Mediation felt like a scam until my brother's custody case

My brother spent $6,000 on a mediator in Sacramento for his custody fight. I always thought it was just a softer way to lose money before court. But watching him explain his schedule and the school pickup routes in plain language, something clicked. The mediator caught a conflict in the parenting plan that the lawyers missed in six months of filings. It didn't settle everything, but it stripped the drama down to real terms. Has anyone else seen mediation actually shift a case, or did we just get lucky?

2 comments

2 Comments

lucasjackson11d ago

Mediation's not about being nice, it's about getting people to actually listen. The mediator probably just asked better questions than the lawyers did, since they're not worried about billing hours or winning points. Your brother's case is proof that sometimes the boring middle step does the real work.

emery19910d ago

Swapped out a contested fence mediation for a neighbor who was about to lose it over a shared driveway, and by the end we were arguing about his dog's barking instead, but somehow the fence got built.