Coming to the decision to divorce is emotionally challenging. The road ahead to a finalized divorce can be just as difficult if you do not know what to expect. In order to make things easier and perhaps less intimidating for our potential clients, our Des Moines divorce lawyers of The Law Offices of Mark. R. Hinshaw have prepared a quick rundown of Iowa divorce procedures you are going to want to know about.

When you work with our law firm to complete your divorce, you can expect it to follow these steps:

• We start you off with a free consultation so we can better learn your objectives in your divorce, and so you can decide if you want to retain our services.
• We like to use intake questionnaires after we are retained to get an even clearer picture of your divorce and how it might pan out.
• We draft a petition for dissolution of marriage – a legal term for divorce – to your liking and file it to the appropriate court on your behalf. This is the first major step to making your divorce a reality. We also make certain the divorce petition is served to your spouse using a professional, reliable network of process servers we know and trust.
• We discuss and complete any additional mandatory forms courts will want to see. Certain counties or districts have unique forms. Allow us to locate all of them for you.
• We attend temporary hearings to represent your best interests in the meantime. A temporary hearing establishes rules to follow between the hearing and when your divorce is official, such as child custody rules or spousal support payments.
• A pretrial conference is used to discuss negotiations that could potentially conclude your divorce disagreements before ever needing to go before a judge.
• In case we have to go to court, we use discovery to find any evidence that helps your cause that your spouse might possess, like bank statements, testimonies from family members about how much your kids appreciate you, and so forth. Discovery also includes us looking through your evidence again to construct a case for trial.
• The last step is the actual trial. We fight for your rights and the best interests of yourself and your children. You will see that we never back down and never get intimidated by the opposition.

Not every divorce will follow exactly the aforementioned steps. Legal twists and complications can sometimes arise unexpectedly, even with the best-laid plans. Not to mention that you will probably be confronted with plenty of unfamiliar emotions and uncertainties.

Our Des Moines family law attorneys of The Law Offices of Mark. R. Hinshaw want to reassure you that you can make it through your divorce as stress-free as possible with our help. We are led by an award-winning team with years of experience and the capability of overcoming any surprise obstacle in the path while we pursue your best interests. Perhaps most importantly of all, we act with compassion and genuinely want to lend you moral support whenever you need it.

Learn more about our law firm and your options by contacting us online today.