As I gained experience in divorce and custody cases, I saw the impacts of litigation on clients and, especially, children. I resolved to find a better way to help families journey through divorce. My own divorce experience informed me about the need for emotional, financial and spiritual support for families going through dissolutions. By 1997 I was trained and offering what I call "mediation plus". Mediation plus referrals to professional counselors for emotional, financial and pastoral needs; usually to professionals/ pastors with whom they already had prior relationships.

At the same time I served as a volunteer board member of Family Assessment, Counseling and Educational Services, Inc., aka F.A.C.E.S., a non-profit whose mission is to provide family counseling, parenting classes, anger management classes, monitored visitation and other services on a sliding scale basis to families with children caught "in the cross fire" of divorce. From 1997 through 2002 I served on their board, including 4 years as president.

I have engaged in countless hours of training and education in various mediation techniques, the issues of families in conflict from domestic violence prevention to pastoral care. In a mediation seminar on high conflict divorce in 2000, I saw the collaborative model applied to a mediation - and another light went on.

Divorce is not the end of the family. There are children, grandchildren, graduations, weddings and funerals. As a peacemaker, my mission is to help you and your family journey through this crisis with a better future and hope for a family that does not remain in conflict and continue to cause pain to your children and grandchildren.