306 - Mediation Without Illusions

Mediation can look calm on the calendar and feel like a wood chipper in the room. If you’re a dad heading toward divorce mediation, this briefing is built for the exact moment the tone shifts, the “reasonable” mask drops, and your parenting time suddenly becomes negotiable. We lay out the tactical mindset that keeps you from getting processed into the weekend-visitor trap and helps you protect a real 50/50 custody schedule.

We start with the courtroom math most people miss: family court often runs on a preponderance of evidence, where that extra 1% of perception can decide everything. From there, we unpack the biggest red flag in the room, the 50/50 custody litmus test. If the other parent won’t support equal parenting time up front, we explain what that usually means for custody, support, and the next twenty years of co-parenting, and how to shift from “nice guy” hoping to strategic defense.

Then we get concrete. We talk about using mediation as intelligence gathering, locking in small wins with an a la carte approach, and building a durable floor through documented agreements like an MOU where your jurisdiction allows it. You’ll also hear tools for high conflict divorce dynamics: the legal pad protocol for handling provocation and false allegations, how to “spoon feed” the mediator labeled facts and a parenting log, and how to use ask-based questions that force the other side to show evidence. We close with the decision gap, managing exhaustion, and why you should demand a 24-hour review before signing anything.

Being unprepared is how great fathers become weekend visitors. Most ground is lost quietly through "drift" and decisions made under pressure. Stop the drift today at TheDivorcedDadvocate.com.

Access your tactical tools:

• Risk Assessment: Identify your "quiet loss" exposure in 10 minutes.
• Protection Session: Book a private triage to ensure mistakes don’t become permanent.

Your kids are counting on you.

Transcript

The Mediation Wake Up Call

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Hello, dads, and welcome back to the show and this week's briefing. And if you're listening to this today, there is a high probability you're either staring at a mediation date circled on your calendar in red, or maybe you just walked out of a session feeling like your entire reality was just put through the wood chipper. Either way, I want you to stay with me today because we're going to talk through mediation the way it actually happens in the trenches, not the way the inner internet romance version describes it, or maybe even the way that your attorney has described it or prepared you for it. What I'm my goal today is I want you to leave this half hour or so with a script in your head, a strategy in your pocket, and a clear sense of exactly what to do the moment that amicable mirage evaporates. See, there's a specific moment I see over and over with the dads that I coach. And you walk into that mediation room thinking, hey, we're both good people, we both love the kids, we can just sit down with a neutral third party and work this out like rational adults, right? For years, you've probably been the guy who kept the peace in your marriage. The yes man. You bought a temporary, fragile peace by constantly sacrificing your own boundaries to keep her happy. And then you walked into mediation hoping that's there's that word again, hope. And we know hope is the enemy of a good defense. Hoping that if you just stayed flexible and kept being that same nice guy, she'd eventually see reason and meet you in the middle. But then you actually sat down in that chair, and within the first 30 minutes, some subtle thing changed. The tone shifted, a phrase was used, a refusal was issued, and that amicable mirage didn't just fade, it blew up. You realized with a gut punch that she isn't there to find a fair middle ground. She's there to perform a surgical strike on your fatherhood. She's there to restructure your time with your kids until you are nothing more than a visitor in their lives. This is a brutal wake-up call where you realize the woman you used to trust is now a high conflict opponent, unfortunately. And she's using the mediation process to see exactly how much of your role you're willing to surrender just to stop the fighting. Now, guys, and especially guys that are listening to this, going, well, you know, this isn't high conflict. I'm not in high conflict. I don't anticipate this being in high conflict. I get this all the time. And even with guys that I coach that might not be in the beginning, and they're hopeful, again, hopeful that they're going to go into mediation and work stuff out. Then they come out of mediation and they go, that was a complete waste of time. And I spent three grand on my attorney, her attorney, the mediator, preparation for all of this, and it was a complete waste. Well, it's not a complete waste, and we'll talk about that a little bit a little bit later. But point being, I see this all the time, guys. But anyway, before we go any further, I want to recap the foundation we laid last week because you can't understand the danger of mediation or really the the framework and ground, you know, the framework of mediation if you don't understand the math of the courtroom. We talked again last week about the 51% rule, right? In family court, they don't need beyond a reasonable doubt or or clear and convincing evidence. They work on a preponderance of evidence. That means if the other side sways the judge just one single percent more than you do, you lose. And even the weight of a just a little bit of feather can tip those scales. When a false allegation is fired off in mediation or even hinted at, the system's goal shifts instantly from fairness to risk management. And an overworked mediator, or if you're in court, a judge would rather sideline a fit father for months just to be safe than risk a headline. This is why you can't hope for a good outcome. You have to build an evidentiary record so dense that you move that 1% needle back yourself. So let's first begin with what I feel is the single brightest, biggest, largest red flag you will ever see in that mediation room. And I'm gonna call it the 50-50 litmus test. Let's just call it that. If you walk in and she is not 100% supporting 50-50 custody off the bat, you need to wake up immediately. Do not hit the snooze button on this. Don't let yourself be lulled back to sleep by her excuses about stability or the kids' routine or some vague story about how they're just used to being with me more. These are not child-centered reasons, these are tactical justifications for your erasure and the diminishment of your parental authority. Think about these cold, well, think about the cold hard logic about this. Your children are the most important, quote, asset end quote in your life. Like if you want to look at it that way. And if she's willing to look you in the eye and try to keep your own flesh and blood from you, why on earth would you think she's going to be fair about the equity in the house? Why do you think she'll be cooperative when it comes to splitting up the retirement accounts or the business you spent a decade or more building? Or why do you think that she will then, post-divorce, all of a sudden become reasonable? When a woman rejects 50-50 custody, she's sending a high frequency signal that she views you as a secondary character in your own family. She's signaling that she intends to control the outcome long before you ever walked into that room. The amicable split she promised was just a carrot on a stick to keep you docile and maybe unrepresented for a while while she designated, uh while she designed the new reality that is going to potentially sideline you. When that happens, your posture has got to shift immediately from your nice guy persona to a strategic defense. So let's look at the data. And and so sometimes, guys, I I get this well, that's just not the reality in this case, Jude. And you know, I I know that you've seen lots of different things. And you know, to some extent, I deal with this stuff in in worst-case scenarios a lot every single day. But everything that I talk to you guys about is backed up by by data and and by by statistics and by studies and by everything else that supports everything that I'm sharing with you. And so the data on this is really, really clear. Nationally, fathers are marginalized to about 35% of parenting time as a default. And in some states, the craters to as low as 21%. That's 80 days a year for you and 285 for her. And this isn't because those dads were unfit, really. I mean, tell me, you can't tell me 65% of dads were unfit, and that's why they only got or that that 80% of dads were unfit, and that's why they got 65% less parenting time than than moms. It just does not statistically uh wash out and make sense. It's because they didn't stand their ground in court and didn't stand their ground in mediation. They accepted the maybe stability argument and then walked into the weekend visitor trap. So if she refuses 50-50, she's telling you, she's she is she is telling you up front, she is no longer your partner, she is your opponent. So that is, at least in my mind, that is something for you, that is great for you to know off the bat, because then it helps you to position where you're at. If she won't be fair about the children, she's not going to be fair about the money or your life for the next 20 years. So it's time to stop hoping she'll change her mind and start executing a plan that secures your role. You're gonna have to change how you see that room. And really, this whole podcast now is helping you to see the lay of the land and change how you see the entire process from your attorney to the judges to the legal system to how you're dealing with your ex. And mediation is just another one of another part of that that you're gonna have to that you're gonna have to see differently. Mediation is not a chat, it is a strategic operation. And even if you don't settle a single thing uh on that day of your mediation, you're there to gather very critical intelligence. So it won't be like the guys that come and they're like, well, it was a complete waste. Uh, if they come to me after, or even if we've set up or or prepared them for mediation, because part of what I'll do is I'll I'll help you to prepare for mediation and create a strategy. And we're gonna talk about this a little bit and then go into it. But if it doesn't, if you don't get a result that you're looking for, you're still gonna get some results because you're gonna be doing other things while you're there. We're gonna we're gonna talk about that now, which is your job is to learn exactly where she stands, number one. So that's why it's great for intelligence gathering. And then listen for the bottom line, identify what she truly values versus what she's just using as a trading trip, a trading chip to bleed you dry. The other thing that you can do and that you really need to do, which is critical strategic intelligence, is if you are face to face, if you're doing it in a room face-to-face, sometimes it's face-to-face. Sometimes you're in different rooms, sometimes they're over over Zoom and in different rooms or Zoom online. But if you're face-to-face, watch her attorney and learn what they are like. Are they are they bombastic loudmouths who are going to try, who are trying to intimidate you? Or are they quiet surgical strategists? If you're in that joint session, watch your watch your wife's body language. Those tells reveal her emotional state and the dynamics she has with her lawyer. And this is information you and your legal team will exploit, will exploit and utilize if the case goes to trial. And this is something that we will talk about in coaching, and I talk about a lot in coaching that helps us to craft what your game plan is and how you're going to go forward, whether it's in uh leading up to trial or leading up to mediation or actually in mediation and trial. So this is all good feedback. Most dads mistake not settling the whole case as a failure. So I want you to just reframe that in your mind and really forget about that and think about it more of like being a commander, right? Real commanders will pivot or a coach, like you're coaching this team. If you can't resolve the big items because she's being unreasonable, you pivot to what I call the a la carte strategy. And oftentimes I really think, especially in high conflict, this is the number one way to go into it from the start. You're gonna narrow the narrow the battlefield, if you will, and lock in some small wins. Maybe you can't agree on the asset split, which I usually recommend doing second and working on the parenting plan first, so that maybe you can lock in the summer vacation schedule, the holiday rotations, uh the school pickup logistics, the the parenting time, et cetera, and then work on the other things. So every small issue you resolve first is helpful. And then if you do it in mediation, it's one less thing that a judge who doesn't know your kids, who isn't going to go into detail, who's who's working within a system that is just not designed to look at nuance is going to end up deciding for you later. And those small wins will can and and will build a judicial floor, if you will, when you put them into a memorandum of understanding or MOU. And what you know, what uh and and so once that MOU is signed, it's an enforceable contract. Now, this this hat you can do this in some states, some jurisdictions, some jurisdictions you can't, but but basically what the strategy is here is you you agree to part of it. And if you can agree to that parenting time, which which arguably is the the the biggest the the biggest part of making the the in my estimation, the biggest part, the most important part, the time with your children. If you can agree to that in in mediation off the bat and then get an MOU submitted to the court, what it does, what it does then, it prevents late-night revisions or prevents the other side from changing their mind the second they get home or when they talk to their friends, or oftentimes the mental emotional state of folks that create these high conflict is that they're gonna blow everything up over one little thing. So if you're able to agree to part of it, get an MOU submitted to the court, then it it protects you from those reactive shifts in her mood and creates that permanent floor, if you will, for your for your case. And they become very hard to undo. So that's why when I'm coaching, when I'm coaching dads, that I'll we'll often talk about the strategy going in and focusing on that, getting the W's on that, and then getting the agreements on that, and then working out the rest secondary, maybe in another mediation, or maybe through temporary orders, or maybe through just going directly to to a trial. But but but it's an it can be an effective strategy. Now, now let me give you another tactical tool that for the room and and when you're in mediation. And and this is your defense against verbal fire. It's it's the legal path protocol. Now, this is if you're if you're face to face. And and this works also really well if you're when you go to trial, too. This is something that coach dad's on in when you're going to trial. In high conflict situations, the other side is always trying to provoke you. She or her lawyer is lying about something or saying something about your parenting, whatever it might be, and they're going to smear your character. They're going to use an emotional tax to bait a reaction. And they only do it for one reason to just make you look unstable, angry, or difficult in front of the mediator or the judge. And as you heard me talk about, the perception matters, right? That 51%. If the media thinks you're the one losing it, you're losing leverage in this. So what you do is you carry a legal pad with you. And when when you show up to the to the mediation or when you're when you're in court. And when something gives you a an emotional trigger when a lie is told, you're not going to interrupt, you're not going to scoff, you're not going to roll your eyes, you're not going to do anything. You're not going to give any kind of emotional response, physical response at all. You're going to look down to your pad and you're going to write the lie down on your pad. And all this does is give you the simple, the simple act of having your hands do something, and it hides your facial expressions, and then it just creates the record right there. That's your shield. And then if it's a factual error, like her saying you missed the pickup last Tuesday or whatever, you're not calling it out loud, you're not saying anything. You simply can just set your notepad down. And if you've worked with your attorney about you, hopefully, and we're going to talk about this also, too. Hopefully, you guys, you with your attorney have you've you've you've gone through what your plan for mediation is, how you're going to approach maybe the parenting plan first and go through all that. One of the things you'll agree to is that you know you put the you put the notepad down, and then your attorney can just read that, which is the fact check of I picked the kids up at 3 p.m. on April 2nd, whatever. See parenting log number 12, right? That's the the sidebar or whatever that you've already prepared when you're there. Uh, it allows your attorney to handle the the law part of it and the correction while you continue to manage the facts without breaking your regulated state. Regulated state is huge, guys. You hear me talk about it last week with the gray rock, and it is huge all the time. If the narrative she's continually to try to create, particularly with a false allegation, is that you're angry or unregulated or whatever. And every time you're showing up with a mediator in court at hearings and everything else, you're the opposite, it's just not gonna hold, right? So if you feel your chest tightening, you're gonna do the reset. And the reset is just taking a second to pause and breathe before you write or pass a note. We work on this, we work on this in session with guys a lot of times. These emotions that come up don't last very long. You just need it to take a second to breathe, to breathe. And that pause prevents you from creating the impression that Reed's dad lost it in mediation, and then the mediators being human, they form the impression that you know maybe he's not regulated, or maybe she's right. If she's the one loud and lying, while you're the calm one, again, this data-driven rock in the chair, you're gonna win the mediator's perception of your fitness. Now, the next thing with with the mediators is that you need to spoon feed the mediator, and your attorney is gonna help with some of this, but again, guys, the there's some terrific, terrific attorneys. There are a lot of really bad ones, and they don't know and don't understand how to manage a courtroom, much less how to manage a mediator and how to facilitate this process. The mediator is your neutral facilitator. It's not your friend, and they're not a judge in this whole process. Your goal, and because you are the one driving this divorce bus or coaching this divorce team, if you will, your goal is to provide them with the ammunition, if you will, they need to persuade the other side to move. You need to give the mediator data. So you need to come prepared. You need to bring labeled exhibits, a one page summary, your parenting log, calendar screenshots, school emails, whatever it might be. And there's a high probability your your attorney's not going to prepare you in in this. Manner, but I can tell you it is highly beneficial, particularly because lots of these mediators are either other attorneys or they're former attorneys or they are former judges or magistrates. And so they've been within the system. So if they see you showing up this well prepared, again, that goes to that impression that you get. And when you can give the mediator a neat stack of facts, they can take those into the other room during the during their caucus with the with the other side and present them as maybe maybe it they can present them number one, but maybe it they it becomes a reality check to your to your spouse, and they can present them as that re that that reality check because sometimes these these mediators are, especially if they are have been part of this of the court system, are are part of the reality check for for her. So utilize that opportunity by being prepared. The next strategy is use the ask strategy. Now, this is instead of making demands, right? You don't want to show up making demands. You want to be curious. I guess curious isn't the best word, but but but you want to seem you want to seem as though you're you're curious. So the ask strategy to the mediator is doing something like saying, how does their proposal reflect the best interest, the children's best interest, specifically regarding school logistics, right? So you're curious, you probably already know the answer coming into some of this stuff. But if you can ask the mediator, then then what it does is forces the mediator to vet the other side's logic rather than just accepting a vague claim. Another example is what's the evidence or what evidence are they providing to support that financial calculation in the in the circumstance of a of a financial uh mediation. So so you know, just remember that the so just just remember that this mediator is a is a neutral, but given their their background and their understanding of the law and the position that they're in, you can utilize them in order to leverage what it is that that you want, or at least leverage in the sense in the direction that you want to move. And you're doing that without making demands, you're doing that through through logic, through staying emotionally regulated, by asking good questions, and and and you know, and then coming to agreements. The the next thing I want you to remember is when when that mediator is caucusing with the other party, and and then you're in your private, you know, your private space. So this is again if you're in different rooms, and then you have your your private caucus. This is your this is your time when the mediator leaves the room to be able to do your your tactical breathing, right? This is your opportunity then to, if you got emotional about this and and it happens to all of us, you can re-regulate yourself. If you need to vent, this is the time to do it just with your attorney. You're never ever venting in front of the mediator. You're never calling the other sides unreasonable, you're never you're never doing any of that with the mediator, right? You're maintaining your bulletproof persona at all times when a third party is is present. So utilize that, utilize that that private time, that private caucus time with your attorney when the mediator's out of the room to re-regulate yourself, do some breathing, and then you can strategize with your attorney. Now let's talk about the decision gap. And this is the the this is the challenging and potentially the most dangerous period in mediation. And you hear me talk about the decision gap all the time, guys. And in this circumstance, it's the the time between an offer hitting the table and your response. And this is where lots of bad decisions are made. The other side, uh, and sometimes even the mediator will try to rush you. Now, hopefully, and then some, you know, honestly, and unfortunately, sometimes it's your attorney too, which which sucks. But sometimes they're going to try to rush you. They'll tell you, this is the best you're going to get, or the judge will not like it if you don't sign this today. And what they're doing, and what I see happening to guys all the time, is they're betting on your exhaustion and your desire to just make it end. So do not fall for that pressure. And I'm going to give you, you'll briefly hear some preparation so that you do not get exhausted and you do not just fall for that for that pressure. One of them, and and one of them is the breathing that that we talked about, right? So when you're looking at this, take a breath. Okay? Take three breaths, take full cycles of breath, contemplate what it is that that you're responding to. And this ensures that you're responding from a lot from a long-term strategy and not a fear-based story that you might be telling yourself in the mo in the moment, right? By managing your body, by taking this breath, what you're doing is you're actually helping your brain to connect your amygdala to your prefrontal cortex, which is the this the decision making. So if, and this is what this happens all the time, is if you get dysregulated, if you get upset, if something comes and it's unreasonable, or you're getting pressured, we're all going to react in a certain way. It's fight, flight, or freeze. And when that happens, we get stuck in the back of our heads. So that's why the breathing is is is a fantastic way to help mitigate all of this stuff. You can always just stop and take a deep breath. Even if you have to take a moment, go to the restroom. Like you can even just say, excuse me, I need to use the restroom. I I I apologize or whatever. And go and take some deep breaths because that is then going to help you get your emotional regulation back, get that brain like connected again, and then make a really good decision. Okay. Mediation is a marathon. Well, this whole thing is a marathon, right? But the mediation can be a marathon. The other note on preparing for this is make sure that you are you are physically prepared and ready. Make sure you get a good rest the night before. Bring water to to the mediation. Bring some high protein snacks. You want to you want to avoid decision fatigue because you're making a ton of decisions all potentially all at once. And if you have low blood sugar, this is going to create that fatigue. So you don't want to be angry because that is a failed mediation strategy that is going to cost you long term, right, in your life. So if you reach a final agreement, do not sign it immediately. So let's say, best case scenario, this is great. You guys have done this marathon, you've worked through stuff, you've you guys have mostly been cooperative and collaborative and compromised on some stuff. Do not sign it immediately. Lots of mediators want you to sign it before you leave there. Hopefully, your attorney says, no, you know, that's fine. Write it up for us. Most mediators will reduce it to writing, send it over to both parties to look. You're going to demand a 24-hour review period. If you sign after eight hours of negotiation, you're signing under fatigue. You want to sleep on it, you want to review the language with your attorney, and you want to do this in a situation where you're not vibrating with adrenaline. You're going to make sure to look for loopholes, make sure that any flexibility clause isn't a weapon, if it's left too vague. You want to make sure you've got all those I's across all those T's that the agreement has teeth, particularly in high conflict, because you don't want to be coming back. So don't leave the loose ends. And let's get even more practical for a moment. I'm going to give you three, I'm going to give you three real-world scenarios to ex to illustrate exactly these tactics that I've been describing to you. And and and so the first one is the amicable guy who woke up. That's what I'm calling it. He came in wanting a peaceful split. Okay, this is this is where I get a lot, I get a lot of guys. He's been a yes man for 15 years during his marriage and thought that niceness was a currency he could trade for time. Okay, and I know this is striking a nerve with a lot of you guys. This was me. Look, I understand if it strikes a strikes a nerve with you, because this was me. She argued then she needed primary custody for quote-unquote stability. Uh, and because you work long hours, he almost softened just to avoid the conflict, but he remembered the data that once that stability order is signed, it is the new permanent status quo, right? These temporary compromises potentially and oftentimes become permanent reality. So he used the legal pad protocol. He just wrote down stability claim, passed note to his lawyer asking for the child care plan, which he couldn't produce specifics. He held his ground, he locked the schedule early, protected his time, and then got the parenting plan that he was looking for. So, lesson here don't trade your parenting time for a momentary feeling of peace. Okay. The second scenario, the credibility win. This this is a dad that brought the detailed parenting log, the school emails, the timestamp texts. Then she made inconsistent claims about him being an absent father. The media looked at the documents. Uh you asked, you asked questions, right? You didn't get he asked questions. I'm, you know, I'm putting in this making this hypothetical. It's not hypothetical, it's like these are coming from descriptions of all the guys, so lots of guys that I've worked with. But so you know, she then pressed uh he then the the mediator saw the doctors, then the mediator then pressed her in the other room during the caucus because you asked questions, and then she was forced to revise her entire position. The mediator literally took those facts and used them as a reality check for her against her narrative. And what was the result? It was a fair schedule. And what was the lesson? That lesson was what I described, which is spoon feeding the mediator and asking good questions. And you know, they're not going to look for the truth. They're not going to go asking those questions. You're going to have to ask the mediator those questions to ask the other, the opposing side. And you're going to have to bring it to them in a label stack, right? And so then now, scenario three, this is the emotional reaction that actually costs time. An accusation of missed pickups was fired at the father. He interrupted, he raised his voice, he tried to explain himself to the mediator. He looked rattled, he got emotionally dysregulated. The mediator flags his volatility right off the bat, assumes he was the source of the conflict. Uh, exhausted and feeling like he was losing, the father agreed to a lopsided agreement just to get out of the room. And the lesson for that is prepare yourself, use the shield, be ready, don't interrupt, let the paper carry the anger. Again, the write it down on the notepad, uh, so your mind can stay focused on the strategy. The other one is, you know, he needed to emotionally regulate himself. So you need to adopt these rules of engagement. And not just the mediation, guys, like a rule of these lots of lots of these rules of engagement we work through in in coaching and implement these as daily habits because they're going to help you in that time between mediation, court dates, et cetera, right? And and if you trust the strategy and not the feeling, you will have results. Comprising on a desk or a chair to secure 50-50 is not a defeat. It's a tactical trade. And when I say a desk or like I mean like a desk or a chair, like you compromise on giving something up that isn't wasn't one of the assets or one of those the marital asset splits in order to secure custody custody. That's that's not a defeat. It's actually a victory, it's a tactical trade, right? And and for the love of everything you value, guys, silence the external noise. Don't post about your mediation on social media. Do not run to friends to vent. Because once you leak the details of your negotiation, your leverage evaporates. After each session, run an after-action report. Write down what worked and what didn't. Update your parenting log and date everything. Send a short email to your attorney documenting exactly what was agreed upon and what the next deadlines are, or if you didn't come to any agreement, just hopefully you're going to have a debrief after with your attorney, regardless of what happened. And then you can talk about what you witnessed. Follow up here is where sloppiness will lose the ground that you just gained. So whether you have some gains and you put those into an MOU, your attorney gets it signed and you get that, get that submitted to the court, or you don't, but you have info on how they showed up, what her bottom line is, everything else, that's good to be able to debrief with your your attorney. Now let's let's talk about a couple of things, a couple more strategic things for the for the for the night before, preparing the night before. You need to create, and this is part of what I talked about earlier, which is hopefully your attorney is prepared with you about what you want showing up to the to the mediation. You need to create your priority matrix and know exactly what you're willing to trade and what's non-negotiable. You also need to know what your three-year vision is, and that's something we work in in coaching, is you need to clarify what your vision and direction is and write it down so you have it in your mind. And understand that this is a, if you can reframe it, understand that this in your mind is a business transaction and it's not an emotional journey. So that you so that when you are preparing, just like you would a high-stakes business transaction or litigation or negotiation or uh maybe meeting at work or whatever you need to do to prepare for a big day at work, whatever it is you do work, you're gonna prepare yourself. Again, get good sleep, eat protein, hydrate, dress neutral, arrive early, watch the mediator and the other side. That's all recon. Ground yourself with your breasts, know when to walk away. If they don't produce documents for uh for whatever their claims are, financial or otherwise, uh, if the mediator's pressuring you to sign something that violates your your non-negotials, you just walk and and you just do it cleanly uh because you're regulated, because you had a plan, you had a strategy, you worked with your attorney to do it. And you just say something, we appreciate the meeters, your time, we'll gather more data and reconvene. And then you just that just leaves your posture intact. And I understand that this all sounds like a lot because it is, but understand, dads, you are fighting for your name, your money, and the history you have with your children. Again, nationally, fathers only represent 20.1% of custodial parents. And if you don't stand your ground today in mediation andor later in court, if you have to, you're choosing to be one of the 80% who are processed out. And again, if she won't support 50-50 today, she isn't your partner. She's an opponent, and she's an opponent betting on your desire to be a nice guy. Guys, as soon as she says, as soon as she goes away from 50-50, on it, obviously, barring any kind of barring any kind of physical any kind of physical issues or some something that is putting your kids' lives in danger that she can prov that she can prove. And this isn't, you know, this needs to be provable, not just like her idea or her reality of that you're a bad dad or whatever other stuff she's conjuring up. This needs to be provable, right? If she can't do that, she is your opponent. I'm sorry. And and and she's she is strategically betting on your desire to be a nice guy. She's counting on you to value peace over parenting time. And this may have been the relational dynamic and what is how it's been in your in your life and in your marriage, but this is where the quiet loss happens. So your mission this week is simple. Get your ducks in a row for mediation and bring them as a strategy, not just a folder. Reference your logs, use the data, trust the math of your fatherhood, stop the drift, lead with facts, be disciplined, don't confuse kindness with weakness. Remember, keep at the forefront of your mind. Your kids are counting on you to be the leader they need right now. They don't need a nice guy, they need a protective father that is leading in order to be in their lives. So, gentlemen, I want you to stay strong this week. As always, if you found some value in this, please share it far and wide on social media. Give us a star rating, give us a comment. It really helps. And I sincerely appreciate you listening. God bless.