Off the Fence with Karen Covy: Mastering Decision Making, Divorce & More

Most people don’t want a bitter, drawn-out divorce, yet many end up in one simply because that’s how the system is set up. Rock Rocheleau, a Las Vegas divorce attorney who has spent years watching couples fight over things they’d mostly agreed on, thinks there’s a better way to begin. His firm has built an approach around what he calls a “no-fight divorce,” and the idea is simpler than you’d expect.

In this podcast episode, Rock explains why the court system tends to turn a family problem into a legal battle, and why a single p...

The scariest part of divorce court isn’t knowing you’re right. It’s realizing that being right may not be enough. In this podcast episode, family law attorney Wendy Hernandez, who has spent 27 years in Arizona family courtrooms, explains why preparation is what turns your facts, evidence, and story into something a judge can actually use, and why simply walking into court expecting “the truth” to win can be a costly mistake.

From understanding the rules of family court to deciding which battles are worth fighting, Wendy breaks down what it really takes to prepare fo...

You can be brilliant, successful, and logical and still feel helpless in the one place that matters most: your closest relationships. In this podcast episode, Dre Baldwin, a former professional athlete turned performance coach, explains why high-achieving people can struggle to make difficult decisions in their relationships, even when they know something needs to change. He explores the mental blocks, rationalizations, and blind spots that can keeps people locked in the same marriage fight instead of confronting what’s really going on.

Dre presents a practical way to approach relationship problems before they turn into resentment. HE al...

A late-night phone call from a terrified eight-year-old changed how one divorce attorney thinks about conflict forever. In this podcast episode, family law attorney and mediator Sharon deFala shares the story behind that call, and how it pushed her away from conducting divorce fights in court and toward resolving them in a calmer, more compassionate way. What she's learned along the way challenges a lot of assumptions about what actually damages kids, and what keeps exes fighting long after the marriage is over.

Sharon breaks down why so many divorce disputes never seem to end, even when...

Somewhere between 35 and 40, your body starts a hormonal countdown that can quietly change the way you see your marriage, your career, and even yourself. Women’s health and fitness expert Corry Matthews explains how intertwined menopause and marriage can be and how hormonal changes that begin in your mid-30s can do far more than cause hot flashes. They can affect your mood, metabolism, confidence, relationships, and even your ability to make clear decisions. 

Corry explores what happens when shifting estrogen and progesterone collide with the pressures of midlife, and why women who suddenly feel angry, exhausted, fog...

Divorce can quietly cost you six figures if you don't know where to look or what to look for. Unfortunately, most people have no idea how many divorce money mistakes they’ve made until their divorce is long over and they’re stuck with a result they can’t change.

Certified Divorce Financial Analyst Sue Plisch has spent years helping people uncover hidden income, decode confusing pay stub abbreviations, and catch the kind of overlooked details that can make or break a settlement. Her approach goes beyond just splitting assets down the middle; it's about understanding what a trul...

What if getting divorced didn't mean losing years of your life to an expensive courtroom battle that ruined your finances AND your co-parenting relationship with your ex? That’s the question attorney Amanda Mason set out to answer with her new divorce alternative, Solagree.

Amanda is a family law attorney, mediator, and founder of Solagree, a mediated arbitration process that offers couples a structured way to resolve even difficult divorce issues privately, efficiently, and with more control. Instead of starting with litigation, in the Solagree process couples move through education, negotiation, and, when necessary, private decision-making to re...

When your child’s future depends on a custody evaluator’s recommendation, the way you present your story can matter almost as much as the story itself. In Part 2 of this conversation with custody evaluation expert Reneé Rodriguez, we talk about how parents can build a focused, credible body of evidence that helps evaluators understand what is really happening with their kids, without overwhelming the evaluator with hundreds of texts, accusations, or emotionally charged details.

In this episode, Reneé breaks down what actually makes evidence persuasive, from choosing neutral third parties who can speak to your child’s well-b...

You can walk into a custody evaluation with the truth on your side and still walk out with a result you never saw coming. That’s the reality that Reneé Rodriguez, founder of Best Foot Forward Consulting and creator of the Custody Blueprint™, helps her clients avoid. Drawing on her own experience going through a custody evaluation, as well as her years as a corporate strategist, Reneé explains why family courts default to equal parenting time and why breaking that default requires a specific kind of documentation, not just a compelling story.

In this podcast episode, Reneé walks u...

What if the fastest way to figure out your next chapter wasn't to spend years in therapy, but to spend a week cooking, healing and having fun in a beautiful European venue alongside strangers who quickly become friends? That's the idea behind the women’s retreats led by Hannah McKitrick, founder of Dolce Vita Experiences. Her retreats are built around food, coaching, and connection for women navigating big life changes. 

Unlike a traditional vacation, a retreat combines time away with coaching, reflection, new experiences, and the support of other women. Hannah explores why that combination can quiet sel...

Starting over after 50 comes with its own kind of pain … but that’s just one of the things that makes gray divorce different. The legal, financial, and emotional implications that getting a divorce later in life bring can make the difference between enjoying your “golden years,” and trying to play “catch up” at a time in life when you thought you’d be able to relax.

In this special solo podcast episode, you’ll discover everything from how to decide if a gray divorce is for you to the legal processes that will help you through it less expensively...

Can a marriage survive infidelity, or does trust, once broken, stay broken for good?

In this podcast episode, Brannon and Tyler Patrick, brothers and licensed therapists with decades of combined experience helping couples heal from betrayal and addiction, dive deeply into the world of affairs, betrayal, and broken trust. 

Known as “The Therapy Brothers,” Brannon and Tyler challenge the way most people think about betrayal, explaining that secrecy, deception, and unspoken expectations are generally at play in a relationship long before any physical line is crossed. The brothers trace how old coping patterns, unaddressed loneliness, and s...

Your wardrobe holds your entire past life … which is exactly why getting dressed can feel so stressful after a big life change. When your body shifts, your lifestyle changes, or your identity evolves (especially after divorce!) your personal style needs to evolve with you. Otherwise, the closet that used to “work” can start working against you.

Personal stylist and wardrobe detox expert, Suzanne Bernie, works with clients going through major life shifts (think divorce, career changes, or major illness) who open their closets and realize that nothing in there matches who they are now. Suzanne explains why so man...

Feeling buried in debt can make you believe you have no way out … and that’s exactly when you make the biggest financial mistakes. In this podcast episode, attorney William (Bill) Mitchell draws on decades of experience helping both consumers and debt relief companies to explain why so many people end up overwhelmed by debt, and why the right solution depends on your specific financial situation. 

Instead of treating debt relief as a one-size-fits-all problem, Bill breaks down the four primary options available for getting out of debt, from debt consolidation loans and credit counseling to debt settl...

Most people going through divorce focus on finding a good attorney … but that might be the single biggest financial mistake you make. Jamie Lima, certified divorce financial analyst, certified financial planner, and co-founder of SecureSplit, knows that from personal experience. Watching his parents' divorce strain the family financially, then going through his own costly split in 2017, shaped everything about how he now helps people navigate the financial side of divorce so they can get a better divorce settlement.

In this podcast episode, Jamie breaks down why relying solely on your attorney can cause you to leave serious mo...

If you've ever set a boundary that someone ignored, and then felt stuck between becoming a doormat or issuing an ultimatum, this podcast episode is for you. Licensed psychotherapist Dr. Sharon Martin joins the show to talk about healthy boundaries: what they really are, why so many people struggle with them, and why the way most of us think about boundaries is making holding our boundaries harder, not easier. 

Dr. Martin unpacks why boundary problems show up differently for different people, and why the same person can swing between being a pushover and being rigid depending on t...

If your child has started pulling away from you, or saying things that sound nothing like them, you may already know something is deeply wrong, even if you can't prove it yet. In this podcast episode, high-conflict divorce strategist and domestic violence advocate Lisa Johnson, explores the complicated reality of parental alienation and explains why it’s often far more subtle (and more difficult to recognize) than most people realize. She shares how seemingly small actions and unspoken messages can slowly damage a child’s relationship with a parent over time. 

Rather than focusing on labels or accus...

If you've ever thought about using AI in your divorce to save money on legal fees, this podcast episode might drastically change the way you do it. Family law attorney Hillary Moonay, who co-chairs the Family Law Group at Obermeyer Rebman Maxwell & Hippol LLP and has spent 30 years in the trenches of Pennsylvania family law, shares the hidden risks AI poses in divorce cases, especially to clients who accidentally don’t use it well.

From privacy concerns to unintended legal consequences, Hillary explains where AI can create risks that most people never see coming. For example, uploading a...

If you've ever felt your heart race the moment a message pinged from your co-parent, you already understand the problem that Sol Kennedy set out to solve. Sol is the founder of the Best Interest Co-parenting App, an AI-powered app born directly from his own high-conflict divorce experience.

When you’re locked in a high-conflict coparenting relationship you know all too well how quickly a simple logistics message can turn into a 30-text argument that ruins your day and spills into your parenting. Traditional co-parenting apps didn’t address the specific needs found in high-conflict co-parenting so Sol...

Money has a way of exposing the secrets people work hardest to hide. In this conversation, certified divorce financial analyst Tammy Guns explains how financial manipulation, hidden assets, and business income games often show up long before a divorce is finalized. Drawing from her own divorce experience and years of courtroom testimony as an expert witness, Tammy shares how she helps uncover the financial stories buried inside bank records, business accounts, and spending patterns. If your spouse is hiding money in your divorce, Tammy can help you find it.

The discussion digs into the realities of divorce...

If you've ever felt like you were losing your mind in your relationship - questioning your own memory, shrinking your social circle, or blaming yourself for your partner's moods - there's a name for that. It’s called coercive control.

In this podcast episode, Jolee Vacchi, family law attorney and founder of Foundations Family Law and Mediation Center in Worcester, Massachusetts, explains how coercive control (including manipulation, gaslighting, and emotional intimidation) slowly chips away at a person’s confidence, relationships, and sense of autonomy without ever leaving visible bruises. She breaks down the subtle behaviors that often get...

What happens when a divorce doesn't just end a marriage but threatens to end a parent's right to stay in the same country as their child? In this podcast episode, Seattle-based family law attorney Lucia Levias explains what happens when divorce and immigration collide. 

Immigration status, visas, and international custody issues can turn an already painful divorce into something far more complicated. Lucia shares real-life stories of families caught between countries, courts, and conflicting laws, while also showing how thoughtful planning can prevent devastating outcomes. 

With a personal connection to binational families and years of ex...

Have you ever noticed that the more you talk about your problems, the bigger they seem to get? Master Certified Coach Claire Pedrick has spent over 30 years helping people figure out why that happens and (more importantly), what to do about it. Her approach to getting unstuck is surprisingly simple, and that's exactly what makes it so powerful.

Claire introduces the idea of "right-sizing" problems by asking one small, focused question instead of trying to solve everything at once. She explains why talking to friends about your struggles can actually keep you stuck longer, what it means...

Most people in unhappy marriages aren’t stuck because they suddenly fell out of love with each other. They’re stuck because the relationship has developed a fundamental power imbalance that has eroded trust and dashed the dream of marriage equality that the couple shared in the early days of their marriage. 

In this podcast episode, Drs. Jake and Jennifer Dean-Hill, therapists, authors, and married partners who've built their lives around the science of equal partnership, share the story of how their own 33-year marriage became the laboratory for their “Two Crowns Framework” — a model built on the radical...

The hardest part of codependency in relationships is that from the outside, it can look like love. You feel like you’re the reliable one, the helper, the fixer, the person who keeps the relationship running, until one day you wake up tired, resentful, and unsure of what you even want anymore.

Psychotherapist and codependency expert Michelle Farris breaks down what codependency in relationships actually looks like. She goes beyond the textbook definition and describes the real-life signs of co-dependency: like chronic resentment, losing yourself in a relationship, and feeling like you can't trust your own instincts.

Divorce often starts with the law and ends with burnout. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Karen McNenny, founder of the Good Divorce Academy and author of The Good Divorce, challenges the conventional wisdom of lawyering up first and fighting for everything you can get, especially when children are involved.

In this podcast episode, Karen explains why having an elegant exit can prevent years of damage. She also reveals her counterintuitive roadmap for uncoupling that puts family stability before legal strategy. She shares how to stabilize your household before the legal fight begins, how to...

If your spouse has cryptocurrency and you're heading into a divorce, you can leave a fortune on the table without even knowing it … and your lawyer might not be much help! Certified fraud investigator and cryptocurrency forensics expert Chris Groshong breaks down how digital assets like Bitcoin can be hidden, and more importantly, how they can be found. From blockchain's permanent transaction record to the hardware wallets that look deceptively like USB thumb drives, he explains what clues to look for and why they matter.

In this podcast episode, we dive into the practical mechanics of uncovering hi...

When a business is on the line in a divorce, the financial stakes can be staggering - and most people don't realize how much they don't know. Whether you’re a business owner trying to protect your business in divorce, or a non-owner trying to value your spouse’s business, understanding the rules of business valuation is critical. 

Nicole Sodoma, a nationally recognized family law attorney and founder of one of the largest family law firms in the Carolinas, breaks down how business valuation works in divorce proceedings and why both spouses are often operating with blind spots...

What if the most painful experience of your life could actually become the doorway to discovering who you really are? Lisa Lisser, a certified divorce coach and retired attorney who navigated the painful ending of her own 24-year marriage, shares a refreshingly grounded perspective on how to find the spiritual gift in divorce.

As Lisa explains, divorce disrupts your identity, your nervous system, and the story you’ve told yourself for years about who you are. But with the proper perspective, mindset and a few practical tools, you can turn that disruption into a transformation 

In...

What if the secret to getting through one of life's hardest chapters isn't therapy, legal advice, or even time - but simply putting on your sneakers? Fitness instructor and cancer exercise specialist Carly Fauth joins the Off the Fence podcast to make a compelling case for movement as medicine, not just for the body, but for the mind and emotions, too. As a triple-negative breast cancer survivor who kept teaching and working out through chemotherapy, Carly brings hard-won, personal credibility to everything she shares about using exercise to manage divorce stress.

Carly unpacks the connection between physical...

If you're going through a divorce, there's a financial landmine hiding in plain sight that most people don't even think to check … and it could cost you years of headaches after your divorce is over. In this podcast episode, consumer protection attorney Jim Smith explains how credit reports actually work, why errors happen more often than people think, and how consumers can spot credit mistakes during their divorce before they cause serious financial damage afterward.

Jim explains how common credit mistakes, from identity theft to identity confusion and mis-reported credit information, can quietly wreak havoc on your cr...

Divorce isn’t just painful. It’s full of hidden divorce mistakes that can quietly derail your future if you don’t see them coming. 

After interviewing over 170 divorce experts and real people who've been through the divorce process, the Off the Fence podcast team has distilled three years' worth of podcast conversations into the five most expensive mistakes divorcing people make so that YOU can avoid making them yourself.

This episode opens by examining the patterns that kept showing up across all different experts (lawyers, mediators, therapists, financial professionals, coaches, and people who hav...

Most couples don’t fall apart because they don’t love each other. They fall apart because they don’t understand the patterns quietly running their relationship. In this podcast episode, Psychotherapist and relationship coach Christie Bemis reveals why traditional marriage counseling often fails ... and what actually works to create lasting change in struggling marriages. 

With over 20 years of experience and a fresh approach called Relational Life Therapy, Christie explains how the coping mechanisms that protected us in childhood often sabotage our adult relationships. 

Instead of treating both partners as "the problem," Christie focuses on the dysf...

Divorce doesn't come with an instruction manual … but what if it could? When veteran celebrity journalist Ilyssa Panitz filed for divorce in 2018, she searched desperately for someone who could translate the confusing legal jargon and overwhelming process into plain English, but that "divorce correspondent" didn't exist. So as her long-running divorce dragged on, Ilyssa became the resource she wished she'd had all along. 

In 2020 Ilyssa launched a nationally syndicated radio show, streaming TV series, and website dedicated to demystifying every aspect of divorce. From the shocking cost of legal retainers to why fighting over the family home mig...

Divorce can feel like an emotional freefall, especially because you don’t know what to expect or when the pain will stop. That’s precisely the problem that Oona Metz has set out to end in her book on divorce grief, entitled Unhitched: The Essential Divorce Guide for Women.

As a licensed clinical social worker with decades of experience, Oona shares how her own divorce led her to create structured, therapist-led divorce support groups for women who desperately needed reassurance, guidance, and a sense that they weren’t alone. Through that work, Oona has identified five distinct phases...

Money fights don’t usually start with numbers. They start with invisible beliefs you don’t realize you’re carrying, and they show up in the money conversations you have or don’t have with your spouse. 

In this podcast episode, Terry Gaspard, a licensed therapist, author, and relationship expert, explains why money becomes such a charged issue in relationships and how childhood experiences shape our money beliefs in ways we rarely recognize. 

Drawing from both professional research and her own personal experience, Terry talks about the scarcity versus abundance mindsets and why a clash of...

What if the real block between you and the extraordinary love you want isn’t dating apps or “bad luck,” but the stories your nervous system is still carrying? In this podcast episode, relationship mentor Riana Malia shares how her own history of divorce, betrayal, a DEA raid, and multiple abusive relationships pushed her to develop a way of clearing decades of stored trauma without rehashing every detail in therapy. 

Riana explains how tapping into the unconscious mind, releasing old emotional “marbles” like anger, shame, and fear, and practicing true forgiveness allowed her to stop repeating painful patterns an...

What if the biggest obstacle in your divorce isn't your spouse, but the system itself? Jonathan Merel, a progressive Chicago family law and divorce attorney with over 20 years of experience, reveals the hidden dynamics that can turn even amicable divorces into drawn-out nightmares. From lawyers who overpromise to judges who won't decide, he explains why some divorces cost fortunes while others resolve efficiently.

In this podcast episode, we dive deeply into high-conflict divorces, exploring what happens when only one spouse is reasonable or when opposing counsel ramps up the conflict for profit. Jonathan also shares...

Divorce can feel like a never-ending war that slowly strips you of your money, your identity, and your sense of control. Ravit Rose learned this the hard way after burning through over $100,000 and nearly a decade and a half of her life in a brutal, toxic divorce that left her broke, depressed, and questioning everything. 

In this podcast episode, Ravit reveals how cycling through lawyers, escalating court battles, and making emotionally reactive decisions only fueled the conflict and nearly broke her physically, financially, and emotionally. Through self-representation, intense self-development, and learning how to remove emotion from strategy, R...

When you can’t decide whether to stay or go in your marriage, your biggest fear is that if you decide to leave, you’ll be making a mistake. But staying on the fence can be an even bigger one.

In this special solo episode of the Off the Fence Podcast, I talk about why staying in limbo is so hard, and how you can finally move through it. I break down why waiting for absolute certainty will keep you frozen, and why clarity comes from taking action, not from a magical, lightning-bolt moment. Most importantly, I expl...