Bad Behavior and the Need for Christmas Vacation

I know I sounded uncharacteristically pessimistic yesterday.  As those of you who read this blog regularly know, many, if not most, of my clients or their spouses are what Bill Eddy likes to call high conflict people.    To put it simply, these folks are tough, and it takes a lot of energy to deal with them on a regular basis.  What makes them so tough?  For starters, nothing is ever their fault - and I mean nothing.  If nothing is ever their fault, then it must be someone else's.  In the Trenches, that someone is usually their soon to be former spouse, but it can just as easily become their lawyer.  They do "bad" things and justify their behavior because of some action by the target of blame.  The problem is that bad events have longer lasting consequences than good, and bad behavior is more destructive than good behavior is constructive.  If you think about it cognitively, it makes sense.  It only takes one event to gain a bad reputation, but once you have a bad reputation, it takes multiple positive events simply to neutralize it, let alone turn it back into a good reputation (which may never happen).  Many people don't exercise or eat right to feel good; they do it so they don't feel bad.  What does all this have to do with the Trenches?  Contrary to popular belief, lawyers don't just provide legal advice.  Our jobs, done correctly, mean that we help our clients clarify their needs and goals, explore and weigh options, and negotiate effectively with their spouse.  We know that once someone engages in bad behavior, given that our clients are already in a negative situation, our jobs become that much more difficult.  That means that contemporaneously with helping our clients on a substantive level, we need to work to prevent bad behavior from occurring, both in them and their spouse (and probably the spouse's lawyer as well).  We have to identify the high conflict people, recognize and manage our reactions to them, and help them feel safe so they can resolve their differences and move on in life.  It's a tough job, and it can be exhausting and draining.  We keep doing it because we care.  We don't always like it.