In this episode, Tamsin talks to family solicitor (among other things) Karin Walker, who is an expert on Narcissistic Personality Disorder, about where to spend your money wisely if you are divorcing a narcissist.
Karin Walker
Karin Walker is a family lawyer, based in Woking, Surrey. She is a solicitor, mediator, collaborative practitioner, neutral evaluator, and arbitrator.
Having previously been a partner in a large Surrey based firm, she set up the award-winning firm, KGW Family Law, in January 2012. All of the firm’s solicitors are trained in mediation and both Karin and her colleague Simon Clark are arbitrators. The ethos of the firm is to encourage clients to consider out of court dispute resolution options, thereby minimising both acrimony and cost.
Karin regularly speaks on all issues relating to family law locally, nationally and, on occasion, internationally. She is also a trainer of family law professionals.
Karin is a co-author (with Dr Supriya McKenna) of “Narcissism and Family Law – A Practitioner’s Guide” and “Divorcing a Narcissist – The lure, the loss and the law”, both of which are published by Bath Publishing.
www.kgwfamilylaw.com
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Tamsin Caine
Tamsin is a Chartered Financial Planner with over 20 years experience. She works with couples and individuals who are at the end of a relationship and want agree how to divide their assets FAIRLY without a fight.
You can contact Tamsin at tamsin@smartdivorce.co.uk or arrange a free initial meeting using https://bit.ly/SmDiv15min. She is also part of the team running Facebook group Separation, Divorce and Dissolution UK
Tamsin Caine MSc., FPFS
Chartered Financial Planner
Smart Divorce Ltd
Smart Divorce
P.S. I am the co-author of “My Divorce Handbook – It’s What You Do Next That Counts”, written by divorce specialists and lawyers writing about their area of expertise to help walk you through the divorce process. You can buy it here https://yourdivorcehandbook.co.uk/buy-the-book/
Hello and welcome to today’s episode of the smart divorce podcast and today I’m really excited to be joined by Karen Walker um I heard Karen speaking at a conference I’m thinking a month ago but I’m really not sure time seems to be going at a whole different rate at the
Moment so it could well be less or more than that but roughly that um and she was speaking about um divorcing a narcissist on which he is an absolute expert so thank you Karen for joining me today it’s very kind of you oh my pleasure ton it’s really nice to speak
To you so I should introduce you properly so Karen is the founding partner of KGW family law based in woking she is a solic mediator collaborative lawyer arbitrator trainer and author and I’m having to read that because there are so many different hats that Karen wears um she’s also
Co-written two Publications on the area of narcissism in family law and this is what we’re going to be talking about today so I guess there’s one specific aspect of this that I want us to to get into the detail of but I guess before we really get started it would be worth us
Attempting to Define what narcissism or or narcissistic behavior is so can I throw that over to begin with yes of course so um so narcissism is a very particular type of behavior um and um in the books to which you’ve referred we’ve set out the narcissist playlist so they
Um they behave in a very particular way very often they’ve suffered some kind of trauma or difficulty in the in the early years of their own life and quite a useful tool to use as a practitioner is when you meet with a new client to talk to them not just about their current
Serv circumstances but to drill down a little bit into their background and you might get some telltale signs of perhaps the loss of a parent to very young age or a very bad relationship with a parent or perhaps going off to boarding school at a very early age anything like that
Um so it’s that sort of event which can cause narcissistic personality disorder to develop and um then what what you’ll tend to find is someone who’s got extremely low empathy um who will react to most things in in the manner that a four-year-old might if you attribute all of those sort of tant
Me very selfish very um self-focused approach to um to a situation um I think one of the big giveaway signs is an enormous sense of entitlement and also an inability to have any boundaries or to have much of an association with the trth um I think it’s important to underline at that
Juncture that obviously as family lawyers or otherwise we’re not qualified to make diagnosis or anything like that so it’s it’s very much looking at a pattern of behavior and then having a feel for whether someone behaves in a particular way you’ve then got the example of the cycle of idealize devalue
Discard Lin and repeat um which is um is very prevalent as I say that I think the big um red flags are this sense of entitlement so everything is self- focused um no association with the truth the truth is whatever they want it to be
On a given day a huge desire to win and to win at all costs even to their own detriment so somebody narcissistic will have an objective and they’ll want to achieve it and even if it’s to their own personal disadvantage if they’re focused on it again like that small child they
Can’t get that out of their head so I that’s probably a snapshot of the type of person that one is is dealing with and sadly because they lack empathy um they’re very poor at relationships and that means that those of us that deal with separating couples encounter them
Far more than anybody else might um so whilst I think um a statistic is that that a small sort of 5% of the population um may suffer from this or or show signs of it um in family law work that percentage zooms up because we’re dealing with those unempathetic people
Who find it difficult to maintain a relationship yeah absolutely and it I think the words become thrown about banded about used regularly in in in our world to mean somebody who’s very egotistical perhaps um very self-centered and it it how does it I guess because we’re largely this is for rather than
Practitioners we’re talking to the general public people who might be in a position where they feel that they are divorcing a narcissist what will they have been experiencing that will be the ttile signs that they see um I think um it’s a feeling of being constantly on eggshells so not
Really knowing how to deal with this person I talked about the cycle of idolizing and devaluing and discard so in the first instance you would have been love bombed you’ll be told you’re the most wonderful person that walked the Earth you’re their soulmate um they will make you feel as though you’re a
Million dollars and of course we all like to feel like that um AB they’ll also seek people who are vulnerable to being treated like that so people who perhaps lack lack self-esteem or lack confidence um because they’re very Adept finding someone who meets these needs that they have who gives them this
Narcissistic Supply um and so I think it’s if you’re in a relationship where someone makes you feel wonderful really great about yourself and then slowly it’s chip chip chip away at that and suddenly you think hang on know two months ago I was the best thing that walked the Earth and now everything
Every little thing is being criticized and it’s a gradual erosion um and then that that that will become worse um and to the point that you may find um you imagine there perhaps having a relationship with somebody else um or you just their whole demeanor towards you has changed completely um and then
As soon as they feel that perhaps you’re getting a bit fast off with this or feeling as though something’s wrong they’ll put you back up on that pedestal so it’s that cycle and once you’re sucked into that um Behavior pattern a it’s very difficult to leave it’s a bit
Scary to leave and what they’re doing to you all the time is trying to maintain control um and you’ll find I think a number of people to whom I’ve spoken who um know there’s something wrong with their relationship but can’t quite pinpoint it when you start to delve in
And look at the the playlist as I say that that’s set out in the books um it all starts to slot together and as there a lot of people to whom we’ve spoken um have said when they read the books it’s like reading about their life uh well it
Isn’t it’s it’s been written about a a repetitive Behavior pattern and that’s why it feels like that but I again at risk of being repetitive I think it’s that it’s that sense of entitlement that somebody demonstrates and making you feel as their spouse that you’re always
Not quite sure where you are it’s like being on shifting sand are you going to be the most wonderful person ever or are you going to be criticized at every turn or some combination of the two it feels very unsettling and very unnerving but when it’s good it’s amazing um and
That’s why it’s so hard to pull away from because you’re constantly craving the good times and that’s what they’re setting up so that you do so that you behave you behave as they want you to basically um and wanting approval constantly um will will trigger that wow okay so tricky situation not nice
To no and as you say the the book um the I’ve got to get this the right way around the L The Lost and the law that’s um find it really difficult to say for some reason um it h I’ve certainly recommended it to clients who have said exactly what you
Said that it feels that you’ve written that about my life and I think that’s always a kind of that’s like all right okay this is this is what we’re dealing with in in these circumstances as you say it’s not it’s not about a diagnosis it’s about understanding how to work
With that person moving forward and what to expect coming at you from their spouse um that they’re divorcing so I think that’s really useful to begin with um what I really wanted to focus on today was something that you talked about um at your talk at um the Northern
Lights conference um which is a fantastic family law conference that it was really enjoyable it was absolutely brilliant really was and I came came away motivated and um and had learned absolutely loads which it it means that it’s been a good day if you come away Having learned stuff it’s it’s been a
Good day definitely um but you were talking particularly about about people who are divorcing a narcissists spending money in the right way and that just that phrase really hammered home to me and I wonder if you could expand on that a little bit because I think this is a really
Important topic I I think um it’s important to remember that um narcissistic people like to maintain the chaos and drama of the call process or they don’t really want an outcome they’re looking for ongoing Supply and if they don’t get that through adoration and validation then they can get it
Through being in control of creating a very difficult situation and perpetuating it um and so they’ve got no particular desire to bring things to an end but they also Delight in spending somebody else’s money because again it’s a control thing um and I think when you’ve been on the
Receiving end of this kind of behavior um you have a real sense of Injustice that you’ve been treated very badly that things are not fair um and it’s been a massive step to come out of an abusive relationship it’s probably taken a number of attempts and an awful
Lot of courage and a really big step to break away and there’s the expectation that the court system is going to provide fairness Justice retribution all these other things um and sadly those of us who work within that environment know that that court is really the least
Worst Last Resort if that’s where you have to find yourself and makes the best out of a difficult set of circumstances or the best that it can um and so there is um I think on the part of the person subjected to the behavior a willingness
To spend money on trying to achieve this fairness and very often the court is seen um as the way to do it encouraged hugely by the other spouse I think it’s important when you’re in this kind of situation particularly where resources are limited and nobody has um a savings account ear marked for
Divorce costs in the future don’t it’s all it’s all money that’s being taken out of somewhere else so it’s not really reducing the available resources for the family as a whole so important resources to conserve as far as you can um but I think very important to think about
Where is money worth spending and where are you going to get something back and value for it and where do you run the risk of wasting money um and having an understanding of that I think is really important if you think about the end of
A case so you way um if you think about the end of a case where um it’s all come you’ve reached an agreement or you’ve had an adjudication um and you think right that’s it done um and the client probably can’t get away from lawyers fast enough because they’ve spent a lot
Of money and they think you they’ve had a cost estimate up to the end and very often lawyers give quite um small cost estimates for implementation which I think can be quite dangerous to do in itself because where dealing with somebody like this who is looking for loopholes and problems and future
Opportunity for ongoing litigation it’s so important to draft an order really really carefully in quite a lot of detail and I think important to discuss perhaps with your barister or your sister that this is a really important piece of work and there’s going to be a cost to it but it
Needs to be done properly it’s not something to be drawn Ed while you’re balancing on one knee in the court waiting room um or or rushed off on some kind of precedent without any proper thought so I think that’s the first point um in circumstances where you’re the recipient of ongoing maintenance um
A barister I know well told me many many years ago that um maintenance is only ever as good as the person who pays it and there’s a great deal of Truth in that you can talk about enforcement and of course enfor ment is possible but it’s not straightforward and inevitably there
Will be a long gap between failure to pay and ability to enforce because the court process just is not very quick so I think it’s also very beneficial when you’ve got your final settlement to go and talk to a financial advisor somebody who’s looking at your financial
Long-term position um and look at things like what if this goes wrong what if what if if I don’t get the maintenance for six months a year ever how am I going to manage where are my strengths and weaknesses what do I really need to
Think about um do I want to take my maximum borrowing capacity now or might I be better not doing that um what can I really afford to spend on a property so having a real sort of health check financially and also to think about the what is if this goes wrong because
Narcissistic former partners are not renowned for paying what they’re supposed to pay um and will mess around with things so I think those are always very very valuable um pieces of work to undertake and I think that when cost estimates are given it’s important to build that in and look at the real
Benefit that that sort of thing can achieve where I think it’s important not want to spend money is um I talked at the conference about the difference between fair and achievable and there is a big difference between those two things sadly life’s not fair as I think was scar famously said in The
Lion King when my children were small and that’s very very true it isn’t fair um and um you’re very fortunate if you manage to achieve fairness and so but because those who’ve been who have been subjected to an abusive relationship will feel um that somebody’s now going to put this right
That it’s going to be made better they become reliant on on something someone to achieve that for them and um so for to take as a a very simple example if you have a child Arrangements order and the children are supposed to come home at 6 o’ on a Sunday well
Narcissist will bring them back at 5 5 10 7 any variation but probably not six o’ there’s a huge um desire in those circumstances to run back to a lawyer oh they were late they’re always late I’ve got an order they need to be told I need
To go back to court to have this enforced point one rarely are those sorts of orders enforced very well point two your narcissistic exp partner will want you to spend money will want to have achiev drama and best of all we want to know well that worked that’s
Caused an upset I’m back Center stag in this situation so I’m going to do this again and I now know that that it does work so I’m going to look at what other aspect of this order I could mess around with um safe in the knowledge that actually doing something about that can
Be quite futile um and so spending money on that sort of thing rather than when they arrive late just saying oh dear the traffic must have been bad never mind goodbye or oh gosh you’ve come early that’s great you know kids you can come in and do this and help me cook dinner
Or whatever just really calm it down um and not rise to it and they’ll stop because they’re not getting anything back from it and you’re saving money so I think I don’t know what your experience has been tamson in that kind of area but for me it’s about picking
Battles don’t fight a battle you can’t win even if you feel you’ve got right on your side because narcissists aren’t interested in what’s right or wrong they they’re interested in getting the attention and the feeling of being in control that starting a score ball or a
Battle um provokes for them and and then maintaining that is better still because that’s their real source of Supply if they try to provoke or pick a fight and they get nothing back they’ll move on to something else because they’re not achieving anything um and so it’s about
Evaluating what can I really do about this and and also you know I I sound as though I’m saying there’s no point in getting an order um that’s entirely wrong it’s really important to have a detailed order and a detailed road map but it’s also quite important to talk to
The person who’s putting that order together and to find out just how enforceable parts of it are you know time and again kind of flipping it around to when parents are expecting to see their children and then the other parent won’t let them or says they’re poorly or whatever um they think they
Can take their piece of paper to the police station and that the police officer these children work like that um but I think I think very often people have a misconception of what an order can and can’t achieve so again spending some time identifying that um so that
You recognize um it’s all very well having an order but how are you going to enforce it or or should you just let it go because actually you’re going to spend money that you don’t have achieve very little and it’s not really a great benefit yeah I think that’s brilliant
Advice I love that example of um of just uh you know they come home early or late and you just go oh thank you very much for bringing them back bye which is really hard to do because if you you know you might be in the thinking they’re coming home an hour
Later and suddenly your life’s turned upside down or or you know you’ve been waiting for them and there’s that big worry if children don’t come back on you know are they on a plane to duai or you know all sorts of really scary things so um and when you when you have been
Traumatized um and you may well be suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder with all everything that that brings with it so um it’s very easy to sort of catastrophize a situation and it just heightens your own anxiety yeah absolutely and I am the world’s best at doing stuff like
That absolutely sit in sitting those shoes and I I think you’re right I think it is it’s it’s that difference between getting an order so everybody knows where they stand and getting an order to think that something’s immediately going to happen differently that they they’re two different things but although
They’re the same you know it is you do need everything written down you do need the detail in it you do need to understand what what may or may not happen afterwards and I think that’s vitally important you talked before about um about maintenance ongoing maintenance and the likelihood of the um
Ex paying or not paying um the the preference from what I can gather that you’re saying and and this would be my view as well it sounds like if there’s an option of not having ongoing maintenance and taking Capital sum instead even if it’s a little bit lower
That would be preferable than relying on ongoing maintenance that may or may not turn up definitely and I mean the the rules say that the court must consider a clean break in every case so it’s not just may must so the objective for the court is to try to sever people
Financially um if it’s achievable where you’re dealing with somebody who’s narcissistic that’s even more important because it’s going to take away a point of contact and a dependency if you think about the fact they want to be in control or somebody providing someone with part or all of their income which
Meets their needs is a pretty big control to have absolutely and if you can take that away um then then all the better and you know back to fair and achievable sometimes if you can get a clean break even though it might mean that you’re going to take less than you
Might have been advised would be fair um if a if a clean break is achievable and you could manage and it’s within the backet of what a court would see as reasonable then the fact that you become the author authoress of your own future financially is vitally important um and
It just moves that opportunity for messing around in the future or every month just wondering am I going to get get my money this month or not um and because things tend to be paid just after the the paying person has been paid so a little bit further towards the
End of the month um and because most people standing orders are set up at the beginning of the month you know you could have just two or three days of complete crisis um not knowing where to turn and that’s why I said earlier I think you know having that conversation
To look at if disaster struck how would I get myself through a few months um you know is it worth trying to put some money on one side um or or how how would I deal with this because again um that there may be a period of time with
Almost nothing and to literally have no money in your bank account is a very very unpleasant experience yeah absolutely terrifying I think our kind of view is always try and have kind of if you possibly can three to six months of of your bills covered
Of your lifestyle covered in a in a pot somewhere else just so that you you know if the worst comes the worst there’s there’s something there and the bills can be paid and and food can be put on the table because that’s it’s terrifying not to be in that position yeah we
Talked about um about using the the courts and about how how your narcissist Act is likely to use the courts and and these cases often go all the way because there’s no desire to to sat alert an FDR and and we’re we’re all the way to the
Final hearing and heaps of money have been has been spent is there ever an opportunity in these circumstances to avoid that to attempt the um the dispute resolution route or is that just that’s just not going to work no I think I think I think there is
Um you’ve got that balance between um somebody narcissistic wanting to perpetuate the drama and stay in this sort of model that is is sorting things out um against they quite like to feel special so if you can sell to them that ADR arbitration mediation is is for the
Um you know for for the Discerning person who’s going to settle things in a very grownup and um very future focused way um and quite Innovative way then then that plays to their inner ego and think oh well you know I’m a very special person so I I would like to adopt this
Opportunity um I don’t think that mediation in um its classic form with the mediator the couple together works particularly well because I’m not saying it never works but I I think there’s a real danger of setting up a triangle um and um for the narcissist to switch between um rescuer and um perpetrator
And victim and spin that Circle um but I think that if you have a if you have a mediator who understands the dynamic that’s going on um recognizes the need to win on one side and the desire to get out on the other and can help facilitate the
Creation of an outcome which meets the needs of both and if you’re very very skilled at it you will um help create an outcome where um The Narcissist thinks they’ve won but actually they haven’t um that their spouse has already thought three steps ahead of them and has put
Forward a proposal knowing that they will come back with something less and knowing that they will be prepared to accept that so I think that can work extremely well um arbitration I think works well because it’s um it’s it’s very much presented as for um those who
Want to be a bit more sensible about thing it’s little and I think anything that that smacks of being a private system or or something a little bit elevated which it isn’t at all but um I think you can sell it as the it is um it actually works extremely well for people
Who have very limited resources because it’s quicker and it can be extremely cost effective but I think you can sell it as that sort of higher level of of of dealing with things anything like that um is very likely to work similarly I think neutral evaluation is a very
Underused tool where you bring in somebody to just get give a view about what they think the outcome should be um it’s and I think the fact that it’s used in frequently makes a narcissist feel oh this is quite unique and they think that that that I would warrant this so I
Think that can work um can work well I definitely don’t think that ADR should be ruled out I think the difficulty is that the narcissist will want to prolong matters and so you’ve got to find a reason why prolonging it isn’t great I think also cutting down the communication so and I think
Lawyers um can think about this as well that if um you don’t respond to letters um all the time and you kind of leave things and reply in one go to 16 different emails or whatever else you might have received um The Narcissist doesn’t feel that they’re getting that instant pingpong
Fix see um they ping an email out they they want an immediate reaction and ideally an immediate um s toing and fr or or creation of a bit of a a moment in this or because that’s what makes them feel good about themselves and they they sense the attention that they’re
Immediately getting if that doesn’t happen then they may become slightly less interested in this court process so then to turn their focus to something which does make them feel special I.E an an ADR process which isn’t used quite so much can work um to the advantage of everyone yeah that’s really interesting
I was going to ask ask you about communication between from solicitor to well between solicitors I guess because my understanding and I’m not a lawyer is that solicitors are acting on on their clients instructions so if they’re told to send a letter over and over again and I’m
Assuming this is the sort of behavior that we can expect from a narcissist that they’re they’re obligated to do that did how much um how much I think did they have I think it depends um on the individual as to how they run their practice but um yes you
You do act on instructions so um you know you can give your client the most sensible advice in the world if they not prepared to listen to it that’s their prerogative and um you would stop acting for someone if there’s a a breakdown in confidence between celester and client
Actually that’s quite easy to create in a narcissistic environment because probably they criticized you more than once they because they treat their lawyer in the same way that they would treat their their former partner um but um it’s I think it’s important to think about from your own
Perspective as a lawyer what you’re contributing towards so um you know we’re all really busy um so you might not be able might not have time to get that letter out as immediately bombarding the other person um I don’t send things out on a Friday afternoon late um unless it’s something pretty
Simple and straightforward um so you might say to your narcissistic client sorry we don’t send correspondence out later this will have to go on Monday and and I think you can do that without not following instructions so you can have some kind of moderating to it um quite
Sort of topically as we Zoom our way towards Christmas um again when um we had fault-based divorce occasionally we would be asked to issue divorce proceedings on Christmas Eve or make sure that they arrived on Christmas Eve now I as a practitioner I would never do that instructed or otherwise it’s just
Not appropriate in my view and I was asked on a few occasions I always said no um particularly if there were children but for all kinds of reasons because it would arrive on Christmas Eve most people are Clos then until January you can’t get advice um so I just wouldn’t
Do it but I’m sure well I know that there are people who would and did um I’m sure that because we now have an online system there might well be people who would log on and do said things on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day who knows but um so you know yes I
Think yes of course of course lawyers have to take instructions and act on instructions and that can become a shield to hide behind um but there’s Al there’s also a way of practicing and I think that and it’s again about boundaries I said about not sending
Things out later on a Friday U and so on so I think you set your own professional boundaries and if you have clients who want to push those you just say no you know if you have a client who wants to ring you at 11 o’clock at night I speak
To clients then just say no um I’m sleep and but but you know boundaries big or small um are important and I think we have to as professionals set our own professional boundaries um probably another indicator of whether somebody um suffers from NPD or not back to my earlier point about entitlement
And boundaries they think they can control you um and you’ve you’ve got to act in um in their best interest and you take their instructions but you still maintain your professional boundaries yeah absolutely and as a as a solic on the receiving end of that of
Let’s say the solist on the working for the narcissist had less strict bandages than someone like yourself and and was bombarding your list to with with correspondence do those does that correspondence need to be all passed on to your client no I don’t think it does
I I think you can agree um with your client um things like um you know I’m not going to send you if if they don’t want to have everything um again that that’s their instructions they they should do and you would write and want to say you do need to know everything
This is your life not mine um but if you know it’s going to upset them um you might want to pick the phone up first and tell them what the content of the email or letter is um you might want to put in the heading of the email that you
Send to them this is fine don’t be worried about opening it because sometimes when you’re the re and I know it sounds amusing but when you are the recipient and you get an email and you think you know you go called and you think God what’s going to be in this and
It might just be um you is the valuation report for something nothing to be alarmed about at all and and I think con conveying that um because you don’t know what’s in an email until you’ve opened it is again important um and I think having that conversation back to
Spending money at the right time having that conversation with your client right at the outset so that you are setting boundaries and parameters and you have an understanding with them um that that something that is likely to be hurtful or difficult you’ll talk through with them rather than just sending it out and
The worst thing you could do as a lawyer in those circumstances is just ping something out with no covering anything um especially on a Friday afternoon and then trash someone’s weekend so you you you you’d be sensible about how you deal with that I think if you’ve got a
Celester on the other side who’s bombarding you with hostile correspondents I’d pick up the phone um and you know sus out first of all whether you they give a deep sigh and say this is my work case I can’t wait for it to be over I’m so sorry I’m
Sending you this stuff but I’ve got to um or words to that effect um or um or that they might be the complete other end of that scale and be quite hostile themselves and then at least you know where you are when you’re from your practice perspective um I’m a great fan
Of picking up the phone I think we hide behind the written word far too much now um just a sh no I’m absolutely with you I I I think there’s a massive danger in the written word because it’s it’s not it’s always received in the different
Way not always no it’s often received in a different way in than which It Was Written because you receive it in the emotional state that you’re in at the time that you read it and we can read all sorts of things into emails that that don’t aren’t intended I think I
Think the creation of the Emoji has massively helped with this and that sounds ridiculous but some you know a word like like somebody could write great well I could being great as in that’s absolutely fantastic brilliant I’m so chuffed or it could be a really sarcastic great you know and you can’t
You can’t tell from that one word and and emails are exactly the same so I’m with you I think you can absolutely from somebody’s tone of voice and somebody’s um and and their language they use on on the phone much more easily work out who they are and where they’re coming from
Than than in an email so yeah I think that’s um I think that’s really really interesting and really useful um to know kind of what how how you dealing with these things and your comment about the about the note on the email about the con the and naming the email is so
Incredibly useful one of my clients was having a terrible time with her ex and she said can I just ping the email straight to you like I don’t even want to open it but when it comes to me can I just send it straight on and I was like
Of course you can and she’s like then you read it and tell me what it says so was like absolutely no problem whatsoever but these are you know the situations we’re dealing with people are in going through divorce or in heightened state of of emotion at the
End of the day aren’t they very much so yeah um and I think anything that um as as professionals involved we can do to alleviate that um is is really important yeah no I think you’re absolutely right um really horribly we’re at the end of our time together
Karen talk to you is there anything that I should have asked you that I did in or that you would like to add in summary before we part ways no I don’t think so I think that’s covered um what I thought would be use you know I think as we discussed at the
Conference this idea of when it when people perhaps don’t want to spend money but should and when they when they are very ready to spend money but shouldn’t is is quite an important aspect yeah absolutely vitally important completely agree and I love the the difference between fair and achievable I think
That’s that’s a massively important takeaway that people can uh can get from this podcast Karen thank you so much for joining me it’s been an absolute pleasure it’s been a pleasure to see you too thank you so much for asking me no problem at all take care you too