she has to say and get the details from all of that.

Let’s do it.

Welcome, Samantha.

Thank you for being here today.

We are really looking forward to today’s podcast and talking about parenting plans.

Thank you so much for being with us.

4:43

All right.

Thanks for having me ladies.

Of course, but first, I want to just take a couple minutes to introduce Samantha.

As a certified divorce mediator and coach, Samantha empowers moms to protect themselves and their children’s future by providing expert guidance on parenting plans and navigating high conflict exes.

5:04

So Samantha, before we dive into our topic today, can you tell our listeners a little bit about your story and journey that created the passion for the work you do?

Well, I was married to my first husband after 60 days, and if that isn’t a red flag, I don’t know what is.

5:20

But I did it and got pregnant 60 days later.

I quickly knew I probably was going to get divorced, was going to be the first person in my family to get divorced.

So there’s a lot of shame and guilt that came into that decision, but I did it.

And so I started the divorce process after four years of marriage.

It was ugly.

5:36

It started off me thinking honestly, and I say this all the time and people laugh at me.

I thought divorce was literally like on The Young and Restless where they trifold a blue piece of paper and they hand it to someone, Jack Abbott signs it and gives it back and then boom, you’re divorced.

Like I, that’s how dumb I was about divorce.

5:53

I didn’t know it could spiral into a financial loss.

I didn’t know it would spiral into a four year battle, multiple attorneys, multiple judges, in and out of court 300 times.

I didn’t know when I said I want a divorce, that it was going to cost me that much of my life.

6:09

So I went through my divorce and I was a teacher this whole time, teaching kids in high school and junior high.

And I was slowly helping friends and family with their divorces.

You know, Hey, Sam, I got a question for you.

Hey, Sam.

You know, because they knew I’d went through a whole train wreck of a divorce and I learned a lot.

6:24

I learned what I did wrong.

I learned what I should have done.

I had hindsight.

I had insight.

And so I got this feeling of like, well, you know, I do love helping people.

I love teaching people.

It’s what I naturally do, teaching kids.

And then I met my now husband and he said, I really think you should stop teaching kids and you should teach adults about divorce.

6:43

And I thought you are on drugs.

There’s no way I can leave this pension, this insurance, this, you know, security.

And he said, please do it.

And so I did.

I took a just leap of faith and I went and got certified and I started teaching people started doing this mediation and I fell in love with it.

6:58

And it was the best decision ever.

And so I’ve been able to take my story of all the things I did wrong and tell people the ugly truth about this is going to happen to you.

And if it doesn’t, great.

But if it does, you’re prepared.

And I’d rather you could be prepared and educated.

I, I mean, I was an educated person that came from a good home and I knew nothing about divorce.

7:19

I literally just, I thought it was going to be so simple and it turned into one of the most complex things I’ve ever done in my life.

And I was always behind the 8 ball.

I was always finding out at the moment I needed to know about it.

And I didn’t have time to research.

I didn’t have time to learn or ask questions.

It was like make this decision, make this decision.

7:35

And I didn’t know how those decisions were going to greatly impact my future.

And it was all emotional and I didn’t have anybody leading me.

I didn’t have coaches, I didn’t have counselors, nobody.

I didn’t have a financial person telling me, hey, this is going to affect you later.

I didn’t have any of that.

And so I just, I, I hope that by telling my story of failure helps people feel, you know, not alone and like, OK, well, if she failed and could admit to it, what else can she teach me now that she knows how to do it the right way?

8:01

So I became a divorce coach.

And I absolutely love my job.

I love teaching.

So I still get to do that.

But now I’m teaching adults who love to listen versus kids who sometimes don’t.

Well, adults don’t to listen either, so that’s.

A.

True.

That’s true, True.

They at least pay me no matter what.

8:17

You know, Whether they listen or not, you know they’re paying me no matter what.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I always say that people become experts at divorce the day they get divorced.

Yep.

It’s like learning a whole new language.

8:33

The only challenges the rest of your life depends on it, right?

Depends on the decisions you’re making during that time.

Yeah.

You know, thank you.

I’m sure it was really rough.

Catherine and I have stories similar, but you know, it does create a passion to help people coming down that pathway behind us for sure.

8:53

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And when you say that you had mentioned this in the discussion before we started recording that you knew nothing about finances and you just left that.

And, and a lot of people approach divorce not knowing anything about anything.

9:08

And that’s very common.

But understanding the financial pieces of it and understanding how things may work, what you’re doing, it is so important.

And I think people have much more access to that information than ever, for sure.

9:24

Yeah, but back then I didn’t, you know, I came from a marriage where he did the books and he did, you know, he knew how much we had.

He, he wrote our bills out.

So I was going into a blind and my, I know my first appointment with a first attorney, you know, was just like, hey, here’s how much your retainer will be.

And I thought, man, that’s a lot of money.

9:41

Surely that will cover a lot.

It did not, you know.

And then quickly another deposit was supposed to be made and another deposit.

And then trying to live on my own for the first time away from him and having my own house and jumping.

I jumped into a house too fast and bought a new car too fast.

9:57

I did all the wrong things because I didn’t know how big this divorce was going to get, how much it was going to cost.

And my divorce ended up in the early 2000s was $113,000.

So I can’t even imagine with this inflation of what that would cost nowadays.

But yeah, I was scared.

10:13

I had blinders on.

I didn’t want.

I want to look at my checkbook because I knew it wasn’t going to be pretty.

I didn’t want to look to see how much I was robbing Peter to pay Paul back then because I felt like I had to pay my attorney because they were the one that was supposed to be getting me out of this mess.

So I kept paying them, but I wasn’t paying my cable bill and I wasn’t paying my water bill and things like that.

10:31

It got really messy really fast, really fast.

Well, you know, we all do the best we can at the time we’re doing it.

And unfortunately, you know, you didn’t have the resources then to get the help that you needed.

And that’s the beauty of today with technology and with this new generation of instant information from people that we have, we can meet via Zoom like this.

10:55

I mean, we have so many resources now because we don’t have to meet them face to face, right?

But for us, it’s about making sure you’re financially clear.

So when we start with your financial analysis, that is this is your, this is your cable bill, this is your water bill.

And you need to know how much you can budget after that to pay your attorney.

11:12

And your attorney needs to know this is all you have coming in.

And this is what needs to go out.

And you need your coach to talk to you about the emotional stuff like what am I doing with my kids?

You don’t need your attorney to talk to them about that.

So it’s nice to know what your finances are.

11:29

Focus with first of all, you should have your portrait, which is what we we do is your financial portrait.

But then you can go work with the other experts, for example, with you with coaching.

They can work on their parenting plan and saves, even though they have to pay you and they have to pay us.

11:45

Overall, you’re saving your costs, but not only your cost, the billable hour or the flat fee, because we’re a flat fee, whatever the whatever it is, you’re saving yourself from making really big financial mistakes.

Well, I think I think you had on, on a huge point that I, I know I didn’t understand when I started divorce is that you should hire experts for where you need the expert.

12:07

And when people go into a divorce, they think everybody here is you got to have a lawyer.

And I’m not trying to ever give anybody advice that they don’t.

But you need a lawyer, yes, for the legal part of your separation, but you need financial experts to help you with breaking down your current finances before divorce and after and how you’re splitting up the marital asset.

12:25

You need somebody in that financial field to do that, just like you need somebody like a divorce coach to help you with your emotional part because like you said, your lawyer is not certified in emotional well-being and your lawyer is not certified in financial.

So why are you letting it’d be like a General practitioner, your your medical, just pediatrician handling your child when they broke an arm, OK, They’re not the person to set the arm and put a cast on.

12:50

They’re going to send you to a specialist.

You’re not going to stay with that General practitioner.

You have to get specialists involved in your case.

And I wish I would have known that through mine because I made a lot of wrong decisions from an attorney that was just saying, we’ll just do this.

This is what everybody else does.

OK, well, that doesn’t feel right.

13:07

Well, you know, let that retirement go and just take this.

What?

That’s apples and oranges.

Now that I know that, you know, so I again, I think when people look at divorce, they’re like, I don’t want to spend so much extra money.

And all these specialists, I’m telling you now, you’ll be money ahead in the long run if you do, because then the right people are giving you the right kind of choices and the right kind of options to consider versus somebody that’s just giving you a general, you know, analysis of things.

13:31

You want the experts for sure.

You know, Samantha, I was on your website in preparation for this discussion and I, you know, you approach parenting plans to kind of how we approach financial plans for the eventual marital settlement agreement.

13:48

Everybody, and I love that you say this, everybody should realize that in a, an attorney’s office, it starts with a template and a paralegal.

And if you don’t know the basis of your data that’s going into the template, you’re getting a template.

14:04

We do that over and over.

And so relative to what you do in the parenting plans, I really appreciate that you made that you make that really clear.

So then how do you help people build the detailed parenting plan that then the attorney can use effectively?

14:23

Because I think that’s the gap for everybody in in divorce on any kind of topic.

The gap is what are my customized needs and I need to know them and I need to know the solution and my resolution of them so that when it goes into the template of the enforcement and protection language, you know my goals are there.

14:45

Right.

Well, I think first and foremost, people need to realize your divorce is different than your neighbors and your girlfriends and your coworkers.

And so if you’re going to that attorney that they’ve referred, your parenting plan shouldn’t look anything like theirs.

Everybody’s parenting plan should be customed to their type of children, the demographic, their work environment, the goals that they want for their children.

15:05

So it should be custom.

So my clients, when they come to me, I work with one party.

I don’t work with both parties anymore.

I work with one because I really want my client to get all of her thoughts down clearly about how does she see her child being raised, What are the goals that she has.

She knows everybody’s work schedule, she knows what school district, she knows the doctor’s office and all that.

15:24

And I want her to plan all of that out and get all of her thoughts.

So we have just someone fill out a questionnaire pretty basic, because again, over the decade of doing this, I’ve really realized the person that we’re going up against is high conflict.

I work with high conflict, you know, couples and individuals that are dealing with somebody that is totally irrational.

15:41

And so we kind of have a methodology of details matter and we got to make sure the details are in all of those decisions.

So I tell people, you know, I want to build a parenting plan that gets your child from diapers to diplomas and everything in between.

So if your child is only two and you’re a first time parent, you may not know what your child is going to go through those leaps of of life.

16:01

I do.

I’ve raised kids already.

My kids are 21 and 19.

I’ve been through all of that.

They were divorced kids when they were the 1:00 and 3:00.

So I’ve done it all as a divorced mom.

And so I know all those leaps and I know how custom each portion of that needs to be.

And I think those templates that are being used, it’s the same ones since the early 80s.

16:18

I’ve seen them and they’re disturbing.

They’re not up to date with where kids are AT and what kids are doing and how both people are working now.

And the dynamics have changed.

This summer looks different than school schedules and medical needs are so different.

We got families that are out there, they’re doing holistic point of raising kids in the medical.

16:34

We got over here that people that are following traditional religious, there’s so many different religions.

And so if you’re using a template, you’re saying that your family is just like the next door neighbors and the next door neighbors.

And that’s not true.

Every household is different and it should be reflected in your parenting plan.

16:50

So then I have them build their parenting plan with me and then they take that to their attorney and it’s such an ease of stress because now they can say, OK, attorney, your, you know, guidance is in law.

But here are my thoughts about my children.

You don’t know my children.

You’ve never met my attorneys will never meet your kids.

17:06

So it’s like, why is an attorney who’s never met your kids, never been in your home, doesn’t know that Adamic doesn’t know anything Building a parenting plan for you.

You should be the one building it.

These are your kids and your future, you know, So I want you to have the most input.

Not, you know, an attorney who’s been using the same template for 20 years.

17:25

That’s so true.

And so they take that to their attorney.

How do you coach them for their attorney to adopt that because we have that issue as well on a level?

I love to use my parenting plan as an interview piece.

17:41

I want my the ideal client for me is the woman that’s listening to this going.

I mean, I’ve wanted a divorce for like 5 years and I haven’t had the courage.

Now I know where to start, right?

I want her to come to me first after you guys and say, OK, build me a parenting plan.

And then I want her to use that when she’s interviewing 3 or 4 attorneys and saying, OK, this is my situation, here’s my thoughts and hand over that parenting plan.

18:02

And the attorney that looks at that and says, wow, you’re educated, you’re well versed, you have your thoughts down on paper.

You’re an ideal client for me.

I can help you because you’ve already done a lot of the legwork for me.

That’s the attorney I want you to hire.

The attorney that looks at something like that and says, whoa, whoa, whoa.

18:20

You mean you went and spent money with somebody else?

You don’t trust me.

You mean you went and did work behind my back?

You don’t think that I could do that?

The attorney that has an ego problem with the fact that I got educated about my own case is not my attorney.

That’s not who I’m giving 10s of thousands of dollars to.

18:36

I want somebody that’s OK with me being smart about my own life.

I want somebody that’s OK with me putting my thoughts on paper.

Because isn’t the end goal for me to be divorced and start my new life as a great, well founded on a good foundation structure with my children.

But you want to give me some crappy parenting plan where I’m going to have to keep calling you over and over again.

18:54

I’m have to keep reaching back into my pocket to pay you to help me five years from now, 10 years.

No, I want to get all the way to graduation.

So unless you can, you can show me something that looks just like this attorney, you’re not my attorney.

So it’s, again, I like to use it as an interview process to really check your attorney.

19:10

What kind of ego does this person really have?

And we all know attorneys have big egos.

I mean, they have to be.

I mean, they’ve spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on an education they got.

They’re going to have an ego.

And I want them to in the courtroom, but I also want them to trust me that I am well versed in this and I know what I want for my future is not your attorney’s future, it’s yours.

19:27

You should.

Have the biggest voice in that yeah, we do the same thing financially.

We think that you should come get your portrait first because you mentioned earlier, you know, you get referred by your friend, your sister, your hairdresser, whoever to somebody but they don’t know the complexity of your case and nobody finances with anyone.

19:44

So when you get your portrait, we agree you need an attorney but at what level do you need an attorney?

At what capacity do you need attorney What type of attorney you do you need Some don’t need parenting plans so they don’t need a good parenting attorney.

They some have really complex issues and businesses and they need an attorney who’s used to dealing with corporate issues and same thing with every complexity.

20:07

So for us, we do that same theory that you’re using on the child side, financially speaking, because I don’t know why you would go to an attorney unprepared because you wouldn’t know if they can handle your case or not because they’re always going to say yes or it depends.

Like that’s their big thing.

20:22

Well, it depends.

Oh, sure, we’ll do that.

You want that?

Well, it’ll depend.

But if they if you walk in with your portrait and you show them the complexities of your finances, you’re going to see their reaction and they say the same thing.

We have our own financial people, we have this.

It’s because it’s a whole billing cycle for them.

20:39

Absolutely.

It is a billion dollar industry for a reason.

I mean it’s $10 billion a year in the business.

You know, it’s a business to them and I get it, it is their nine to five, you know, it is completely their business.

But I think it’s your job to know who you have on your team.

And I think too many people till your credit what you’re saying.

20:56

People walk into law office and they’re in this emotional state and they just go just help me and they give all of it to their attorney to do.

And that’s where you’re going wrong.

This is your case.

It’s your case.

They’re the assist, but they’re not.

They should not be doing the whole job.

You should be doing a lot of the legwork yourself.

21:14

They’re there like bumpers in a bowling alley to push you back.

Like, Nope, go back over here.

Nope, try harder over here.

That’s all they’re there for.

But I see too many people just walk in, dump their whole life and and say, OK, let me know in court what and don’t do any of the work.

And then they show up in court and they’re like, what’d you get done?

21:30

Well, I have 14 cases going on same time as yours.

Tell me again about your case.

And then they get so like this attorney doesn’t even know my case.

It’s like you’re right, they don’t.

You should know your case.

You should be sticking up for yourself.

You should know how to do this.

I mean, this decision of divorce is it’s like a death and you’re going to go through a whole mourning phase and a whole grieving phase.

21:51

You got to have the right people there pushing you up each time you start to fall off the wagon, like whoop, Nope, sister, back on the horse.

We’re doing this some more.

You know, get this paperwork turned in, fill out this form, get this done because you don’t want anybody to take advantage of you at your weakest moment.

And that’s what the other side’s going to do.

They’re going to see weakness and jump on that, and you got to be.

22:08

Ready, but even your even your same side.

I’ve seen attorneys jump on their own clients.

Absolutely.

Bill, bill, bill, bill, bill.

I have a lot of attorneys too, or cases too, where the attorney is just, you know, they tell me what’s going on.

I’m like, there needs to be an endpoint.

You have a court date.

No.

So you have no pushing point.

22:23

You you have no pushing point to get anything done because they’re just billing you by the month.

Oh, no, you know, we’re not getting anything done, Sam.

Oh, it looks like the other side hasn’t turned anything in.

If there’s no end date, they are going to prolong it because it benefits somebody.

In that case, it either benefits attorneys or it benefits the other side from not having to pay.

22:39

So it’s always going to benefit somebody with nothing happening in your case.

And the end date often then when, when a case is evolving that way, the end date is when you then you say we’ll wait a minute.

I just spent, to your point, $113,000 and we’re nowhere and I need an end date.

23:00

And you know what the end dates going to be?

Sign your spouse’s proposal or give me another 50 to get ready for trial.

That’s what your end dates going to be.

If you don’t figure a way to take charge, way ahead.

And I would rather our clients be the one that do send over that proposal.

23:16

You know, again, I only do parenting plans and you guys do financial packages and stuff.

Like you want to be the lead, You want to be the one sending over the proposal.

Because I mean, I’d rather, again, I’d rather be the lead than trying to take, you know, A and Polish it up and make it look nice.

So, I mean, I want them editing my version of things.

23:33

I want them.

That’s funny because I like to be the lead.

I like them to show me their cards for us financially.

It might be different with money.

But it’s so funny.

Yeah.

With.

Kids, I want to know, I want to like this is doctor’s appointments, medical everything.

I want all of this.

This is how tailored we’re going to be with this plan.

23:48

I mean, mine’s like a playbook.

You know, we get to a certain phase in life with kids.

Let’s flip through the playbook.

OK, we’re on this section right here.

What are we what are our requirements?

What are we supposed to be doing there?

We get to a new section there.

I don’t want to take their plan because most often than not, if they haven’t worked with someone like me that’s an expert, it’s going to be vague.

24:05

It’s going to be Gray.

It’s going to be where a high conflict person can totally take charge and then still ruin my life as a single parent.

So I want to be leading all that.

But I it does make sense for finances that you kind of want to see what are they really showing first, you know, and let’s do that.

That would be fun.

24:21

Mine is.

Mine is not fun.

No, no, I like that with the parenting plan because the more detailed you are, the less they have to combat because how do you argue something that’s already been laid out as fact?

Like the like, like the mom typically knows, you know, when the appointments are, what the kids are involved in that like they’re the CEO’s of that, the lifestyle.

24:43

So when you can lay it out, how’s the other side going to argue that?

Right, well they argue it out and this is what I hear all the time.

Well, how do we know what this 2 year old is going to want to do in high school?

Simple, most kids do the same things.

They go to school, they play sports, they get a job, they get cell phones, they get cars.

25:01

Most kids go through the same gamut of stuff that every kid goes through.

So we just kind of again, lay out those parameters of and I told her mom this yesterday.

She said, Sam, I do have the 2 year old, how, how do I know?

And I said, well, here’s the deal sister.

If we don’t put anything down about the future, I can guarantee you two things are going to happen.

25:17

You’re going to have to work with your ex and hire your attorney again.

If you don’t put anything down, then you’re for certain going to have to come back because you 2 are not going to agree.

Because if you could agree, you’d probably still be married or you’d be neighbors and raising these kids together and you wouldn’t even need to be on a phone call with me.

But you already know you’re in a problem spot.

25:33

So if you don’t put anything down, you’re guaranteeing more money in the future being spent on this.

If we at least lay out everything now, I at least know there is a decision there.

I might not be 100% behind it because I’m like man I wish I would have picked something different but at least there’s a there’s a decision there and I don’t have to hire my lawyers again and I don’t have to work with my ex and I can just cope with that decision.

25:53

Might not be the best one, but at least there’s one if I don’t guaranteed I got to spend money.

Yeah.

So how that’s interesting.

So how do you help people make projections for, you know, two and three and five years old?

26:08

And I mean, we can see we have our kids are older now, but how, how do you put that in a formal document that people can count on?

Right.

Well, we, we break it down into different categories, you know, like the four pillars of parenting is we have to figure out all the medical decisions.

26:25

So in that category, we basically say, you know, most states are all switching to 5050 joint parenting on medical, but we say joint at the beginning of the paperwork, but then later we go into detail about what does that look look like?

Are we vaccinating our children on what kind of parameter are we doing everything the pediatrician says we doing slow pace vaccinations?

26:43

None.

And so we kind of pick.

So we take all the decisions, braces, context, we talk about it, we put that in there.

Medical emergencies, we put that in there.

So we break down anything that could be a major decision.

We go into more detail later into the parenting plan.

Same thing with education.

If our kid needs an IEP or a 504, who’s going to be the lead on that?

27:01

Who’s going to be the point of contact?

What school district are we?

We just take every decision and go ahead and pre make it.

Now again, we’re not saying exactly what school district, but we’re going to say, OK, mother’s school district or father’s school district.

If they’re both in the same, then obviously it’s that school district.

So we just kind of get ahead of any major blow up that could happen.

27:18

We predetermine a decision.

Extracurriculars is the toughest category.

I will say that as you guys know, with kids being in everything under the moon and you’re living off of a calendar for four or five years of your life, that’s the hardest one, but it also has the greatest impact of financial loss.

So if you don’t go into a lot of detail there, that’s where a parents paying for all these travel sports on their own or they’re missing visitation because of the travel sport.

27:39

So we really break it down between is this a school related activity or an outside of school related activity.

And then I like them for my clients to pick an age where the activity becomes a priority over visitation.

And then it’s just cut and dry.

You’re losing visitation just like I am, because we’re all at the soccer field every weekend, you know, and that’s just the way it is.

27:58

Versus if we don’t make those decisions now, we’re arguing every time a new season comes up, why are we doing soccer?

Are we not doing soccer?

Well, I didn’t like it, but I did.

We got to get out of those fights and those arguments.

And we just have to say, if there’s one parent and one child interested 100% into it, we’re doing it.

At what age are they determines if we take them or not?

28:15

If they’re over that junior high age, then yes, I have to take them under junior high.

I can keep them at home and we can miss the soccer game because it doesn’t say I have to take them.

So we just get ahead of the fights.

Again, doing this so long, I know what people fight.

I know what they argue about.

I know where the hiccups are.

And I’d rather you just be like, tell me what to do, Sam, and I can lay it out for you after I know what kind of case you have, I’m getting, I want to know how many kids do you have?

28:35

What are their interests?

You know, your your ex, what’s he like?

What’s he going and we can kind of predetermine All of these type of divorces are a lot alike with the high conflictness where the power trips and the control come in.

So I just use my methodology to kind of lay it all out for them and and kind of close the door on future arguments.

28:52

Well, how do you combat then a change in child support calculation with you have a change of it.

If you’re putting visitation out the window, there goes a child support modification.

So we, we have visitation listed in it.

So we, we plan out visitation all the way through.

So that would be just a change of circumstance.

29:08

So I’m not saying this is 100% guarantee anytime there’s a change of circumstance, anybody can change or modify anything inside of that already predetermined all the way to diplomas type of parenting plan.

So anytime like a visitation schedule would change, they’d have to modify and child support would be right along that.

29:23

I don’t deal with child support inside of my parenting plan.

I leave that up to the experts.

But what we do in financial in our parenting plan is we do talk about the extracurriculars, we talk about medical costs and we talk about educational costs, which are the three biggest things that people forget, their attorneys forget to put in.

And they think child support covers everything.

29:41

And it doesn’t for me, and this is just the easiest way to explain it.

Child support covers my household and help me out in my household.

If our child is in something outside of the household, at school, at an event, at the at a doctor’s office, my child support is not covering anything outside of my home.

29:56

That should be a split cost on top of child support that we both have to participate in.

And that’s where, again, I, I leave it up to the attorneys and the financial people to help me on that percentage, the proportional percentage breakdown between, you know, am I paying 60% of that medical cost and you’re paying only 40 or is it 5050?

30:12

We leave that kind of open in our parenting plan.

So, yeah, there’s always going to be an opportunity for change of circumstance, a loss of job, a gain of of income and things like that.

But that’s again, you’re going to have to modify for that.

Yeah.

Do you find that the courts, like, if there is a change in circumstance that the courts do give deference to this plan that people may have made early on and maybe they’re, you know, maybe someone’s changing their mind or something.

30:39

So irrespective of the change in circumstances for what it is, do you find that the courts give deference to the work the family did at that time?

They’re working through this.

I think it, to quote good attorneys, it depends if it’s the same judge that ordered the 1st order for you to change it, you’re going to have to show a heck of a lot of evidence to show that their first decision was a wrong decision.

31:04

But what I will say to that is the way I’ve been coaching people as of maybe just two years, I’ve kind of switched my motto.

I see a lot of people fighting for, you know, against 5050.

You got maybe say a mom over here that thinks 5050 is ridiculous and you got the dad over here that says 505050.

And a lot of courts are going to 5050.

31:20

And what I’m telling my mom’s now is like, sometimes we’re going to have to just let the 5050 happen so that we can let it the judge be right.

Yep, 5050 sounds great, you know, judge.

And then I can build my evidence to show that it’s not working.

They’re not helping me financially.

31:36

They’re not doing their visitation, they’re not being responsible and following the parenting plan.

And then after the divorce, I have to go in for modification right away, within a year or two and show them the evidence, the actual proven fact that they’ve been going against the parenting plan to then modify and say, judge, you ordered this, but it didn’t work out.

31:54

I’ve documented all of these things, these discrepancies that show he was late, he didn’t pay, he didn’t do these things, you know, and all that.

And please roll reverse this if your listener is a male for a female.

But yeah, it’s it’s a matter of finding the right judge that will look at evidence.

And I will say, family courts are so backlogged that you better have a really good reason for coming in for a modification because judges are just not wanting to hear about it unless there’s been a big change and a lot of evidence.

32:19

Yeah.

Factual evidence, Not theories, not thoughts.

But facts do.

You find that people talk about caps of like especially the extracurricular activities because these team sports, the travel across the United States, we or even internationally, we cross that a lot where one spouse just cannot feasibly do that because so many states are capping support that’s even available, even if the the wage earning spouse has more.

32:54

So how do you deal with that?

Just, I know that you don’t deal with the finances and printing plan, but I presume then that you help them talk about it, especially in those states that are very kind of clamping down on the support availability.

33:11

Absolutely.

And again, I think that’s why I emphasize child support is one thing and getting all those extracurriculars added in as a separate whole category is something I’ll push #1 The other thing again, I’ve done all the travel sports.

And so I’ve been on my podcast and all my, you know, social media accounts just preaching to parents that really think about if you even want your kid playing all these travel sports.

33:32

I mean, all my kids did it.

My son was a traveling cheerleader.

My daughter did travel softball and volleyball.

We’ve been all over the country.

I think her senior year I totaled it was $25,000 in volleyball.

I did all that 100% on my own and I, and I will just advocate that I don’t know that that was probably the best decision.

33:47

Some of the greatest memories with my daughter, don’t get me wrong, but I didn’t have any time with the rest of my family because I was traveling all over the, you know, God’s green earth taking her to volleyball.

So I mean, I think it’s also a stop and look at yourself.

If you can’t do it, don’t do it.

And the other thing is if you want your child to do it, you’re going to have to figure out a way to pay for it yourself.

34:05

So if there’s a cap on your child support and you’re looking at a heavy, extensive bill for extra curriculars or a private school or something like that, we really got to look at.

If your budget says you can’t, then you don’t.

And I’m sorry, but little Johnny might not be able to be on the neighborhood, you know, traveling Baseball League because your budget says that it’s not in the cards.

34:23

Or here’s what I really would rather everybody do.

Get off your ass and go get another job.

Go go sell something, build a business, go figure out what your true passion is and make money with it.

And your kids can do whatever they want.

I see a lot of my clients looking in the direction of their ex of like, he should pay, he should have to pay, he should have to pay.

34:43

And I’m like, OK, that’s your plan A, but what’s Plan B if he doesn’t?

How are you going to live?

How are you going to survive?

How is Johnny going to play baseball?

You can’t just keep blaming Plan A Didn’t work.

Didn’t work.

Well, he’s the reason Johnny can’t play baseball.

No, you’re the reason Johnny can’t play baseball.

If you want Johnny to play so bad, go find a way to make it happen.

35:02

I don’t like the idea of us depending on anybody for money.

I did and it was the worst eight years of my life where I depended on the Child Support, depended on the copay reimbursement depending, depending, depending.

And the second I build my own business, never had to think about another human help of me out whatsoever.

So I mean, yeah, the caps suck.

35:18

They really do because you have this high earner that only has to pay this much.

But the standard of living was way up here and all the activities are way up here.

But now she’s not getting what she, you know, financially could should be getting, I think.

But I don’t like the caps.

But it does affect the rest of the parenting plan because if they’ve already been capped out at child support, he’s most likely or she will most likely ask for a cap on extracurriculars as well, which again, for my parents that don’t make as much money.

35:43

And you have a high comp conflict parent who wants the kid in 25 sports.

I have to have a cap because I can’t give half of all of those 25 sports.

I can only give maybe 3000 a year or five hundred a month towards something.

So yeah, I think that’s where you really have to customize what are you able to do and that needs to be reflected into the parenting plan totally.

36:03

So I don’t know if I answered your question 100% accurately, but I just, I just feel like we got to be more real with our situation and not compare ourselves to the whole town or the whole neighborhood and do what we’re supposed to be doing in our household.

You know, but you’re saying this from hindsight, right?

So if you’re a man right now, it’s really hard to, you know, you can’t go start a company you’re emotionally not ready to do.

36:22

That.

From a place that she’s raised her kid, she’s done that.

And nobody wants to tell your kid you can’t go to a sporting bet or you can’t play in this.

But yeah, you, you, you.

It’s all about setting expectations.

And it’s not a cap situation that Karen brings up.

It’s because your spouse makes a lot more money and the caps come into play.

36:41

But you know, you can also set the expectation and put the spouse, your spouse on the table.

I mean, I remember saying to my ex, fine, if you don’t want our son to do that, you tell him that he can’t do that.

I don’t have to be the bad guy all the time.

I can say I can’t afford it on my budget in which I did, but dad’s another scenario.

37:00

And you don’t play that against your kids, but you say to your spouse, listen, you want to pay it.

You pay it.

I I can’t afford it.

And those are the things that you can build into your agreement too.

You mentioned a spouse who wants their kids to play in 15 travel teams.

OK, well, when you’re negotiating, go ahead and bring that up, Say my spouse would like me to our son to do all this.

37:19

Can you put it in there that he agrees to pay over this because I can.

I know I cannot afford it, You know, so they were private schools, saving a private schools.

You know, I, my kids, I went to private prep schools.

Yeah, in hindsight now, shit, I say, did we have to spend that much money on their.

37:35

My kids happen to be smart, so they would have done fine in a public school, right?

But they’re thriving now.

They’re having kids now.

So I mean, so it all worked.

But if I had to go back in time, sure, I would love to have all the money I spent on their private school.

You know, my income is different.

37:51

But you know, we do the best we can at the time we’re doing it.

Right.

And I think that’s where, you know, I have older kids and I have a 5 and 6 year old now too.

So I get a second time through this, right?

And I see all my neighbors getting in their little minivans and pulling out at 5:00 every night to go to soccer and AT ball and all this stuff, you know, and then we’re home and we’re hanging out at the pool.

38:10

And, and I’m just, I’m going to do it differently the second time.

But I did when I was going through that whole process of being a single parent and the Joneses were going to soccer kids, you want to do soccer?

Sure.

And we were, we were doing all that.

I’m not saying it’s not a good thing.

I’m just saying if you, if it’s not your budget.

I was cleaning toilets to pay for my son to do cheerleading because I could not afford it.

38:28

But I knew it’s what he wanted to do.

When I had the pressure, his dad was saying no to it.

So I had to pay for it 100%.

I clean the toilets, I clean the gym mats.

I was going across the street and helping the elderly man that lived next to us to take care of him and he was paying me to do that.

Like I did a lot of things that I normally wouldn’t do to provide for my kids because my Plan A wasn’t working.

38:49

He was not going to help me with those situations.

But the reality was I had to go get it somewhere else.

And so that’s why I just, I want people to not just rely upon Plan A.

You got to go find it somewhere.

I mean we do we do 3 scenarios and division scenarios.

There’s here’s your best case scenario that you would love to have and here’s your next case scenario because you’re going to have OG and then here’s your C scenario.

39:11

So you go in hoping for A, but you might be on C.

But if you have the mindset that you can shift to say, OK, I can deal with that.

And we start with your budget.

It’s the same thing to what you’re talking about.

You know, it’s a big reality check.

I mean, I hate doing budgets and I’m the financial 1.

Karen’s an expert of them, but it is a, she did one with me and I was like, what?

39:30

I’m not telling you all that, but I did because I need to experience how the clients feel.

But it is reality, you know, it is like this is what’s coming in and this is where it’s going out.

And maybe I do have to scrub toilets, and maybe I do need to get another job.

Or maybe I don’t and I have to set a different expectation out there.

39:47

That’s why it’s not that important for my for what I thought my financial goals were.

Once I see it, all of a sudden you have a change of mindset that cannot happen.

And I want your audience to know it.

It’s temporary if you are OK with making changes.

40:05

You know, this temporary set back of maybe you have to tell your kids no for this season and maybe that bothers you so bad that you reach out to friends and family for sponsorships or you go to your local businesses and you ask for sponsorships.

I did that too.

You know, you got to be resourceful if it’s something you truly want for yourself or for your kids instead of just sitting back and like, whoa, it was me.

40:22

We can’t no go get after it.

And I think that’s the mindset shift that you have to have when you work with experts like you guys or myself is you’re not always making the best decisions during this time.

And that’s why hiring the expert is so, so important that they can think of things that you can’t even see or hear right now.

40:39

They’re going to come up with different scenarios.

I mean, looking at your financial idea of given the AB and CI know my people didn’t do that.

My attorney said this is your option, sign it or not.

And I was like, well, I mean, OK, like I, I guess I’m signing because you’re not even telling me what option B is.

I mean, the fact that you guys are giving people options.

40:56

I’m giving people options of all these different ideas for holidays, all these different ideas for education.

Like here’s the possibilities.

And I think lawyers are shortchanging and they don’t have the time nor do they have the capacity to sit down and say, OK, Catherine, here are your three financial options.

OK, here’s your 3 holiday options.

41:11

They’re not wanting to do that with their client.

That’s why you have to hire experts in the field to give you all the options and all that.

And again, I think you guys probably hear this too.

Where were you five years ago?

I should have talked to you guys a long time ago.

Like where where I would have loved to have known this before, you know, and I think if you’re listening to this and you’re getting ready to start the process, you know exactly who to come to now for both categories.

41:31

But you want to be the most educated person in the room because it is your.

Future.

Oh, totally not.

This is is everything in divorce knowledge is everything.

Totally it is and it really does matter how you start.

You know, starting prepared is your best course of action.

41:48

And it doesn’t matter if you already started the process and you’re saying, Oh my gosh, I should have done this.

You can take pause.

You can put your attorney on pause right now.

You can say, let me back up.

If you’re no, you’re working off a template and you know that you know your kids better.

I totally agree.

No judge should be telling you how to raise your child and no judge should be telling you what your financial outcome should be.

42:08

You don’t want that because first of all, we don’t even know how they are living their lives.

So why would we want them to run our lives?

So get your plans together and you’re going to feel really empowered to just move on to that next step because you’re going to take the power back into your hands, which is where it should be.

And I think that’s what we’re talking about today.

42:24

It’s your divorce, it’s your family.

You make the decision, but you can only do that with the knowledge and being prepared.

And if you’re listening, no matter where you are in the process, just reach out to us.

We’ll how do they contact you?

Go to samanthaboss.com, you know, helping with parenting plans.

42:41

I have really affordable class that you can take just to get education again.

You don’t have to get a parenting plan for me unless you really want to just come and take my $97.00 class.

It’s two hours of me just high energy telling you everything about parenting plans that you go into any mediation, any meeting with your attorney, any discussion sitting at the kitchen table with your ex and you know what to say and how to present yourself and what to pick and, and things to talk about.

43:05

Again, I thought parenting plans were as simple as visitation.

We’re going to talk about money and visitation.

I didn’t know there’s all these hundred other things, you know, that were included.

So yeah, go to samanthaboss.com, check it out.

You can get consults, you can get parenting plans, or you can take that class.

And I have a couple free checklists as well.

43:21

So I mean, I think it’s just know what to ask and how to ask.

It would be educated about what you’re asking about.

Samantha, thank you for this.

Great conversation and thank you to our listeners for joining us today.

If you found this episode helpful, please like, subscribe and share with anyone navigating divorce.

43:39

It may just be what they need right now.

We’d love to hear from you.

If you have a divorce related question or a topic you’d like us to explore in the future, e-mail us at we WeChat at ck11.net.

For more resources to guide you through your divorce journey, visit azure-emu-499854.hostingersite.com/.

43:58

From personalized financial planning to expert insights and community support, we’re here to empower you with knowledge and financial clarity.

Remember, knowledge is power and you are stronger than you think.

This concludes this episode.

44:14

Thank you Samantha for really a fantastic conversation.

Thanks lady, that was awesome.

Thanks for joining us on another episode of WeChat Divorce.

We hope this episode was informative and supportive on your divorce journey.

If you're looking for more support for navigating divorce with confidence and clarity, head over to azure-emu-499854.hostingersite.com/ for more podcast episodes, divorce events, and resources for your divorce.

44:42

We’ll see you back here for our next episode.