Pegotty Cooper

Working in partnership with my husband Randy who is a Supreme Court of Florida Certified Family Mediator, we put together a framework for coaching people from the beginning of their divorce so that we could bring the transformation available through coaching to the anger, the overwhelm and the emotions of divorce, and help each client turn the story of divorce into the business of divorce. This refocusing has a huge impact on the outcome of the divorce and lays a much better foundation for the next chapter for them as individuals and for their family as a whole.

I began coaching in 2002 and worked as a coach for many years with people experiencing rough spots in their lives - like job loss, losing someone you love, moving to a new place where you are alone, business failure and divorce recovery. But when someone came to me overwhelmed by fear and anger after her husband had announced they were getting divorced, I felt like a deer in the headlights. I realized in that moment that coaching someone at the beginning of the divorce process was very different from coaching someone in divorce recovery. And I realized if I could coach individuals who are just beginning the process of divorce, I could help them make better decisions at the very beginning - decisions which could reduce the recovery time at the end!

Ten years later we are training and certifying people to be personal divorce coaches through the CDC Certified Divorce Coach Program (www.certifieddivorcecoach.com).

In our first book, Divorce: Overcome the Overwhelm and AVoid the Six Biggest Mistakes, we shared a framework of reflective questions which help the reader to think more clearly and avoid the mindset mistakes which are at the root of all of the other mistakes in divorce.

In our second book Divorce: Taking the High Road - Simple Strategies for Creating a Healthy Divorce, we engaged 10 of our CDC Certified Divorce Coaches from a variety of backgrounds and invited them to share the strategies they use with their clients to help them to take the high road so they can create a healthy divorce. We invite the reader to see these simple strategies which they can use to keep their divorce on the high road. Simple strategies do not mean easy strategies - so the value of having a team supporting you in the divorce process comes out through all of the chapters.

Before becoming a coach, I was an executive in two Fortune 100 companies and an association executive for two international member organizations. I earned my Executive MBA from Rutgers, have completed a wide variety of coach training programs and conflict mediation training and now live in Tampa, Florida with my co-author and husband Randy and our two found cats.