Almost nobody learns how divorce works until they are in one. This episode is the orientation nobody gets: what starts a case, what the process options actually are, what gets divided, and where people give away things they never knew they had.

Ken Novenstern is a matrimonial attorney who began practicing in Syracuse in the mid-1980s and has spent most of the decades since in Westchester County, New York, where he is a partner at Fredman Baken & Novenstern with offices in White Plains and Mount Kisco. Alongside litigation he works in mediation and collaborative divorce, and he served as president of the New York Association of Collaborative Professionals. He also recorded a large library of short explainer videos during the pandemic, for the same reason this show exists: people cannot find plain information about any of this.

He starts with process. One attorney cannot represent both spouses, so the arrangement people describe as sharing a lawyer is really mediation, where the neutral gives information rather than legal advice and each party keeps a consulting attorney. Collaborative divorce puts counsel on both sides plus financial and mental health professionals. Litigation is the last option, though Novenstern is fair about when it helps, particularly where one spouse has not accepted that the marriage is ending and nothing moves without a judge. He walks through the summons and complaint, the request for judicial intervention and the clock it starts, and how uneven the wait for a judgment can be from county to county.

Then the substance. Separate property claims built on a parent's contribution to a home purchase decades earlier. How 529 accounts are actually owned, and how they are treated when they were funded during the marriage. What to gather before a first consultation, and why an attorney asks about your finances at that meeting, which is issue identification rather than a look at your wallet. Why judges are more concerned about someone refusing to acknowledge a mental health or substance issue than about someone treating one. Dividing retirement against home equity once tax is accounted for, stock options and restricted stock with vesting dates that straddle the case, and the domestic relations orders that keep the division from triggering tax. And prenups: useful when written reasonably, and dangerous in the version where one party waives everything.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why one attorney cannot represent both spouses, and what mediation actually is
• Mediation, collaborative divorce, and litigation, and when each one fits
• What a summons and complaint start, and what a request for judicial intervention triggers
• How a parent's contribution to a home can support a separate property claim decades later
• Who actually owns a 529 account, and how it's treated in a division
• Why a dollar of retirement money isn't a dollar of home equity
• Stock options and restricted stock that vest after a case begins
• What makes a prenup reasonable, and the version that leaves one person exposed

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Decades in matrimonial law, and why self-representation is a last resort
3:00 Separate property: a parent's contribution to the house, and 529 accounts
7:00 "Let's just use one attorney": the conflict, and what mediation really is
15:00 The summons and complaint, and the request for judicial intervention
18:00 When litigation is the right call, and what it costs everyone
21:00 First steps: gathering documents, and securing what matters to you
24:00 Therapy and medication, and what judges make of them
26:00 Choosing an attorney, and why the first meeting asks about money
35:00 Prenups: useful, and the version that goes too far
40:00 Dividing assets: retirement, home equity, stock options, and QDROs
47:00 Filing first, grounds for divorce, and orders of protection

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Ken Novenstern at Fredman Baken & Novenstern: https://fbndivorcelaw.com/ken-novenstern/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

The therapist is not for you. It is for a twelve-year-old who has spent two years inside a custody fight, and the list you are working from is a directory page where every practice has ticked every box. There is no obvious way to tell any of them apart, and you get one phone call each.

Sara Mathews Dixon is a licensed clinical social worker with a private psychotherapy practice in Darien, Connecticut. She has been in the behavioral health field for more than twenty years and has run her own practice for most of that time, working with individuals, families and couples, with particular experience in trauma, depression and personality disorders. She has testified in divorce and custody matters, which is unusual enough among therapists to be worth knowing. This is her second time on with Lisa, and the episode exists because of a term that came up once in passing and stuck: cultural competency.

Dixon defines it without jargon. It is whether a professional assumes things about you before asking. She gives the examples she watches for in her own practice: asking a new client whether her husband is paying for the sessions, which assumes a marriage, a gender and a financial arrangement. Asking a child whether they live with their parents, when plenty of children live with one parent, a grandparent or a foster family. Filling in a demographic box from someone's appearance when they are Jamaican, Trinidadian or Puerto Rican. Her point is that these are not etiquette failures. A person who has been misidentified in the first ten minutes has already learned something about how much of themselves they can bring into the room.

The rest of the conversation is a practical guide to hiring one. What her office does and does not display, including the young Jewish client who objected to her Christmas tree and the answer she gave him. Why she keeps her family out of the office and off the internet. How she answers a client who says she cannot possibly understand their experience. How long rapport takes to build, and how she raises it directly when it has not arrived by week four or six. What she does when the problem is her own reaction to a client, and the one relationship in her career she had to end. The questions to ask on a first call, including whether asking about narcissism is fair game. What a therapist means by a success rate, which turns out to be about how soon you stop needing them. And why most therapists will avoid a courtroom, so you should ask before you are counting on one.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• What cultural competency means, and why it decides how safe the room feels
• The assumptions to listen for in a first conversation with any professional
• The questions to ask on an exploratory call, and why to treat it like hiring an attorney
• Why a directory checkbox list tells you almost nothing, and what to read instead
• How long rapport takes, and what to say when it is not there yet
• When a therapist should refer you out, and what a good one does instead of just declining
• Whether it is fair to ask a therapist if they understand narcissistic behavior
• Why most therapists avoid testifying, and how to find out before you need them to

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 What cultural competency is, and why it matters in these cases
3:00 The intake questions that reveal whether someone gets you
5:00 The assumptions that shut a client down
7:00 The menorah, the family photos, and what an office says
11:00 "You haven't lived my experience," and her answer to it
14:00 How long rapport takes, and the one client she let go
19:00 Shopping for a therapist: what to ask on the first call
23:00 Narcissism, success rates, and therapists who will not go to court

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Sara Mathews Dixon, LCSW: https://www.smdpsychotherapy.com/

🎧 More with Sara Mathews Dixon on this podcast
Ep 103: Teen Therapy in a High-Conflict Divorce

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

Kristen Darcy handed her kids composition notebooks and started writing to them. No requirement to write back. Some of the entries are hard to read now, and years later her adult son called from Los Angeles after his car was broken into, upset about losing those notebooks and the cards she had tucked inside them.

Kristen is a coach who works with people moving through traumatic change, much of it divorce and much of it high conflict, and she and Lisa recorded this around Mother's Day. Their starting point is that holidays built to celebrate a parent land badly on parents in a custody fight, and that the pressure comes from every direction at once, including from inside.

Kristen's frame is entitlement, used the way almost nobody uses it in this community. Not the ex's sense of entitlement, but the belief that you are owed good things: rest, help, affection, space to take up. She describes a client who said out loud that she could not believe she was entitled to anything, and works from there into what you can actually control, which she puts at three things: how you think, how you speak, and how you act. The practical version is a pause and two questions. What am I feeling. What do I need.

The second half is about grounding before something hard. Kristen describes using the shower deliberately, letting the water carry the day off, and carrying an object into the courtroom that makes her feel protected. Lisa wears her late aunt's vintage boots to every hearing for the same reason. They talk about gratitude as a daily practice instead of a mood, about the sticky-note habit of writing down a fear and scheduling time to read it back, and about Kristen's rule of twenty minutes to fall apart followed by one action step, which her adult son now uses on her. Kristen also tells the story of the young woman crying alone on a courthouse bench, and why she would not walk past her.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why Mother's Day and Father's Day land hard in a custody case, and how to opt out
• The two questions to ask when you are triggered: what am I feeling, what do I need
• A re-entry ritual for the moment your kids come back from the other house
• The back-and-forth journal: how to build a written record of connection with your child
• Gratitude as a daily practice rather than a mood you wait to feel
• How to ground yourself before a hearing, and what to carry into the courtroom with you
• The sticky-note habit: write the fear down, then schedule time to read it back
• Twenty minutes to fall apart, then one action step

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Mother's Day pressure, and why it lands hard in a high-conflict case
5:00 Entitlement, the good kind: believing you are owed good things
8:00 What you can control: how you think, how you speak, how you act
10:00 What am I feeling, what do I need, and how to ask for it
13:00 Opting out of the day, and the guilt that follows
15:00 The re-entry ritual, and the journal you keep with your kids
22:00 Gratitude as a daily practice rather than a mood
24:00 Grounding before court: the shower, the talisman, borrowed strength
31:00 The woman crying alone on the courthouse bench
35:00 Being entitled to be cherished, and trusting yourself again
42:00 Twenty minutes to fall apart, then an action step

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Kristen Darcy: https://www.kristendarcy.com/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

Best friends for thirty years, leading parallel lives, married within the same stretch and raising kids side by side. Thirteen years in, both of them found out their husbands were cheating, covering for each other, and traveling with their girlfriends. One of those marriages ended in a divorce the two people can still be in a room for. The other did not, and that difference is what this episode is about.

T.H. is one half of ExExperts and the Divorce etc. podcast, which she and her friend Jessica built because the only real resource either of them had during their divorces was the other one. Not just for the legal questions, but for what to do with a weekend without your kids in it. The platform now runs on a stated mission of empowering anyone going through divorce, men and women both, through education and support, and Lisa is one of the experts on it.

The premise this conversation attacks is that two adults will settle down after the separation and start doing what is best for the children. That happens. It happened for Jessica. It did not happen for T.H., whose ex was largely absent for four years and did not know what grade his children were in, and whose communication ran through attorneys. She describes what it is like watching friends with amicable divorces save each other seats, and the particular loneliness of measuring your case against theirs. Her working approach is to treat co-parenting as a business transaction: prepare, know what you are raising, and work from an outline instead of improvising into a trigger.

The rest is the harder material. Learning to be Teflon against the smirks and the energy, and how long that took. The therapist who told her before the divorce started exactly what she was dealing with and that she would be taught how to get through it. The birthday setup, when a cake and balloons arrived days after a phone call blew her marriage open, and her children told her she was the one not being nice. Lisa brings in the advice she got at an Al-Anon meeting, which she credits with keeping her out of that trap: tell your children the truth about why the marriage ended, because if you do not, the other parent will supply a version in which you broke up the family, and your kids will have to rewrite their own history later when they find out. They close on why the question "why didn't you leave sooner" misunderstands how these relationships are built.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why co-parenting advice written for amicable divorces doesn't transfer to your case
• Treating co-parenting as a business transaction: prepare, outline, don't improvise
• What it costs you to measure your situation against a friend's cooperative divorce
• Learning to be Teflon, and how long that actually takes
• The setup: being made to look unreasonable in front of your own children
• Why telling your kids the truth early protects them from rewriting history later
• Why "why didn't you leave sooner" misunderstands how these relationships work

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Meet T.H., and how ExExperts started
5:00 Co-parenting as a business transaction
7:00 A basketball game, and comparing yourself to an amicable divorce
9:00 Learning to be Teflon
11:00 The birthday setup, and being cornered in front of the kids
13:00 Telling your kids the truth, and Lisa's Al-Anon lesson
15:00 Grooming, love bombing, and why people don't leave sooner
17:00 Lonelier inside the relationship than out of it
19:00 Where to find ExExperts

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 ExExperts and the Divorce etc. podcast: https://exexperts.com/

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

Ending a marriage to someone you also own a company with means two breakups running at the same time, in two different courthouses, on two different clocks. Attorney Linda Alle-Murphy calls the second one a business divorce, and she says the mistake people make is assuming their divorce attorney will take care of it.

Linda Alle-Murphy is litigation counsel at Company Counsel LLC in the Philadelphia area, handling business litigation and partnership disputes, and she is admitted to practice in both Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Law is her second career. She holds a bachelor's and a master's in cello performance from Juilliard, still plays, and serves as a church organist. She draws a straight line between the two: presenting a case to a judge has a lot in common with presenting a concert, and the ability to shut everything else out at a deposition, including an aggressive opposing counsel, is a musician's habit.

In this episode, Linda explains why business disputes are heard in state court rather than family court, and what a business attorney brings that a general practitioner may not. She covers what an operating agreement should settle at the start, including what happens if an owner dies, becomes incapacitated, or wants out. She explains what she looks for first in a partnership agreement, why minority, majority, and fifty-fifty ownership lead to different claims, and how a derivative action works when a minority owner needs to enforce their rights against the company itself.

The second half is enforcement. Any owner can request an accounting and access to the books, and Linda walks through the escalation when that access is refused: a motion to compel, then monetary sanctions, then civil contempt. She describes a case where sanctions came out of opposing counsel's own pocket. She also explains the certificate of dissolution and what it takes when a soon to be ex will not agree to file it, why the statute of limitations is often shorter without a written agreement, and why waiting for the divorce to finish before filing can cost the claim entirely. She closes with how to choose the right attorney, and why the state your business is registered in matters as much as the state you live in.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why a business dispute between spouses is usually heard in state civil court, not family court
• What an operating agreement should settle at the start, including death, incapacity, and an owner wanting out
• How minority, majority, and fifty-fifty ownership lead to different legal claims
• How a derivative action lets a minority owner sue on the company's behalf as well as their own
• What a certificate of dissolution is, and what happens when the other owner refuses to sign
• Requesting an accounting: your right to the books, and the escalation when it is refused
• Why the statute of limitations keeps running while your divorce is still pending
• How to choose a business litigation attorney, and why jurisdiction and registration state matter

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Meet Linda, and what the cello taught her about litigation
5:00 Why your business dispute is not heard in family court
7:00 The operating agreement: a prenup for the business
11:00 Minority owners, derivative actions, and the certificate of dissolution
15:00 Civil court vs. family court: decorum, evidence, and the timeline
17:00 Risk-benefit, and requesting an accounting
19:00 When the books are withheld: motions to compel, sanctions, and contempt
21:00 Statute of limitations, and why you cannot wait for the divorce
24:00 Choosing a business attorney, and why jurisdiction matters

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Linda Alle-Murphy at Company Counsel LLC: https://www.companycounsel.law/linda-alle-murphy

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

A woman tells one of her oldest friends that her marriage is over. The first thing out of the friend's mouth is that she cannot believe she will never see him again. That happened to Lisa, and it is the moment she decided she could not talk to people about any of this. The damage friends do at this stage is rarely deliberate, which is part of why it works.

Rebecca Ishida is a licensed marriage and family therapist based in Los Angeles. She specializes in narcissistic abuse and works extensively with trauma, including childhood trauma, is trained in EMDR, and has been pursuing certification in sex therapy alongside a good deal of couples work. She also does standup. Her own marriage ran alongside her clinical career, which she talks about here: she was licensed and running groups in the field of compulsive sexual behavior while living inside emotional and verbal abuse at home, and she is straightforward about the gap between being objective and being the person it is happening to.

This episode is about the friendships. Rebecca defines betrayal trauma as an injury from the people you emotionally count on rather than from anyone you would call an enemy, and explains why that lands on top of an existing wound rather than beside it. She and Lisa go through why friends stay neutral and why neutrality functions as a choice, why the fifty-fifty assumption people apply to ordinary conflict does not fit an abusive relationship, and how the same charm that worked on you has usually worked on everyone around you. Lisa explains why it took her two years to tell her own family anything, including the exit she was already planning and the threat she had been handed about who would be blamed if she left.

The second half moves into what to do about it. The friend who was more present when you were falling apart than when you were rebuilding, and what that says about the friendship underneath. Whether going no contact applies to friends and family, and how you do that with someone you have known since childhood. Sunk cost, and why a longer history makes leaving harder rather than easier. Rebecca also questions some received wisdom out loud, on unconditional love in romantic relationships and on the promise that doing your own work will deliver you the right person. They close on rebuilding trust in your own judgment, and on letting new people earn a place rather than handing it over.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• What betrayal trauma is, and why an injury from a friend can land differently than one from a partner
• Why "I don't want to take sides" functions as taking a side
• Why the fifty-fifty assumption doesn't fit an abusive relationship, and what friends miss
• Why friends who only met the good version struggle to believe you, then start doubting you
• The friend who is more comfortable with you struggling than with you getting better
• The sunk cost fallacy in friendship: why a long history makes leaving harder
• Whether going no contact can apply to friends and family, not only an ex
• How to rebuild trust in your own judgment, and let new people earn their place

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Rebecca's practice, and what betrayal trauma is
5:00 Friends choosing sides, and why staying out of it is a side
8:00 Lisa's story, and why it took two years to tell anyone
12:00 Cognitive dissonance, and the good version your friends saw
14:00 Shame, and being capable everywhere else in your life
20:00 When friends move from doubting the story to doubting you
21:00 The friend who liked you better when you were struggling
24:00 Unconditional love, intensity, and what recovery actually takes
27:00 Letting people go, and the sunk cost fallacy
31:00 Rebecca's own experience with a man who hadn't actually left
38:00 The friend who ended up in the ex's circle, and rebuilding self-trust

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Rebecca Ishida, LMFT: https://rebeccaishida.com/
🔗 Rebecca Ishida on Instagram (@rebecca_ishida): https://www.instagram.com/rebecca_ishida/

🎧 More with Rebecca Ishida on this podcast
Ep 13: Sex Addiction, Gaslighting and Narcissistic Abuse
Ep 109: Lying by Omission and the Double Life

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

Amber Chapman's oldest daughter started gorging herself at dinner, and Amber could not work out why, until she learned the girl was stocking up because she would be hungry at her father's house. That is the kind of thing this episode is made of: small, telling moments from seventeen years of a high-conflict custody battle, told by someone whose kids are now grown.

Amber Chapman is a writer and a survivor of a high-conflict divorce she filed when her youngest was about a year old. She raised three kids across two very different households and a move between states, and she came on the show to share what she learned, along with the reassurance she wishes she'd had: that both she and her kids would make it through.

Much of the hour is the day-to-day. Two homes with opposite rules on meals, medication, and car seats, and how Amber taught her kids to be their own voice about their safety without running down their dad. The kids cast as messengers and spies, and her rule never to discuss her ex while they were with her. Her oldest parentified into the caretaker of the youngest, and the hard math of which incidents to bring to an attorney when the court will not act on most of them.

Then the strategy she credits for getting through: attorneys who listened and collaborated rather than just followed orders, and the relocation playbook she learned by trial, staying put until she could leave with her kids, filing first, and refusing the endless extensions that were really a tactic. She also describes coming within inches of parental alienation without knowing the word for it. She closes, through tears she does not apologize for, on where it landed: three grown kids who chose their relationship with her, and a message that you do not give up.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• What to do when two households have opposite rules, and you can't control the other one
• How to teach young kids to advocate for their own safety without badmouthing the other parent
• Why kids grow up faster in these cases, and the mixed cost of that
• How to build a support system, and why one honest friend can keep you from quitting
• Why an attorney who listens and collaborates beats one who just does what you say
• The relocation lessons: never leave the state without your kids, and why filing first matters
• How to recognize parental alienation early, before it takes hold
• The long view: how and when kids come to see the truth for themselves

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Meet Amber Chapman, and the fear that your kids' lives are ruined
3:00 Two households, opposite rules, and the confusion for the kids
5:00 "Call the stepparent mom": the early red flags
8:00 Damage control: teaching kids to advocate for their own safety
13:00 Building a support system, and the friends who wouldn't let her quit
16:00 The three attorneys, and the day she almost gave up
19:00 Kids as messengers and spies, and not talking about the ex
22:00 When kids ask you to intervene, and picking your battles
27:00 Court lessons: show no emotion, and keep the attorney who works
29:00 Relocation: file first, and don't leave without your kids
35:00 The alienation she almost missed, and the hope on the other side

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

A client told Vance Long that her car was the only place she felt safe, and then said she no longer felt safe there either, because she knew it was being tracked. His team found the device and removed it. What she told him afterward was that she could go sit in her car again.

Our guest this episode is Vance Long, who came into this work from corporate executive protection. He started in physical security and moved into cyber work as tracked phones and monitored executives became routine, then took those methods into domestic violence, intimate partner violence, and high-conflict divorce cases. He trains police departments in cyber stalking detection and volunteers with a county domestic violence high-risk task force. He rarely does live interviews and asked for this one on short notice.

His framing on why people arrive overwhelmed is that none of this happened overnight. We spent two decades moving our lives online, into accounts and apps and connected devices, without paying much attention to the security of any of it, and now someone is expected to fix all of it in a week while also being abused. His counter is sequencing: one thing at a time, in an order that reduces the risk fastest.

The substance covers a lot of ground. Why a phone number now works as a de facto social security number, and why changing it at the carrier puts the new one back into public record within days. Porting the old number into a line the attorney and the investigating detective can log into, so the abuser keeps calling a number that is building the case against them. County property records, Zillow images, and the archived copies of pages you thought you had removed. Social engineering, which has its own headline competition at the big hacker conferences, because humans breach more easily than hardware. The distinction between private and secure, which Vance explains with the image of a house built from bulletproof glass. Password managers and two-factor authentication, never over SMS. Encrypted messaging, and why he moved his own practice off WhatsApp. Smart TVs, thermostats, doorbells, and the default passwords that let a neighbor's camera watch you. Email forwarding rules left behind after a password change. And the principle he trains, staying left of bang, meaning ahead of the incident, where you still get to decide rather than react.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why every hidden device gives itself away through heat, and what a thermal camera finds
• Your phone number as a de facto social security number, and what a soft credit pull ties to it
• Porting your old number into a monitored line instead of abandoning it
• Public records, Zillow photos, and the archived pages you thought you deleted
• The difference between private and secure, and the bulletproof glass house
• Password managers and two-factor authentication, and why never over SMS
• Smart TVs, doorbells, and the default router passwords that let a neighbor watch you
• Staying left of bang: staying ahead of the incident instead of reacting to it

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 From executive protection to stalking cases, and the car as the only safe place
5:00 Reactive policing, proactive security, and training patrol officers
12:00 Your phone number as a de facto social security number
14:00 Porting the old number, and building a throwaway
15:30 Public records, Zillow, and the internet archive
19:30 Social engineering, and why private is not the same as secure
24:00 Two-factor, password managers, and the ninety percent fix
27:30 The thermal camera, and how a room sweep got fast
32:00 Passwords, forwarding rules, and the internet of things
44:30 Staying left of bang

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183

🎧 More with Vance Long on this podcast
Ep 149: Protecting Your Data During a Legal Case

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

High-conflict parents will fight to the last dollar for custody, win, and then hand the child back. Padideh Jafari has seen it enough times to treat it as a pattern, not a surprise. The fight was never about the child. It was about not letting the other parent win.

Padideh Jafari has practiced divorce and mediation law in California for twenty years. She earned her law degree at Southwestern Law School, studied communication and psychology at Loyola Marymount, and clerked in a Los Angeles District Attorney unit handling child sexual-abuse cases, experience she brings to the family court work she now does across Los Angeles, Ventura, Orange, and Riverside counties. She also consults with people in all fifty states, often to help them find the right attorney. This is the second part of an ongoing conversation with Lisa about how a toxic person turns the legal system into a weapon.

Jafari is candid that she screens hard at intake. She represents what Chris and Lisa call the sweethearts, not the toxic party, partly on principle and partly because her standing with local judges is something she protects. She shares the red flags she listens for in a client's dating history: a whirlwind romance, a long trail of "crazy exes," estrangement from their own children, cruelty to animals, chronic financial dependence, and why she treats them as patterns rather than single data points. And she explains why a high-conflict parent is drawn to chaos, which is the same reason co-parenting with one is so hard.

The practical core is how a strategic attorney fights back. When the frivolous motions start, California's Family Code 271 lets a judge sanction bad-faith litigation, and Jafari puts opposing counsel on notice early. When an opposing lawyer floats a baseless alienation accusation, she answers it with documentation and a firm line: words matter. She walks through building a credible case when a child has been abused, police and CPS reports, medical records, and the family's history, because as a judge once told her, people lie and documents don't. And on smear campaigns her guidance is blunt: do not retaliate, because chaos is exactly what the other side is fishing for.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why a lawyer's own credibility with the local bench shapes what they can win for you
• The red flags Jafari screens for: a whirlwind romance, a trail of "crazy exes," estrangement from their kids, cruelty to animals
• Why a high-conflict parent fights for custody they don't want, and the patience that can turn it around
• Frivolous motions and California's Family Code 271: asking the court to sanction bad-faith litigation
• How to shut down a baseless alienation accusation before it takes hold
• Smear campaigns: why retaliating is the trap, and what to do instead
• Building a credible child-abuse case: police and CPS reports, medical records, and a documented history
• "People lie, documents don't": why evidence, not emotion, carries a family court case

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Part two, and meeting in real life
3:00 Padideh's background: family law, psychology, and the DA's office
5:00 Why credibility, hers and yours, decides cases
9:00 The red flags she screens for in a toxic partner
22:00 Why a high-conflict ex fights for custody they don't want
27:00 Reverse psychology, and why chaos makes them hard to co-parent with
31:00 Frivolous motions and California's Family Code 271 sanctions
33:00 Shutting down a weaponized alienation claim: "words matter"
39:00 Building a credible child-abuse case with documentation
43:00 Smear campaigns, and why you must not retaliate

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Padideh Jafari at Jafari Law Group: https://jafarilegal.com/team/padideh-jafari-orange-county-family-attorney/

🎧 More with Padideh Jafari on this podcast
Ep 52: How a Difficult Ex Weaponizes the Legal System
Ep 129: 50/50 Custody and Protecting Your Kids

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.

First marriages in Los Angeles County end in divorce roughly two-thirds of the time. Second marriages, family attorney Padideh Jafari says, end in divorce even more often, closer to seventy percent, often because people skip processing what happened the first time before remarrying.

Padideh Jafari has practiced family law in Los Angeles for twenty years, across mediation, collaborative law, and litigation. She has a law degree from Southwestern University School of Law, a psychology minor from her undergraduate years, and early experience clerking on child abuse and molestation cases for the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office. She also teaches as an adjunct law professor. Roughly a third of her caseload involves an abusive or high-conflict ex; the rest are more straightforward separations.

In this conversation, Padideh and Lisa go through what changes when the other spouse has a cluster B personality disorder: why the case can run one to five years instead of six months, why both spouses sometimes end up hiring attorneys who are just as combative as they are, and a real case where proving a retirement account did not exist cost another forty thousand dollars after a divorce that had already run three years and six hundred thousand dollars. They also talk through what a judge actually needs to see to deviate from a 50/50 custody split, why a recorded phone call can backfire in a two-party consent state like California, and which apps she recommends for keeping a clean written record.

Padideh also explains why online groups that push parents to mail judges anonymous packets about their case are encouraging something illegal, not just unwise, and what she tells clients who are being targeted by organized harassment campaigns for hiring her.

As always, this is strategic education, not legal or mental-health advice for your specific situation.

🎓 What you'll learn

• Why the normal divorce timeline doesn't apply once the other spouse has a cluster B personality disorder
• Why courts now start from a 50/50 custody presumption, and what documentation it actually takes to move off it
• Why proving something doesn't exist, like a hidden account, can cost tens of thousands of dollars on its own
• Why bringing a new partner to court before your divorce is final can hurt your case
• What counts as documentation of abuse, and what a judge won't act on
• Why a recorded phone call can backfire in a two-party consent state
• Why online groups pushing anonymous letters to judges are encouraging something illegal, not just unwise
• Why attorneys who represent fathers are being targeted by organized harassment campaigns, and what that says about the gender assumptions in this space

⏱️ Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:00 Her background: psychology, prosecuting child abuse cases, and her courtroom persona
5:00 Divorce rates for first and second marriages, and why a new partner in the courtroom hurts your case
9:00 "You're not divorcing who you married": recognizing a cluster B ex
15:00 What it costs, and why she screens clients before taking their case
19:00 Why these cases take one to five years, and the $40,000 fight to prove an account didn't exist
25:00 Legal abuse, staying out of court, and why you argue on facts, not emotion
31:00 Gender: covert vs. overt behavior, and what her own caseload shows
39:00 Why courts start at 50/50 custody now, and what documentation actually changes that
47:00 Recording laws, text messages, and the apps she recommends for building a case
53:00 The illegal pamphlet scheme, and why some attorneys are being targeted online

Keep going 💜
Book a free 30-minute discovery call and we'll help you map your next steps: https://beentheregotout.com/call
📘 Been There Got Out: Toxic Relationships, High-Conflict Divorce, and How to Stay Sane Under Insane Circumstances — https://www.amazon.com/dp/194627495X
📘 Been There Got Out: When Your Ex Turns the Kids Against You (our parental-alienation book) — https://www.amazon.com/dp/1967674183
🔗 Padideh Jafari at Jafari Law Group: https://jafarilegal.com/team/padideh-jafari-orange-county-family-attorney/

🎧 More with Padideh Jafari on this podcast
Ep 53: Frivolous Motions and Weaponized Alienation
Ep 129: 50/50 Custody and Protecting Your Kids

About Been There Got Out
Chris Barry and Lisa Johnson are high-conflict divorce, custody, and co-parenting strategists, and the founders of Been There Got Out. They know these cases from the inside: both have successfully represented themselves in family court. Few attorneys have a playbook for a case like this — Chris and Lisa write yours with you, so you and your kids can get through it as unscathed as possible.