Morgan L. Stogsdill (00:00)

what the attorney needs to know is number one, we're negotiating without the use of attorneys. Okay. Because the attorney is going to say, okay, okay, or this is a bad idea or go ahead and do it, but here's how to do it.

Andrea Rappaport (00:00)

You're welcome.

Let's talk about the right friends to bring this to

keyed up and liquored up is not a good combination.

you could have just cost yourself $350 easily by sending a two sentence email.

Andrea Rappaport (00:26)

If you're going through a divorce or thinking about getting a divorce, this is the podcast for you. Hosted by Morgan Stogsdill, the head of family law at the largest family law firm in the country and comedian Andrea Rappaport, you're gonna laugh, you're gonna learn, you're gonna avoid major divorce mistakes. This is How Not to Suck at Divorce.

Andrea Rappaport (00:48)

My hair's betraying me today.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (00:50)

Why?

Andrea Rappaport (00:50)

I don't know, it's just not doing what I wanted it to do. I had one of those days where I thought I looked like fine in the morning, like got ready. I was like, this will do. And then I was out in a meeting and at one point I kind of like looked at myself and I'm like, who's that? What happened to her? What happened to her hair? Just the humidity. And I think it points to something bigger that's been going on. I have been so irritable lately.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (01:18)

⁓ my God, I'm so glad you're talking about this. I've been biting everyone's heads off. I'm so glad.

Andrea Rappaport (01:23)

Irritable, really irritable. And I feel like my irritability has made it hard for me to focus and make good decisions because I'm so distracted by the fact that I'm so irritable.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (01:35)

What do you think's causing it?

Andrea Rappaport (01:36)

I heard somebody talk once about how ⁓ when you're overwhelmed, when you have lots of like little things on your plate and it adds up to things that you feel like you can't handle, that your body is so drained by like thinking about that all the time, that like that's why you're tired and that's why you're having trouble focusing. And I guess that exhaustion makes you irritable. So I wonder if that's it. I don't know. think I have to...

go back to treating myself like I'm a third grader and writing a to-do list of the tiniest things on my marker board and then check things off that I will obviously do. Yeah. I think I have to write things that I've already done and then check them off just to like...

Morgan L. Stogsdill (02:19)

Yeah, because checking them off feels good.

You're like, I've

done such a great job. Look how many things I've already done and checked off. Killing it.

Andrea Rappaport (02:31)

I'm gonna get myself

stickers and all kinds of things. Yeah, but I am like cranky.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (02:38)

Well, you don't look at and you don't sound like it. So if you're going to snap at me, I'm ready because I'm cranky back.

Andrea Rappaport (02:44)

That would

make for a great episode. ⁓ Can you imagine though, what if attorneys snapped at clients? No, you don't. Really? Really snap?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (02:53)

Well, we do. We do. Yes, we do. Yes.

Really snapped. Yes, we definitely do. We have to be pushed, but we definitely have to do that at times. I did it in the last.

Andrea Rappaport (03:06)

This segment brought

to you by...

Morgan L. Stogsdill (03:10)

Yeah, I had to do it about three weeks ago and I was screaming so loud in my office that actually other lawyers walked by just to check it out. It happens. It happens in the office. It's normal.

Andrea Rappaport (03:22)

I mean, talk about my like good job, Andrea chart. Like I never was screamed at. So I feel like I get a sticker for that. That is.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (03:33)

Yeah,

it's not everybody. It's not everybody. It's the special few that get the screaming.

Andrea Rappaport (03:38)

Okay, well, I think that tees us up well for this conversation. With that in mind, friends, unless your divorce attorney is also your best friend, then it's important to know when to direct questions and concerns your attorney's way and which concerns are better suited for a friend. But listen, there's a lot of nuances that you're about to hear in this conversation, so I don't want you to think that everything we're about to tell you is going to be totally obvious.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (03:39)

Thank

That's right. And you're right about the nuances because there's a lot of things that you might think are not important, but they actually could be very important to your case, especially if they start to create something like a pattern.

Andrea Rappaport (04:20)

You know, when I was thinking about this episode, which again, good job, Andrea, you were thinking about an episode before you hit record. I was trying to think of like one overall takeaway that people could remember. And so I came up with this. Your attorney needs a high level overview of all of the events. Your friend needs to know how these events made you feel.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (04:47)

I like it. like it. agree. And that is so true because right before I got on this podcast, I got one of those blabbering emails that we always talk about. Don't do that to your lawyer from a client. And it was all about what happened last night with the client's daughter and how pretty much that made her feel and how the daughter felt. And although it was important, certain parts of it, there were a lot of

parts that could have been parsed out and talked to with a girlfriend or a friend in general, rather than talking to the lawyer because they were not important to the case.

Andrea Rappaport (05:24)

give me some particulars here so that we can help everybody understand this is the stuff that you should tell your attorney.

This is how you should tell them and here are the details that need to just go to your friend.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (05:37)

Well, I'm going to start, think, with really solid things that clients of mine in the past have not shared with me that have been detrimental to their case because they thought maybe they could share it with a friend or maybe they just didn't want to get charged or whatever it was. OK, so one of the cases that sticks out in my head is I had a female client will call her Brenda,

Andrea Rappaport (05:52)

Okay.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (06:01)

because if you're friends of our show, you know, we always talk about Chad and Brenda. They are our couple.

from the How Not to Suck a Divorce podcast, and yes, they're fake, but you can think about them any way you want. So Brenda, we got Brenda here. Brenda, during the divorce, has a serious medical issue. She tells us that she's had a medical issue, that it required some hospitalization, and that she's having follow-up tests. The tests are done, and she does not tell us the true results of those tests, which were detrimental to her health.

So very big problem for us in many reasons. I don't think that the reason in her mind as to why she didn't tell us until the last minute, which kind of hurt her case, was because I think one, she was being private about her medical, obviously, totally understand that. Two, I don't think that truly she wanted her ex or soon to be ex to know. And she was worried about how and when she might tell the children. Totally understandable.

But remember, your relationship with your attorney is completely confidential. And you need to share that information because that affects you in so many different ways. Like for instance, she could be a longer term maintenance or alimony candidate because of her medical issue. She could need follow up and medical care that could cost more money. It affects whether or not what kind of insurance that she might be looking at post divorce. Those are all really big things.

that we could have built up a case around, but because we had no idea, it was just like not even in the mix. And so we maybe left some money on the table because she refused to disclose this.

Andrea Rappaport (07:38)

So what we're saying in this case is you need to tell your attorney the main idea. This is what happened. You tell your friends maybe the fact that I did not want to share this with my attorney. This is how it made me feel. This is what I'm so worried about. Do you think that when giving out this kind of information, do you start off with as little information as possible and you have let your attorney ask you?

for more based on what they need or how does somebody discern between what is high level?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (08:12)

Well, I think just get to the bottom line and let your attorney then ask more questions. Like for instance, this client had an issue with a potential, ⁓ a brain issue, I should say. And there was some kind of stroke or something they found that was like a stroke. Go to your lawyer and say, hey, just by the way, the follow-up testing showed that I had a stroke. And because of that, I have a lot more testing to do or this is the procedure they want to do.

Leave it at that. Let the attorney ask for more questions. You don't have to go into, is how it made me feel and this is what I did when I got home from having the stroke and this is what my children said and my husband and let the attorney parse that out because it'll be faster to get to the point that the attorney needs.

Andrea Rappaport (08:54)

And just as a reminder, in case you're newer to our show, the reason why we're guiding you to not share all of this information with your attorney ⁓ is because you're paying for all of these conversations. So you want to be very effective and mindful and efficient, rather, with how you're communicating and what you're communicating. So your attorney needs to know a lot of this.

But what they don't necessarily need to know are all of the emotions that are behind this, unless something could be really relevant to your case. What about money stuff? Can we talk about money?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (09:35)

Yes, let's talk about money. So one of the things that clients do that they should not do, meaning they should share with their lawyer, but a lot of times they don't, is something related to negotiation, whether it's money or children. So a lot of times what they want to do, and I understand the reasoning behind why clients do this, they want to negotiate without lawyers because they think it's faster, it's cheaper. And

That might be true in certain scenarios, but remember this, you hired a lawyer for a reason. You don't know the law. You don't know how to negotiate your settlement. Now, there are times that I work with a client to say, sure, go negotiate, but let's work through it and let me tell you where the ranges are. Let me tell you what could work, et cetera. What happens and where it gets really detrimental to your case is you start negotiating behind your lawyer's back.

And now your lawyer is trying to settle your case too. And they're having conversations with opposing counsel, et cetera. And then you might hear from opposing counsel, well, why did you make this proposal? Why are you talking about this when the parties have already talked about this amount of money? And now you've just completely cut your knees off. Your legs are gone. Basically all your leverage is gone because back at the house, Brenda and Chad talked about settling for this amount.

Andrea Rappaport (10:52)

So here, like with this particular example, what is the information that the attorney needs to know, like specifically?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (11:00)

Exactly. So

thank you for asking that because what the attorney needs to know is number one, we're negotiating without the use of attorneys. Okay. Because the attorney is going to say, okay, okay, or this is a bad idea or go ahead and do it, but here's how to do it.

Andrea Rappaport (11:03)

You're welcome.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (11:15)

They need to know that you're negotiating. And two, if you're negotiating without the assistance of your attorneys, they need to know the back and forth. So if you come and say, I will give you a hundred dollars and the next round.

Chad says, I will give you $50. And then the next round at 75, we need to know what rounds, who's made what proposal, who's made what counter, et cetera, so that we are not, we know where our leverage lies, so we can get the best deal for you. Again, my recommendation, and this is contrary to popular demand, is to negotiate through your attorney. If you want the best deal, that's why you hired a lawyer, negotiate through your attorney.

Andrea Rappaport (11:51)

If there have been outside conversations that the attorney is not aware of, what is the best way of conveying that information to your attorney? Is it important for your attorney to know that there was a back and forth, or does it not really matter?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (12:06)

It's super important if it relates to financials or children, and you don't have an agreement on either yet. Your attorney, it's super important that they know that this has been going on, this has been discussed. So there's two ways to communicate. It's either an email with bullet points and let your attorney decide if they need more information, or just get on their calendar, a short phone call. Andrea and I always say, sometimes a short phone call.

Andrea Rappaport (12:07)

That's what I'm thinking.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (12:31)

is so much more cost effective than emails because an email always warrants a response and with more questions. And then the next thing you know, you've had four emails back and forth about the same time.

Andrea Rappaport (12:41)

Well, you know what I just thought of because I'm so smart? You always talk about giving your attorney information that they can use to help your case. One of the things that you personally specialize in is creative results. So by giving your attorney a breakdown, a high level breakdown of the back and forth, you could be cluing your attorney in to how your...

soon-to-be ex negotiates and how they respond because, and this might be a little bit in opposition to what you said before about have everything go through the attorneys. When everything just goes through the attorneys, you miss a little bit of the nuance that Chad or Brenda themselves has to say or how they feel. So like, let's say it's about money and

Chad sends you a high level overview of, just want to let you know, Brenda and I had this discussion last night ⁓ and she offered this and then I said this and then her response to that was blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's something that he could think is totally benign, but you see that and you're like, well, that's interesting that all of sudden Brenda would mention this. This tells me that Brenda is willing to play ball.

and this is what she could be possibly willing to negotiate over. So you kind of hold that as your ace that you put in your back pocket.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (14:10)

I not agree more. always say there's no way we can settle the case until we know what each side needs and or wants. A lot of times that comes from those kind of conversations. where the feel usually the feelings. This is how I'm feeling. Andrew and I just talked about that in more normal situations. That's better for your friend when you're actually negotiating about something that matters or or your ex is soon to be access talking about something that matters to them. In a negotiation setting.

That's something the attorney would like to know.

Andrea Rappaport (14:40)

If it were me, and tell me if you agree with this, if it were me as the client, what I think I would do in this situation is I would send a bullet pointed email that goes over all of the highlights, right? This happened, then this was offered, then this, then this, then this. And then I would say, Morgan, should you want to recap this and ask any questions on a brief 15 minute call?

I'm happy to do that. But at least then Morgan, my attorney, has this in writing and can refer back to. What are your thoughts on that method?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (15:14)

I like it because I do that a lot where if it's super interesting to me and I'm like, ooh, there's some good stuff here. We need to flesh this out. I'm going to go that extra mile and say, I need to talk to you about this. Or I'm going to send back a few very specific questions that I need answered and determine at that point whether we need a phone call.

Andrea Rappaport (15:32)

Something else that I do or that I did, I'm not currently in court and don't need an attorney, but when I did, and as you all know, I had several post-decree issues and I know what I'm talking about here when we're talking about what do you communicate to your attorney and what do you need to not. I will often, did often, throw it at my attorney and say, hey,

this is something, do you want this information or am I just paying for your boathouse? Like, let me know. And then it was like, well, to be honest, I don't think that has anything to do with anything. I'm sorry that this happened, but blah, blah, blah. Okay, great. Or yeah, yes, give me the overview. Then that gives you time to go and think, okay, how can I communicate?

what happened in as few words as possible, get to the main idea, so then my attorney can decide whether he or she needs more information from me and whether this is actually going to be beneficial to my case. Sometimes, I think though, when it has to do with kids, that's when it's tricky.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (16:45)

Yeah, and one thing that's kind of, you know, letting you into divorce lawyer's mind. So, for instance, you just get an email talking about transition of the child yesterday. And it's all about what happened, you know, with the child, what the child did, how you felt about it, et cetera. To me, if I read that, I'm like, OK, that wasn't maybe the best transition. OK, but it's not anything I really need. And it would have been better suited to talk to your friend about it.

I'm not going to respond to that and ask for more information. So the problem is, is that if you don't put a question at the end of the email, you as a client may not know that this is not that important. So like Andrea said, I would always say, if you're going to write an email about something and you're not quite sure if it's better suited for a friend or for your lawyer at the end, say, do you think this information is relevant or would you like any more information related to this? Let the attorney respond. They will.

at that point and say, I don't need any more. Thank you for sharing.

Andrea Rappaport (17:45)

If you, let's keep with this theme. So let's say you had a very challenging transition with the kids and the kids did something very out of character for them or your soon to be ex did something that was very out of character or something just does not sit well with you. I mean, I did go through this exact thing and I remember sending an email that says, hey,

something happened, it's really raising a red flag for me that like, this feels weird. I don't know if we need to dig into this. What are your thoughts? ⁓ Is this something I just talk about with my therapist because I'm bothered by it? Or is there something legal here that needs to be looked into? And then you let them say, well, give me the specifics. When you give the specifics, think about this.

reporting on the incident like a reporter would do on the news. You're not going into like, then I felt like this and then, my God, and she is such a witch. He is such a dick, blah, blah, blah. You're just giving a timeline of the events.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (18:59)

I agree. I love that idea. think that's so great. I also think it kind of dovetails into what you were talking about, which is lawyers want to know if it's a weird feeling or something happened that just feels weird. We want to know why it feels weird to you, because usually the reason it feels weird is either something was wrong with it or like Andrea said, there's a pattern that's been happening that goes towards this issue. And so if it is feeling wrong because you're like, this continues to happen.

list out bullet points for the lawyer. Hey, by the way, you know, this happened, I felt weird about it, but reminding you this happened three other times in the last four months. And remember these three other times, this is what happened at those three other times. Then let the lawyer think about what can we do about this or should we do something about this?

Andrea Rappaport (19:46)

And if you are having a lot of issues that have to do with your kids, be proactive. Don't wait until things get really hairy. Get on a parenting app, a co-parenting app. Use a product like our family wizard to help track all of this stuff. Because some of these things, if there's a pattern of behavior with the kids or behavior with your soon to be ex,

It should be documented in a place that can't be messed with, that can't be altered. And it's a lot more cost effective to have it tracked on our family wizard than to be constantly emailing your attorney with every little thing that happens.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (20:29)

I agree. But let's talk about too, where we go when we're just upset about the divorce. I mean, I think that, you know, Andrew, you've talked about it a lot of times and how much you sucked at divorce and you were upset a lot. And it's so normal to feel that like achy feeling in your stomach of it goes between that sick feeling, but also it goes between that anxious feeling. And you just need to get things off your chest about how you're feeling or how your ex is acting. That is for your friend.

Andrea Rappaport (20:55)

Mm-hmm.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (20:58)

That's when you're going to your friend, unless, unless you have a ton of money and you don't care to spend it with your lawyer, which I have clients like that ⁓ too, which is fine. But if you want to save money and you don't want to spend every dollar on your lawyer, those are the conversations that you're having over dinner, a drink, a coffee, whatever with your friend.

Andrea Rappaport (21:16)

Let's talk about the right friends to bring this to

because, you know, we have friends for a reason, friends for a season, our, you know, our friends who we just have inside jokes with, but not a ton of depth. We have our friends who are so fun to be around, but they don't give great advice. So why don't we go through that a bit? Because I think one of the biggest mistakes that I know I made

is you share something with somebody because you're so desperate to get something off your chest, but then they say something so idiotic in response, and you just want to throat punch them and then cry in the bathroom.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (21:57)

Mm-hmm. Yeah, there are friends to definitely avoid and be very careful about. know, Sally Big Mouth down the street. If Sally's always had a big mouth, she's going to have a bigger mouth with your divorce and how you're feeling. And she's going to pretend like she doesn't have a big mouth. But you know her, she can't help herself. Don't go out with Sally Big Mouth during this time. Don't say anything. And if you're OK with not saying anything, go out with Sally Big Mouth. Fine. But keep your mouth shut. There's other friends that you have to be. They're like,

Andrea Rappaport (22:03)

Ooh.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (22:25)

kind of teetering on the friendship level, also on the professional level. So I have clients that might go out with someone who is, let's just say, a realtor. And they know that you are getting divorced and you might need to sell your house. And so yes, they're listening, but is there another reason that they're trying to be your friend? Right? They want to get the listing. You have to be careful.

Andrea Rappaport (22:46)

Are we suggesting

that people are opportunistic?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (22:49)

Well, I didn't want to go there, but I just had a client that the same exact thing happened. So you have to protect yourself and be careful. And I'm not saying, and I'm not calling out realtors, realtors are wonderful, but I'm saying in general, if they can profit off of you, be very careful and ask yourself whether they are your true friend, because there are things that happen all the time like that. So watch out for the big mouths, watch out for the people that can profit off of you and make sure that you're comfortable.

that whatever you say to whoever is going to stay with that person.

Andrea Rappaport (23:21)

I love that you just called out realtors because those assholes are some of the most opportunistic fucks out there. Sorry. They are. You heard it from me. Quote me on that one. ⁓ One thing that we haven't talked about is don't share your strategy with your friends. Don't. They don't need to fucking know. They are not going to understand it. They don't need to know.

Keep the conversations with your friends about your feelings. Don't get into, well, and then my attorney said I should blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Why? Because you're just, you're wasting time. You're gonna start to get feedback that's only gonna cloud and confuse you from people who don't fucking know what they're talking about.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (24:07)

Okay, talking about that, another issue that I've had numerous times. Let's just say Brenda goes out with her girlfriend, Dana, and Brenda's stressed out about her financials. So they're out, they're having a glass of wine. She's stressed out. What does she do? She whips out her financial affidavit or her balance sheet, and she starts going through the document with Dana. Dana's not a lawyer. Dana's not a divorce lawyer. And now Dana is like, yeah, that's wrong.

Andrea Rappaport (24:25)

⁓ no.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (24:35)

This can't be right. my gosh, you're getting screwed. Now you leave drinks with Dana a thousand percent more amped up. So if it was between Big Mouth Sally and Dana, I'd go Big Mouth Sally at that point because you don't want to go home exactly.

Andrea Rappaport (24:49)

Yeah, don't want you keyed up. don't,

keyed up and liquored up is not a good combination.

Because you know what you're gonna do then. Then you're gonna take your keyed up and liquored up brain and you're gonna email your attorney. And that, number one, you are paying for your attorney to read your liquored up email. Number two, your attorney is gonna get annoyed, okay, which you don't want that. Number three,

Morgan L. Stogsdill (24:55)

pass.

Andrea Rappaport (25:14)

Then you are paying for your attorney to send you an email back that says, what are you doing here? This is the, like, shut up. This is annoying. So what people don't realize is by going out with the Dana's of the world and having drinks and having Dana weigh in on your stuff,

you could have just cost yourself $350 easily by sending a two sentence

email. Your attorney reads it. They send you a four sentence email back.

That is money, money, money, money, money. For nothing. For your attorney to say, who were you talking to?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (25:48)

And it's not that easy because when we get an email basically saying, I'm afraid all my numbers are wrong. I'm never going to be able to afford anything. Everything we just talked about in the last meeting has been thrown out the window because of Dana from the bar. Now I have to have at least another hour meeting, at least another phone call to go through and explain why we did what we were doing and what our reasoning is.

Andrea Rappaport (26:07)

Meet up.

Or what if you have an attorney who's very comprehensive, sees this and thinks, what if you don't preface it with, I was talking to my friend, right? What if you just write an email that says, I have a concern that I blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. The attorney gets that, they don't know where this is coming from. So then they are now putting their team on the case to dig into this shit. That could be more than an hour. That could be three hours.

that you're paying for people to comb through your stuff all over again.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (26:45)

Yeah, and we're not saying to you, don't question why you're doing certain things or your financials. That is not the message here at all. The message here is choose your friends wisely to talk to about your divorce case. If they are not your financial person, if they are not your lawyer, you shouldn't be talking about financials with them. You shouldn't be talking about legal strategy with them. Those are just really important topics that can...

amp you up again. I don't know. I forgot already what you said Andrea, but you don't want to be liquored up and what was it? You know, bad combo, bad combo. You don't need that. You want to go out with your friends, blow off a little steam, come home feeling better, not worse.

Andrea Rappaport (27:17)

Keyed up, keyed up and liquored up.

So let's flip this. Let's talk about how to be vulnerable with your friends and actually use them the way that friends are meant to be used. If you're like me, opening up is not easy. And you don't like appearing weak and overwhelmed and overrun. And you might go inward when things get really hard. Well, that's not really going to help you either. So.

I think, yes, we want you to be mindful about who you share things with, but you can't shut down completely because you are going to need people who you go to and share the feelings part of everything that's going on.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (28:10)

Yep. I mean, I'll share a story about myself. You know, I've been really agitated, but also had a lot going on family wise and all this stuff. And I had sick kids at home and ridiculous thing happened where I gave my child a one of those yogurt drinks to drink. And I nicely, because he wasn't feeling great, I opened the top and I handed it to him. He doing what any child would have done, started shaking it up, right? Because he was going to shake it. That's what he does with the yogurt drinks. I didn't tell him the top was open.

He shook the yogurt drink all over my couch. And I'm talking, it looked like yogurt was murdered on my couch. And it was so bad and so stuck in the couch. I almost started crying. It was so ridiculous, right? But I was just, I was at my wits end, just kind of like our listeners. I was at my wits end. And I felt so stupid about it, but I went out with a girlfriend and I actually was like, you know what? Talk about how you're feeling. And I said, I almost cried over spilled yogurt all over my couch, even though I had the

carpet guys come and clean it off. But that's how badly I was breaking after a week of having sick kids home and everything else in my family going on. And the minute that I spit it out, my gosh, I felt so much better because here's the thing, even if your friend hasn't gone through a divorce themselves, they've been through some shit. And if they're a good friend, you're going to walk away feeling better.

Andrea Rappaport (29:31)

I had moments when my kids were real young and I was already, I can't remember if I was already divorced or not, but I think that in passing, you know, a mom at school is like, how's everything going for you? And instead of just saying, everything's fine, I remember saying, it's hard right now. I'm barely hanging on. I'm frustrated and overwhelmed.

I kind of feel like I'm drowning, but you know what? That's where I'm at. It's going to be okay, but today's tough. Let me tell you what happened after that. I probably regretted what I said, right? I probably thought, ⁓ fuck, why did I say that? He doesn't fucking care. know, like dumb Andrea. And three days later, ⁓ I remember I was living in an apartment building and I had walked down to the mail room to get my mail.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (30:08)

Mm-hmm. Right.

Andrea Rappaport (30:24)

And my mail was usually just like, you know, flyers and stuff. Like I never had anything really come to me. Yeah. Real letter flyer from all those opportunistic bucks. I do love them. And there was a card in the mail from this mom. And I'm thinking, what is this? And this woman hand wrote me a card that said,

Morgan L. Stogsdill (30:29)

Re-eliter flyers, re-eliter flyers. Because we now know how much, we all know how much you like.

Andrea Rappaport (30:51)

I'm just thinking about what you shared with me the other day and I want to let you know you are such a good mom. And I see the way your kids look at you. I know this is so hard. It's hard for all of us. It's not just you, Andrea. We're all in this together, blah, blah, blah. I think she threw in like a Starbucks gift card or something. And it was something. And I remember she even said,

Morgan L. Stogsdill (31:11)

my gosh.

Andrea Rappaport (31:14)

I know you don't like getting together with people in person, so go grab yourself something thinking of you. So what I think a takeaway here is two things. Number one, it's always better to share with the right people. Number two, let's talk about sending a card for a minute and the power of taking the time to send a card. I want to share with you something.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (31:33)

Let's do it.

Andrea Rappaport (31:41)

that you might not wanna hear. You are going through a phase right now where you need people, you need community, but you can't just be someone who takes and takes and takes. You have to give. You have to give a little in order for people to want to lift you up, to want to be there to support your kids. There's something that we're all about to do this season, which is wish people happy holidays, right?

It's the holiday season. I think we've all kind of fallen into a slump where we just post a picture on our social media, post a family picture and say, happy holidays from my family to yours. So blessed.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (32:19)

So thankful, so thankful. my

gosh, on Thanksgiving, it's like, good God, if I have to see one more so thankful photo.

Andrea Rappaport (32:27)

But this year, Morgan and I want you to do something a little bit different. Isn't that right, my friend?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (32:32)

It's so right. listen, we want you to connect with those in your circle. And it's kind of a selfish reason too, but you're also giving back. The reason is, is because when we're heading into the holiday season, if you connect with someone, that's one giving to them. But then when you are taking their time and you're putting your stress on them, it makes it all okay.

Andrea Rappaport (32:56)

Yeah. We are partnering with a company called Truly Engaging. And I got to tell you, when we first started chatting with them, and actually this is the company who made our divorce greeting cards, we were like, holy cow, these are the nicest cards we have ever felt and ever seen. The bulk of their business are designing beautiful custom cards. We're talking like,

Think about what you've heard from other companies where you grab a picture and then you upload all the text and stuff. This is that, but on the highest luxury level, but you're not paying wild prices.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (33:38)

Exactly, and I've actually used this company for the last few years for my holiday cards, and I'm telling you, I've used all the competitor companies too. These cards blow away competitors, hands down, and they are not wildly expensive, especially for our listeners this year.

Andrea Rappaport (33:55)

Right, so we're gonna put everything in the show notes of how we, like what you can do with this company. Again, they're called Truly Engaging. We are truly engaged with everything that they do. But something else that I really like about them, they understand how important community is for our people. So when we were talking to them about everything, they said, you know what? One thing that we do, that a lot of other companies don't do, is we have a...

Concierge customer team, where you get the name of a real person who can help you design your card. You have a question, we have answers. And I actually have a name of a person. Her name is Alicia. We're going to put the spelling of her name because she spells it a little differently. So you don't want to misspell the way she spells it. But we're going to put it in the show notes. You can message Alicia. She's a human.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (34:51)

And here's the thing, even if you're like, this is weird. I'm going through a weird time. I don't want to send a holiday card of myself and my children. Just put your kids on there. And if you don't want to do that, that's okay too. They have cards that say happy holidays, Merry Christmas, whatever, you know, you want to say. I was going to say something raunchy, but I will not. So.

Andrea Rappaport (35:08)

my god,

I want to know what it was.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (35:10)

⁓ you can only imagine.

Andrea Rappaport (35:12)

I was

going to say, if it says, I'm keyed up and liquored up, happy new year.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (35:15)

Happy New Year.

up, they're offering us 10 % off for all of our listeners for any card. So think about it. Create your own community when you are suffering. It goes so long of a way. Literally what Andrea just said, she got the most amazing card from a mom and she's still talking about it years later.

Andrea Rappaport (35:34)

Yeah, this was five years ago, and I still remember this moment. So again, the whole reason why we went into that whole spiel is that people don't often think about giving to your community. But if you're about to ask for a lot, you want to give a little. So for what it's worth, think about that. Staying on this topic of kids, I want to make sure that we're very clear about how we want you to communicate with your attorney.

regarding kid-related issues. And something that we mentioned at the very beginning of this conversation is patterns are very important. The best way to show a pattern is to present your attorney with a timeline.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (36:13)

Yes, put the timeline together. Again, bullet points. So if the child is constantly crying at every transition or going to sleep at night when you're taking them from the other parent, it's not enough just to say, is what happened last night. That would be a waste of your time and money unless something major happened. But if it's just simply, they're having a hard time at my house, we want to see a pattern. So why is this important? Well, they've had a hard time at my house the last four weeks.

And so just want to let you know, let me know if this is anything we should look into or talk about next steps. The timeline gets really important here. The patterns are big.

Andrea Rappaport (36:49)

Again, the main idea with this entire conversation is your attorney needs a high level overview of what happened. Report on the events like a reporter on the news. Your friends get the feelings. And you can ask your attorney, like, hey, this is something that happened. Do you want this information? You can even say, and what's the best manner you would like for me to communicate it to you?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (37:15)

That's right.

That's right. Okay, Andrea, here we go. Let's play a game. I know I can't believe I just said that, but let's let's wrap this podcast up by playing a game. Are you ready?

Andrea Rappaport (37:18)

What?

Are we bringing back Spin the Wheel?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (37:27)

No, we're going to pass on that, but we are going to bring back. We've been talking about all different types of friends. We've been talking about Sally Big Mouth, Dana, the you know what at the bar. Let's talk about what kind of friend would you rather. Are you ready for this?

Andrea Rappaport (37:29)

Okay.

okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. I love a game of would you rather, yeah.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (37:43)

Okay. you rather have a girlfriend who is fun, loyal, she drinks way too much when you go out, and she's very opinionated? That's friend number one. Or would you rather have a friend that's funny, always a good time, no pressure with her when you're out whatsoever, she can go out whenever, but you're not sure that she's truly listening to you when you're out together.

Andrea Rappaport (38:05)

Mmmmm... B.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (38:07)

Ooh, really? Because you just don't want to expose yourself?

Andrea Rappaport (38:10)

⁓ Because people, so when you said opinionated, that kind of, I think I have bad experiences with friends when I was younger who I got pushed around a lot by people who were very opinionated. in ⁓ most friendships, I'm not the alpha. Like I'll get really quiet. And it started to feel like kind of abusive. So I think that kind of set me off. But I wouldn't like, I want someone to listen to me too.

but the drinking too much and the opinionated, that kind of shut me down. Okay, yeah. ⁓

Morgan L. Stogsdill (38:43)

Okay, I've got one more for you. You ready? Let's talk about Chad. Okay,

you get to go on a date or be with Chad, right? You're dating, actually. Let's talk about actually dating Chad. All right, Chad one, he's super good looking. He's funny. You laugh so much with him. He's got it. Nope, nope, we're not done.

Andrea Rappaport (38:59)

Yeah, number one.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (39:02)

He's got a great body, but he has, okay, number one, but he has really bad teeth that can't be fixed. Okay, that's number one. He is European, that's number one. Second chat, are you ready for it? Okay, he's okay looking. He's not horrible, but not good. He's funny. He has lots of money, but here's the thing.

Andrea Rappaport (39:04)

Pants off, number one. I'm pregnant, number one.

Oh, is he European? Is there a reason behind it?

Uh-huh.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (39:28)

He is way skinnier and shorter than you.

Andrea Rappaport (39:31)

Which one would you go with? Yes, it is. It is now.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (39:33)

This is not my game.

I had to make this one up. So we're waiting. Tick tock.

Andrea Rappaport (39:38)

This is terrible. ⁓

Well, wait, is chat number one poor?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (39:43)

TBD, you don't know, could be, could not be. He could be rich, you never know.

Andrea Rappaport (39:47)

We're just dating. think I would go, I don't know, the bad teeth thing. I think it depends, like, what's bad teeth? Are we talking, like, only has two of them? Like, are we talking?

Morgan L. Stogsdill (39:57)

But

we're talking like brown and black for sure.

Andrea Rappaport (40:01)

No, you

can't do that to me. Gross. Then I go for skinny Chad. I mean, nobody wants to feel like a tubby bubby, you know, in a relationship. And I'm like, you know, I have so many body image issues that that would really bother me. I'm also very short. So somebody who's significantly shorter than me would be like a little person, which presents, I mean, just a whole other slew of, you know,

concerns and then I think about shoes and all that kind of stuff. I don't know, Morgan. I don't like this game. I liked it at first and now it's giving me anxiety. Let's go back to the opportunistic fucks that are real. ⁓

Morgan L. Stogsdill (40:42)

we're going to get hate mail from, from this episode. anyway.

Andrea Rappaport (40:44)

Seriously, we've offended everybody. We've offended

realtors. We've offended short people, skinny people. ⁓ yeah, Europeans, Chads, Brenda's. What was her? Big Mouth Sally, Dana.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (40:51)

Don't forget Europeans, you offended them too.

Dana.

Remember this, divorce is a marathon. It is not a sprint. Every day in your divorce process, pre-divorce, in the middle of the divorce, sometimes after the divorce, it's not going to every day be a good day. Some days it's day by day, other days it's hour by hour, and guess what? That is okay.

Andrea Rappaport (41:19)

We do the show to help you get through a really difficult process. Listen to these episodes. Listen to our words. We try so hard to take something very abstract and make it concrete, just like in today's episode. You want to give your attorney a high level overview of the event. Save the feelings for your friends. That's not that hard to remember.

Go back and listen to old episodes. You might find some episodes very educational. You might find some episodes very comforting. We do this to help you.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (41:52)

Exactly. We do this to help you. And if you like our podcast, rate and review us. It means the world to us, but it doesn't just mean the world. It actually enables us to bring on fabulous guests, but also fabulous topics and continue doing what we do. If you need more community, we have a free private community. You can join without your name. You don't have to say anything. You can just watch or you can participate, ask questions, get answers. If you need attorney referrals, we do it all over the world. Yes, that's right. All over the world.

DM us, send us a message. We respond always. If you need more information, check out our website. We have the DCC and other items that you can purchase that can make you feel like you're in control of this process.

Andrea Rappaport (42:34)

And just so I know you all are listening to the very end of our show, I have a little surprise for you. The first person to join our community with the screen name Loud Mouth Sally will get a Starbucks gift card from me. So, Loud Mouth Sallys, come one, come all, you'll get a Starbucks gift card.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (42:55)

and maybe a handwritten note because that is what we are doing these days. We are not text messaging. We're not posting pictures. Those are all fake friends. Get out your pen and paper, go to Truly Engaging, get the actual card that looks like you put in the effort and get a stamp. And that's it. You're going to blow someone's mind.

Andrea Rappaport (43:14)

Get a stamp, get a stamp. And remember, above all else, you, my friends, have got this.

Morgan L. Stogsdill (43:21)

and we have got you.

How Not to Suck at Divorce (43:23)

The How Not to Suck a Divorce podcast cannot be copied or rebroadcast without consent. This podcast does not contain legal advice. The information contained herein and provided on the podcast and the resources available are not intended and shall not be construed as legal