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Divorce Mediation Associates provides divorce and family mediation. We provide full martial settlement agreements. We are unique in providing co-mediation (integrative mediation) by a mental health professional and attorney and gender neutral as one is male and the other female. We also provide mediation for premarital agreements and post-nuptial agreements.

Steven M. Garver has been a Virginia attorney handling divorce cases for in excess of 40 years and has provided mediation services since 1979. He has participated in numerous training programs over several years including programs at Harvard and at Northwestern Universities. He currently is an adjunct professor at George Mason University Law School and co-teaches Negotiation with Dr. Patrice Garver.

Dr. Patrice Garver received her Ph.D. in developmental psychology, specializing in assessment and treatment of children with learning and behavioral problems. She has Masters Degrees in the areas of Mental Health Counseling, Special Education and Clinical/Developmental Psychology. She is experienced working as a special educator, learning disabilities specialist, psychometrication, school psychologist, mediator and collaborative law professional. She also trained at the Kennedy Krieger Center at Johns Hopkins and has taken several trainings in meditation at Northwestern University and with Gary Friedman.

Beyond Trainings and her collaborative practice, Dr. Garver has been providing mediation services for several years.

Steven M. Garver has a Juris Doctor form George Mason University Law School.

Dr. Patrice B.F. Garver has a PhD. in Psychology form the University of Maryland and a PhD. in Counseling as well as several other masters degrees in related fields.

We co-mediate with both parties generally in the room together. While we will occasionally utilize a caucus method, we believe that the best meditation in family matters works with open and transparent communication in the mediation room. While we are primarily facilitative, we will provide some evaluative input and we look for creative solutions. We attempt to collaborate together with the parties to reach interest based resolutions.

We provide a free telephone consultation to each party and we have an intake session which lasts normally 1 1/2 - 2 hours and for which we charge $475. Thereafter, we charge by the hour.