In this excellent article, Gary Direnfeld writes about a panel of four women he attended who spoke of their experience resolving matters with legal support. Two women litigated 7 years each at costs of about $200,000 each. Both of these women spoke of compromised mental health the result of their experience. One woman used Collaborative Law and settled in 2.5 days. The last woman went to court and said she had 3 different judges on 3 different appearances. She then used mediation and was satisfied with this approach and outcome. She reflected, “The best part of the ADR (mediation) experience was picking your service provider and ability of being creative.” As Gary writes, "If you want to retain some control of the outcome, control costs and your sanity, consider the experience of the one women above who opted for Collaborative Law and then the experience of the woman who opted out of the court system for mediation and other creative support. In the scheme of things, these experiences were positive."