Oakland County Law Blog

Contracts form the basis for protecting parties in an agreement. When disputes arise, sometimes the parties are able to resolve the issue through their own discussions. In many situations, however, the parties are unable to find a shared solution to the contract dispute on their own.

In these cases, a business attorney needs to assist in finding a legal resolution to the dispute. There are several typical situations in which a lawyer needs to intervene to assist a client in resolving a contract dispute.

If you are a Michigan parent married to or divorced from a foreign national, you may worry about the possibility of your children’s other parent taking them overseas for a visit and refusing to return them. Such international parental abduction cases are not all that uncommon, especially when the parent has strong family ties to people in the foreign country.

In the event you and your children become the victims of this form of kidnapping, you may be able to get help via the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. This Convention came about in 1980 when the Hague Conference on Private International Law drafted this treaty in an attempt to get all 98 countries that signed it, of which the United States is one, on the same page with regard to their own laws and also their commitment to recognize, respect and abide by the laws of all the other countries.

Being married to a narcissist was a living nightmare. You may be relieved to finally be free of him or her, but you still have to share the parenting with your ex. Unfortunately, narcissists often continue to make life difficult for their exes for as long as they maintain contact with them. You and other Michigan parents who are divorced from narcissists might wonder if it is possible to co-parent.

The answer is yes, but it is rarely easy. This does not mean that you have the luxury of cutting off your ex if he or she has visitation rights. Psychology Today has provided the following tips on getting through the parenting years with a narcissistic ex-spouse:

• Understand that narcissists thrive on drama and contention. Your ex will try to look like the good guy, while painting you as the crazy or bad parent. If you realize this, you may avoid letting it get under your skin.
• Refrain from arguing with your ex in front of your children, or arguing at all. Reason and logic simply do not get through to narcissists. To keep your sanity, you will need to set boundaries and stick with them. This may include writing down your rules and texting or emailing them to your ex, repetitively, if he or she challenges you. Your ex will not be able to say that he or she was unaware of your expectations.
• Whenever possible, limit your conversations with your ex to text message or email, so you have a written record. Keep screenshots and copies of written communication with your ex.
• Look for signs of anxiety or depression in your child, which are common among those who are subjected to a narcissist's abuse. If your child is in counseling, you may need to seek a court order to prevent your ex from switching counselors or trying to end the counseling.

On January 13, 2018, Schwartz Law Firm staff, friends and family gathered at Gleaners Food Bank of Southeastern Michigan in downtown Detroit. Their mission: bag 5,000 pounds of potatoes for distribution to hungry families in the Detroit metro area. It was hard work, as the video documenting the occasion attests. But it was also a fun, team-building event that everyone enjoyed.