Ex-it Strategy

In this episode Kelli declared at eight years old that she wanted to be an attorney.  Her caring and compassionate nature, and her passion for advocating for children, led her to the practice of family law.  Kelli seeks to help families through some of the most difficult times in their lives while keeping the best interest of the children and her clients at the forefront when advocating on their b...

In this episode Tasha Sullivan , MSW – Senior Director of Domestic Violence Services talks about what InterAct is and how it can help people who find themselves in an abusive relationship. InterAct is the only provider of domestic violence and sexual assault services in Wake County, North Carolina - saving lives, rebuilding lives, and securing safer futures for individuals and families in our comm...

In this episode Today's guest is Ryan Kelly , MSW, Associate Director of Victim Services from InterAct . Ryan shares about her role and InterAct and how she helps survivors of domestic abuse. Ryan shares about the ways domestic violence shows up in relationships, physical abuse is often only one piece of the problem. She breaks down the power and control wheel that is taking control over their par...

In this episode Lepage Associates is home to a highly experienced team of experts dedicated to helping you with your concerns.  They recognize that when people seek a psychologist, therapy, or psychiatric services, they are experiencing a problem they would like solved.  By the time you start to think about seeking a mental health service, you have likely tried at least some alternatives, and thos...

In this episode We talk about the Will Smith and Chris Rock drama, and how Will's marriage is well known as a non-traditional or open marriage. We share about open marriage stories we've heard as lawyers. We are great at drafting contracts, if you'd like a non-traditional marriage agreement reach out to us. What percentage of marriages are open? Less than 1%. What percentage of open marriages end...

In this episode SAFEchild stands for Stop Abuse For Every Child and is a Wake County organization that offers a full range of child abuse prevention and intervention services to children and families at no cost.  Cristin DeRonja, SAFEchild’s executive director since 2015, joined the organization in 2004 and has served many roles. She has worked with first-time moms as a mentor for SAFEchild’s Welc...

In this episode Jamie comes back onto the show for a second time.  Jamie is a private investigator that works for Blackman Detective Services.  We talk about serving papers and how important it is to keep a case moving in the court system.  We talk about the different levels of serving people that private detectives take, but that doesn't always work smoothly so they have to find the person and ha...

In this episode, Elizabeth and Sarah provide answers to some of the most frequently asked questions regarding North Carolina divorce law.  Some of these questions include:  Do you really have to be separated a year to file for divorce? What if the other party will not leave your home? Do you have to have a separation agreement or court order to be legally separated?  Why is the day of separation s...

    In This Episode:  Infidelity relationships outside of the marriage account for almost 60% of separation and divorces. This episode airs the day after Valentine's Day 2022, so happy valentines day! How soon can you date: At least wait until you're separated, (legally, not just a verbal agreement) When you're separated in NC, you have to be separated for a year and a day before you can get divor...

    In This Episode:  During the pandemic there has been an increase in domestic violence. We have to protect people in violent relationships. That's something we've observed just as family law enterprise.  We also talk about coming out of the pandemic (we hope), and what we've learned just in our practice, people staying at home together. Did it make their situation better or worse? What do you d...

    In This Episode:  We talk about custody issues that come up during the holidays. What to do and what to avoid if you're dealing with a contentious or congenial custody dispute this holiday season. When thinking about your custody agreement this season it's important to think long term: think about what's important to you, what traditions you want to have going forward. We discuss some other do...

    In This Episode:  There are all sorts of ways to handle custody agreements. In the best-case scenario, we would hopefully be able to resolve custody with some sort of parenting agreement or separation agreement. How do you enforce a contract? First of all, what do you need to have a contract? You need two reasonable people, even though they both have a position they want, are willing to (not n...

Today's guest is Fizzy she is the Senior Paralegal and Operations Manager at New Direction Family Law. What started her love for family law was Fizzy's own experiences as a victim and survivor of domestic violence and her experience with custody battles and working with the court system. This also gives her another level of empathy that she is able to use to help her clients. Fizzy talks about how...

In today's episode, they talk to Tim about his experience of the long custody battle for his daughter and his experience as a single dad raising a multiracial daughter. Tim shares that in his experience we live in a society where mothers are often given preference when it comes to custody and how he had to overcome that stigma to win custody in the court system. After going to court regularly over...

In this episode of the Exit Strategy, we are joined in the studio by the hosts of the Girls That Do Stuff podcast, Sarah Madras and Jenny Midgley.   Elizebeth and Sarah talk about how they don't necessarily want or push people to get a divorce, their job is to come to the best solution to everyone's problems. Although many people who have gotten as far as consulting a divorce attorney already have...

Dr. Ludlam has her Master’s degree in Early Childhood Risk and Prevention from Harvard University and a Ph. D. from Alliant International University in Clinical Psychology. Her research and clinical interests have centered around the topic of trauma and trauma-related disorders. We also spend some time talking about parental evaluations. She is primarily responsible for doing evaluations both for...

You're going to get a court date and have the opportunity to state your case before a judge, but it can be a long road. It can be for two months. It may be six months. You can ask your spouse to pay child support or your bills during this time, but it is not guaranteed. This is the reason many divorce attorneys and counselors suggest prenup agreements. The custody is often decided in an hour in co...

When he’s not sketching random thoughts, he’s running a podcast about the NJ Punk Scene from the late 90s to early 2000s. He also owns an animation company . We chat about creating his comic @dailyBred and how he wrote his first book and, later, his most recent book, The Couple's Checklist. Every day he wakes up and draws his comic and posts it to his Instagram. The character is basically him and...

We highly recommend you check out Kate's podcast, The Divorce Survival Guide . She is also a certified divorce coach and we talk about what that means. " Should I stay or should I go ?" is an area that she coaches people on, she also has an online course of the same name. Kate shares her story about how she got into divorce and discernment coaching. After her successful career in acting (including...

It's a common misconception that you have to file certain paperwork when you want to separate, but this is not the case. We talk about one of the first steps to getting a separation which is a separation agreement.  A separation document is a contract to agree on how you want to go about things like child support and how you want to handle your finances. We talk about a few things that people with...

We talk about how we are excited to be getting vaccines and people are starting to come back into the office. Will McGlone is a good friend of Jen's and is the guest on the show. We talk a little about college-years and how Jen and Will became friends at ECU. We are excited to talk to Will about his experience and remembrance of his parent's divorce during his childhood now that he is grown up and...

As divorce attorneys, we get asked this question a lot. We cover it in depth in this episode. It's important that you have a plan for leaving a relationship and this information can save you a lot of time and stress.

The benefit of Premarital Legal counseling is that we would just tell you what happens, for example, if you open a joint bank account or you keep your money separate, or you inherit a million dollars from your grandfather? So marriage and of itself is legally recognized by the state. It is under the realm of law. So why not understand the laws that have to do with marriage?  This is different than...

There is a good chance if you get divorced and have children that step-parents will be a part of your future. It's not all bad, but emotions can run high. We prefer the word bonus-parent instead of step-parent.  We discuss the story from E-News about Kate Hudson and their podcast called Sibling Revelry where they talk about the drama surrounding the stepbrothers and sisters and step-parents in the...

Social media. We love to hate it. On average people are spending hours every day on social media.  Some of the ways social media can change our lives: Social media is distracting us from actually spending time with one another. The ability to stalk each other. We are oversharing. We are more likely to become addicted to attention. Focusing on strangers' lives rather than our own. Jumping to conclu...