In this conversational video, divorce coach Lara Brunstrom and mediator Scott Levin discuss how couples often undermine their own divorce process by exposing children and friends to adult conflicts, creating a "gossip chain" that fuels anxiety, regret, and derailment of mediation. They share real‑world anecdotes—such as a client who let her anxious daughter overhear a coaching call, an adult child disrupting a mediation, and a father using a teen to weaponize a parent‑child dispute—illustrating the harmful ripple effects of talking about the divorce in front of kids or within social circles. The hosts emphasize the importance of confidentiality, compartmentalizing discussions, preparing clients emotionally before mediation, and adopting a solution‑focused mindset. They advise parents to stop discussing the other parent in front of children, to avoid involving adult children in negotiations, and to seek professional coaching rather than informal advice. The conversation concludes with a reminder to minimize regret by staying on‑track, keeping discussions child‑free, and leveraging coaching to achieve equitable, fair settlements.
Chapters
Hello, everybody. Wow! I think if we aligned our windows, we could actually look like we were in one one building. I'm just realizing how we're aligned.
Love it.
My name is Laura. I'm a divorce coach. This is Scott, who's with me today, and he is the chief peacekeeper, as he calls himself. And I'm just I just think he's a mediator extraordinaire. He's rescued so many people that I've worked with throughout time, saving them a lot of money and a lot of heartache. And so we really enjoy doing these because we just recently actually, um, acquired another mutual client based on things that she was seeing that we were talking about. So it really pushed us both to record another one and be useful and helpful. And the client really expressed gratitude for making some of this information just available that she could just watch. And in the privacy of her own home and chill out and decide what her plan of action was going to be. So here we are.
Everything that you read online these days is probably written by AI, right?
I know we're authentic. You can tell because the dogs just growled.
The last bastion of reality are these videos. I really think that.
Yeah, exactly. So we're going to keep it real and we're going to touch on something that's really hitting in my job lately, which is people self-sabotaging. And I'm going to tell you why. I have a client right now. I, I'm seeing a trend, and I'm going to back up a little bit. Um, I'm seeing a trend of a lot of kids on anxiety meds, and I don't know what's happening in the world out there where all these kids are taking anxiety meds, but, um, what I'm hearing in this particular client is I was doing a coaching call with her And as I was talking, I was hearing like her daughter in the background, and I'm like, is is that your daughter? And come to find out that I'm on speakerphone, and I'm like, oh, I don't know that that's really appropriate. Like they're in the same room, on speaker, full like very naked conversation, very exposed about the the trials and tribulations of the divorce. What they're facing, how her daughter is so anxious and can't deal with all these things. So there's there's so many layers beyond my scope of coaching that's happening here. But what I really leaned into is she's just sabotaging the whole process. She's telling her daughter over and over again to lean into her diagnosis as opposed to giving her solutions. She's her daughter's hearing her say that. This is— this isn't working. This is where all the stressors are. So she's really taken a middle schooler and just dumped her into an adult situation. And that's gonna backfire on so many levels. It's gonna backfire the mom, it's gonna backfire the daughter, it's gonna backfire the dad, because now the dad is getting— Oh, that's my puppy.
I got all sorts of background noise here.
Puppy doesn't like self-sabotage either.
Yeah, so I really—
I think it's really important to—
Yeah, that's tough.
Yeah, not be walking into a mediation like when they walk into you and now we have parents who are talking about the other parent and we have kids who are— their anxiety is going up even more because they're hearing these adult conversations that they should not be hearing. And that's gonna affect your effectiveness.
Well, the first thing I think of is that, you know, what percentage of the mediation is gonna be about things that we aren't there to talk about? Of course, we're there to talk about the kids and how they're doing. But this is a per— an issue that is going to take you left of the, of the solution-oriented discussions that we want to have. So we're trying to, you know, tackle the issues of divorce. Obviously, one of those is parenting. But, you know, bringing in the child to discussions about dad or mom, the other side, dad or mom's girlfriend or new significant other, or what they're doing, or they're smoking this or doing that when they shouldn't be. They, they're drinking too much. They're not, they're not helping. They're helping. I mean, these are all conversations that will impact the other side's ability to focus on the negotiations because they have these other things that they need to bring to the foretable. And none of them have necessarily to do with the core issues that we're there to solve.
Absolutely. And I think confidentiality and avoiding those casual conversations, whether it's with your kids and that's going to affect parenting, or if it's with your friends and that social group, if they're in your PTA circle, that's That's gonna cross-pollinate. That's gonna like, all of a sudden your neighbor's gonna know your business and what you're fighting for and what you're not fighting for. I have one in Southern California right now that they live in the same neighborhood, go to the same public pool, and oh, well, I heard through the grapevine she's doing this. And I'm like, like, that's so— That's one of the reasons why I like doing what I do so well is to be a person who isn't part of that gossip chain, a person who isn't judgmental to your decisions. Um, if we can avoid that and I can deliver them in a way to you that is free of the sabotage, free of the gossip chain, free of child issues that don't necessarily need to be in there at the time— I mean, if you're talking 401s, we don't need To, you know, it's just, it's compartmentalizing, I think. And I don't know how you, like, other issues that you see on your end.
I mean, it can even be adult, you know, parents. So I have a case right now. First of all, they have like 14 dogs. So, you know, there might not be, you know, they all having 14 dogs for 2 people is a little bit unique.
Wait, wait, wait. What did you say?
They have 14 dogs. But notwithstanding that, Daughters? No, dogs.
Dogs. Okay. Still, that's a lot. Okay.
A lot. But they want, you know, an adult child. This is a couple that's been married, you know, decades, and an adult child was brought into conversation with one of the parents during the divorce process. And when the other parent found out, our next mediation, over half of it had to do with that. Like the hurt that it caused, how we're not gonna— like, is there parameters for preventing that from happening? And this, this child is, you know, I'm 45, so they weren't that much younger than me. But, you know, that almost derailed, you know, the entire— that pretty much derailed one entire meeting when we were there to talk about the agenda topics for that meeting had nothing to do with that issue. So it can even happen. When a child is not a child, but they're still— they're an adult child, and it still impacts them and their opinion of the other parent and their interaction for the other parent, the care or disregard that they show that other parent. All those things are taking you away from moving forward through the process of a mediated settlement.
Absolutely.
Like, how do you— I mean, I know when my clients work with you, they're, they're being delivered to the mediation in a way that's focused and on topic and prepared and keeping sort of the fluff out. Like, that gossip chain is oftentimes the worst thing that you can expose yourself to. I think I've mentioned this before. My mom called me recently and was like, I need a shark attorney for a friend of mine's daughter. And I said, Mom, you know what I do, right? Like, I don't litigate. I don't believe in it. Like, I'm sure they could hire somebody that could help them figure out media. No, no, no. I need it. They need a tough lawyer. And I said, you know, well, no one gets— you know, once you bring that tough person in, everyone gets bloodied, right? Like, no one is spared.
Um, absolutely. And we've said—
Saying that to this—
I know, right?
That's the advice she's giving. So, like, friends are not the place to go for, for advice. You need to hire a coach that has it, that can deliver you in the right mindset, because you are going to be conflicted, you're going to be scared, you're going to be nervous, you're going to be angry, you're going to be Sometimes feeling like, you know, depressed-like feelings. But, you know, if you're going to mediate a settlement, you have to come to those negotiations ready and in the right mindset to do that work.
Absolutely. And side note, I can't even tell you how many times I've heard adult children have created chaos in a divorce. It's not just the younger kids. They're really hurt too, and they need attention to detail on that as well. They need They need to be held in the process. It's, it's shocking sometimes to people, but it's like they can be 45 years old and just be like, what, what, like their foundation just crumbled. And yeah, it's hard. So all of those things can be sifted out before they get to you. Um, and if I can leave anybody with a single message today, it is stop talking in front of your kids. Darn it.
No, I was at a Starbucks recently too, where like, I just was overhearing a conversation. They sat right next to me. And it It was 2 kids and a dad. And they had been, you could tell they had been divorced a little while. But, you know, it was like he was saying like, oh yeah, you know, I wanted to take you to that concert. But, you know, it was on Mom's Day and Mom didn't get back to me in time for it. And I was like, really? Like, I get it. Like, you're trying to be with your kids and do something. But like, the way that it was said, it was so clearly like, arming them to go back to mom. I mean, they were already on their phones. These kids weren't that young. They were early teenagers, and one was a little, probably mid-teenager. But like, they were already firing texts away, you could tell, to mom. And like, why didn't you— you know, you're just like charging them up to like go battle your battle with mom. And that, like, what's that going to accomplish for you?
Absolutely nothing. Yeah, other than heartache, because then the, the The boomerang effect of that is then the other parent will start to do it because you're modeling the behavior for the other parent, and now you're just downward spiraling.
So just downward spiraling modeling, like, is that where you want to be? You want to be— and I guarantee you, like most people, Laura, you might, you know this too, right? Like there's a thing at the end of, not end of life, but when people like start having grandkids, a lot of people that were divorced younger when they had younger kids, they kind of rekindle friendships.
Yeah.
And they feel a lot of regret for the years if they spent years like kind of in the fight.
Yeah.
Because, you know, because now they are like, you know, they've gotten over their insecurities or this is their life. They're in their, like, you know, 8, you know, their silver years. And they're just, I find a lot of people expressing regret for like, you know, if they went down the fight path and that downward spiral path. You're likely only to regret it later. So maybe just skip the regret part and just, you know, get on the same page.
Absolutely. Well, you know my motto, getting you through your divorce with the least amount of regret possible.
Yes, I love that.
Great segue.
Well, so fun. Thanks for the conversation.
Thank you.
And we'll see you guys soon. So I'm Scott Levin. This is Lara Brunstrom, Sterling Divorce Coaching. Sterling—
Sterling Fire.
Sterling Fire. Sorry. So we'll put the descriptions and the links and the emails and all that in the description. But reach out. She is a tremendous resource for people. I've seen people find me that were not in the right headspace for this process, but could, after working with Lara, really had success and were able to come to an equitable, fair mediated settlement because of the benefits of working With such a stellar coach and getting those preparations in place. So thanks for all the good that you do. Okay.
Thank you. Together we'll change the world. All right.
