and she felt very lost and alone. She always relied on her spouse to manage the finances which was part of the abuse and control dynamic of their relationship. The coach helped my client set up electronic access to all of her financial accounts, reset passwords so her ex couldn’t get into her email and financial accounts, and facilitated her engagement with me. The coach and the client would meet in advance of meeting with me, set out the goals and questions for the meeting, sit in on the meeting, and then debrief with the client and confirm take-aways and to-dos in writing so the client could organize the progress of her case. The coach was paid through my firm as a contractor and was within the scope of our attorney client relationship. They charged about one-third my hourly rate, so this turned out to be a very cost conscious way to get my client successfully through her divorce case. Healthcare records review. If your client has an injury during a divorce case, it’s important to request and review all of their relevant healthcare records, not only to understand how their injury may now affect support issues, but also to understand how they need to receive information. My client referenced above acquired some processing and short-term memory issues with her injury. She was still as intelligent as she was prior to her injury but could no longer read and understand complex strategy concepts in writing. I learned she needed to receive information multiple ways — first she needed the summary of the information verbally and then later in writing so she could refer back to specific items when she couldn’t remember them. I also supported her recording some of our meetings on her cell phone so she could go back and listen to them later. Once I was cued into the ways her environment impacted her, I also realized she participated better in meetings in a dark conference room or one where there was not significant light coming in the windows — certain light gave her horrible headaches. I was able to make subtle and relatively easy adjustments to support her ability to engage with me on the case. In closing, family law practice is great work. It is challenging and we take our clients as they are. One of my favorite sayings is in criminal law, you see the worst people at their best, and in family law you see the best people at their worst. It is also true that you see people at their saddest, most defeated and most scared. As lawyers, we truly have an awesome power that can be used for good or bad — just like the choice made in every superhero movie. The best thing about superhero movies is they all get stronger when they join forces. I hope this article has given you some new ideas. Feel free to reach out if you need a friendly ear or a hand saving the day. 1. Formal Opinion No 2005-159 and Formal Opinion No 2005-4, Competence and Diligence: Client with Diminished Capacity. 2. The Ethical Lawyer chapter 18, representing clients with diminished capacity and disability, OSB Legal Pubs 2015. 3. Screening tools for attorneys and custody evaluators (Multnomah) — Family Court Enhancement Project (FCEP) — https://familycourtenhancementproject.org/multnomah-county-or/ domestic-violence-screening/. Clients With Diminished Capacity continued from p. 49 50 Trial Lawyer | Summer 2024
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