Many professionals in the divorce community are beginning to recognize the impact divorce can have on children. Out of that realization, innovative programs are emerging that can help children and families flourish despite a divorce.
On today’s Children First Family Law, Krista interviews Trina Nudson, creator of nationally available child-centered co-parenting programs that parents anywhere can access to transform the quality of their co-parenting. Trina first worked as a foster care social worker and later transitioned to a best interest attorney for kids. She recognized that children and parents of divorce needed better solutions to help safeguard childhood and strove to find solutions for change. Trina recently launched her innovative BeH2O program, training professionals across the United States to encourage parents to transform their co-parenting and navigate challenges with resilience and fluidity that overflows to their children, helping everyone flourish.
Krista and Trina start their conversation by delving into Trina’s background in social work, what led her into law, and finally, her work as an entrepreneur developing programs to help parents and children flourish post-divorce. You’ll hear about her initial project, The Layne Project, now known as The Layne Project 4 Families, and how that led to the creation of BeH2O, a 16-week co-parenting curriculum. She shares what she means by “safeguarding childhoods,” the various offerings BeH2O offers participants and coaches, and how BeH2O integrates kids into the process. Trina explains why co-parenting requires rebuilding and shares some of her family success stories. Finally, Trina explains the cost of BeH2O and why it can be much more cost-effective than further involving the court and attorneys.
Previously, resources for parents who want to co-parent more effectively have been limited, but with emerging programs like BeH2O, parents have more options than ever to improve co-parenting dynamics.
In this episode, you will hear:
- Trina Nudson’s journey from social work to law to entrepreneur, developing real solutions to help divorced parents be the best possible co-parents
- How she helped innovate Kansas courts to better serve children, including through the state’s triage system.
- The suffering ALICE families (asset-limited, income-constrained, employed families) experience with few services available to help them be better co-parents and help their children flourish despite divorce
- The Layne Project in Kansas, Trina’s initial effort to meet these needs head-on for decades, now a nonprofit called The Layne Project 4 Families
- New solutions to scale her program through BeH2O, a 16-week co-parenting curriculum, with offerings now (or soon) in 14 states, and goals to reach all 50 states within two-and-a-half years
- Trina’s goal to “safeguard childhoods,” and why divorced parents need to do the same
- How BeH2O Coaching offers training through Trina’s competitive, selective program for professionals serving families.
- Details about how the program works, including integrating kids into the process
- The program is not “magic fairy dust” but “getting real”
- Program topics include: effective communication, tools for tough situations, empathy and understanding, commitment to growth, and well-being beyond parenting
- Why co-parenting change requires rebuilding, because the old models of parental interaction are obsolete
- BeH2O is not therapy and not typical parent coaching, but rather a guided, curriculum-based program
- Real success stories and transformation for even the most entrenched parents
- How the EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System) system helps Trina run the program
- The cost of attending the program as a professional or parent
Resources from this Episode
thelayneproject.com/educational-programs/beh2o
www.childrenfirstfamilylaw.com
All states have different laws; be sure you are checking out your state laws specifically surrounding divorce. Krista is a licensed attorney in Colorado and Wyoming but is not providing through this podcast legal advice. Please be sure to seek independent legal counsel in your area for your specific situation.
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Transforming Co-Parenting Success Through Effective Training: BeH2O with Trina Nudson Podcast Transcript
Trina Nudson 00:00
I had a mom and a dad, and they hadn’t talked for 10 years, and their daughter had stopped seeing dad and hadn’t seen dad for a year. And they were ordered into family therapy, reintegration therapy and BeH2O, and so they were at another facility getting their reintegration therapy, and they were doing the BeH2O they completely and totally transformed. But they also create this new narrative that they share with their kids. And the new narrative that they shared with her was, you know what? Mom and Dad didn’t do this right for 10 years, you saw what happens when people don’t do it right? And you’ve also seen that people can change. So what we want you to take from this is we went through all this so you wouldn’t have to. So you need to learn from us. So that was how they turned the 10 years of hell to absolute beauty. Now she was 16 at the time and not going to cry, and that next year. So about 18 months later, I got an invitation to go to our high school graduation from both mom and dad, and they invited me there, and I went, and the stepdad, who I never had met, mom’s husband, started clapping when I came in, and I was like, what’s this about? He goes, this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for you. And I was like, No, this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for them. Like all I did is provide a framework.
Intro/Outro 01:34
Welcome to the Children First Family Law podcast. Our host, Krista Nash, is an attorney, mediator, a parenting coordinator, and child advocate with a heart to facilitate conversations about how to help children flourish amidst the broken area of family law. As a child advocate in demand for her expertise throughout Colorado and as a speaker on these issues at a national level, Krista is passionate about facilitating and creatively finding solutions to approach family law matters in a way that truly focuses on the best interests of kids. Please remember this podcast is provided to you for information purposes only. No one on this podcast is representing you or giving you legal advice. As always, please enjoy this episode and be sure to like, subscribe and share the podcast with others you think would benefit from this content.
Krista Nash 02:23
Today on the podcast, we welcome Kansas attorney child advocate and self proclaimed serial entrepreneur Trina Nudsen, who has created nationally available child centered co parenting programs that parents anywhere can access to transform the quality of their co-parenting with a background, working first as a foster care social worker and then a best interest attorney for kids of divorce, Trina recognized that children and parents of divorce need better solutions to help safeguard childhood, realizing that courts and social systems often fail families, she strove to find solutions that would enable true change, and she found that she could affect that better through parents themselves. Most recently, therefore, Trina launched an innovative program called BeH2O named such to combine beryllium and water, symbols of strength and adaptability, encouraging parents that if they transform their co-parenting, they can navigate challenges with resilience and fluidity that overflows to their children and helps everyone in the family flourish. Trina also now through her BeH2O coaching program trains professionals across the United States to replicate and scale the offerings to reach as many parents and children as possible. We hope you enjoy all of the innovations that she brings to help families flourish. Welcome to today’s episode of the podcast. If you’re watching on YouTube, I’m in a new location. I try to get away for a few days, but I’m still working and recording, and I’m so glad that we have technology so that I can still today, had this wonderful discussion with Trina Nudson, and she is coming to us from Kansas, and has a lot to share, because she has so much energy in coming up solutions, which is what we’re trying to bring parents and practitioners here on the Children First Family Law podcast. So welcome. How are you today? And tell us a little bit about yourself.
Trina Nudson 04:19
Well, hi, Krista, thanks for having me. My name is Trina Nudson. I am a social worker, so I continue to maintain my license as a social worker. I’m also an attorney, primarily doing guardian of litem, appointment work, case manager, parenting coordinator, mediator and serial entrepreneur.
Krista Nash 04:39
I would say we were prepping for this, going through all that we’re like, what are we going to talk about today? There are so many different like, how many websites do you have? How many companies do you have? Maybe tell us how you got which degree did you get first? Did you get your degree first?
Trina Nudson 04:50
No, I got my degree in social welfare. I worked at a juvenile detention center, and I decided I wanted to be. Juvenile defense attorney. But before I did that, I wanted to get more familiarized with the juvenile justice system. So I thought I was going to be a probation officer, but they wouldn’t just hire anyone as a probation officer. I had to get my experience first. So I took a pivot and got into foster care. So as a foster care social worker, I only lasted a year, not very long at all, and my then boyfriend, now Husband, said, who makes a difference? I said, attorneys and judges. And he said, they’ll be one of them. So I quit my job, and three months later, I started the University of Kansas School of Law. I graduated in 26 months, and then start at a child advocacy firm called Scott Wasserman and Associates.
Krista Nash 05:43
First of all, that’s a fast time to get through law school, so kudos to you. 26 months through law school,
Trina Nudson 05:49
We were surprised by a blessing named Layne, who you’ll that’s who the lane project is named for. And so I had we weren’t married yet, so Jason’s daughter was new to the scene, and I needed to get back into work. I had been stepping out into a law field, and then back into work. It was a lot, so I needed to get input. So I started working for a law firm, and they were having me do some divorce work. And I decided that, yeah, I wasn’t interested in arguing over tool benches. I would rather say, hey, I’ll buy you a tool bench, rather than you pay me to argue over this tool bench.
Krista Nash 06:30
Meaning, like the stuff right, the podium, pans, the towels, the whatever, the lawn. Yeah, yeah.
Trina Nudson 06:36
And so I found really quickly that the divorce arena was the Child In Need of Care Arena, but at least the child arena, care arena that I thought was so bad, at least they had services, yeah, but divorce arena, the domestic courts had no services, none at all. And so I decided that I had a plan, and I was going to open the land project, which is my social service agency. I had no clue how to run a business Krista. They didn’t touch law school or the school social welfare. Yeah, exactly. And so I opened the Layne Project and My Child Advocate, which is my law firm, the same year, in January 2008.
Krista Nash 07:20
Is My Child Advocate still in existence?
Trina Nudson 07:23
It is still in existence. I just do less and less work, as I have had much more fulfillment in my career of coaching and creating transformational programs.
Krista Nash 07:35
So so at My Child Advocate is that where you were getting appointments as a guardian ad litem?
Trina Nudson 07:40
Yep, yes, and I still do get a handful of appointments as a guardian ad litem, I want to keep my thumb in it to kind of just make sure that I have a real understanding of what’s going on in the court system so I can have more compassion for the parents and the kids. Yeah, honor the court system.
Krista Nash 07:57
So do you only practice in Kansas, or are you also in any other states? Are you just mostly practicing, and do you call your best interest attorneys, Guardians ad litem in the domestic courts? Yes, okay, because we don’t in Colorado. So I just want to make that clear for Colorado listeners that we’re talking about a best interest attorney with Trina’s GAL work, because we GAL in Colorado is almost exclusively, not entirely, but almost exclusively in the dependency neglect world. So just, just terminology,
Trina Nudson 08:27
Yes, so we’re automatically appointed as a guardian ad item in the Child In Need of Care Court, and then the domestic arena, at least in Johnson County, they regularly appoint a guardian ad litem, but the guardian ad litem represents the best interest of the child. Yeah, not the child. So if there’s a breakdown in that, we have to say this is what we believe to be in the child’s best interest, but this is what the child wants. Yeah,
Krista Nash 08:56
I was actually just training a new attorney today who’s gonna be working with me, and she was listening in on some things, and she’s asking me, wait a minute, this kid is 16. What are you talking about? About just her best interests, right? And so it was interesting, even at 16, I’m like, Well, yeah, it’s just a multi factor analysis of how we look at that. Even at that age, I think it’s interesting what you just said, too. So do Kansas call your dependency and neglect sort of social services. Is that called Child In Need of Care?
Trina Nudson
Yeah, it’s Child In Need of Care.
Krista Nash
I love that. Yeah, that’s a nice way to frame it, right, as opposed to some of the other lingo labels that we have for these things.
Trina Nudson 09:33
In the sync court, the GALs are automatically appointed, but in the domestic court, the parents have to pay if the court appoints a guardian ad litem. So it’s kind of sad, because if parents don’t have money, then the child does. Best Interest isn’t necessarily represented in the courtroom. It’s through the lens of what mom and dad believe to be in the child’s best interest.
Krista Nash 09:56
If parents can show that they have indigency, is there any state pay option? No. Colorado does. It’s pretty limited. There’s not very many best interest attorneys that get appointed, because there’s just not that. It’s a pretty low amount of money that you have to, you know, kind of show that you make to be able to get one. But the rest of those appointments are all for, you know, private pay. I don’t mean to put you on the spot, but do you have any sense of sort of what percent of the number of cases you even have that get child advocates in terms of attorneys representing kids, not the dependency and collect one, but in the divorce area?
Trina Nudson 10:31
So if you it really depends. If you look at Johnson County versus Wyandotte County, depending on what county that you’re in, it really started in about 2009 where the domestic courts really started appointing guardian ad litems. It wasn’t a thing before that. It was just guardian ad litem were in the child and need a care court. And so that was a real positive shift. But as that has increased, the domestic court is wanting more and more experienced guardian ad litems which become with a higher price tag, right with those guardian ad litems. So we have that arena. But then another real challenge we had is supervised parenting time, supervised exchanges, court involved therapy right now in Johnson County and Wyandotte County, Kansas, if a family is ordered, a parent is ordered at a supervised parenting time, and the parent doesn’t have money to pay for supervised parenting time, the child doesn’t get to see that parent. And so the going rate is about $65 an hour, and it used to be that court services used to offer that service, but they pulled it, and so it’s just been spiraling out of control, because the child doesn’t go see a parent for like, six weeks, and the next thing you know, they’re needing court involved therapy, and court involved therapy isn’t covered by insurance because not doing diagnosis, and then we have even more problems. And so that became a real increasing problem, Krista, and that was really highlighted when Johnson county courts went to triage. I don’t know. Have you heard of triage?
Krista Nash 12:16
I want to hear about that. Let me just clarify. Is Johnson County? Kansas City?
Trina Nudson 12:21
Yeah Johnson County and Wyandotte County are right near Kansas City, Kansas City, Kansas, Kansas City, Missouri. Kansas City is Kansas is Wyandotte County right Overland Park. Olathe De Soto, okay,
Krista Nash 12:35
I want to hear about triage a little because I’m assuming and correct me if I’m wrong, I actually just have interviewed justice Tom Altobelli out of Australia about his triage, about the triage that they do down there. And was so intrigued, because we don’t do that, and we need to. And so tell me a little bit about that. What did the system change over to, sort of meet cases needs better, families needs better.
Trina Nudson 12:58
I was a part of this process before COVID happened, and bringing cheap triage to Johnson County. And Judge O’Grady did an amazing job. He pulled together mental health professionals, he pulled together the sheriff’s department, he pulled together Johnson County Mental Health, guardian ad litems, and we all met in the courthouse and we brainstormed all of these ideas about the best way to move forward, then COVID happens, was a little bit at a standstill, and then we continued to meet. Triage was actually rolled out in April 2023 and I was a very strong proponent of triage, but still incredibly hesitant, because the idea was, we gotta get the right families the right services at the right time. And I said the Layne Project can create the right services. You can find the right families, you can order them at the right time, but if they have no money and the county isn’t offering services. It’s all for not in the court’s mindset . If we could streamline services, it would be all the better, which, I do believe it’s better, but it could be even better. Yeah, even better the services available. So when someone files a case in the domestic court. They take a quiz, if you will, and they put them in pathway one, two or three. And if you’re in pathway one, you’re really not going to need much work. You’re probably going to get it pushed through very quickly, maybe about everything is agreed to, and then you’re required to take a two hour parenting class that is offered through Johnson County Mental Health.
If you’re in the middle, you’re in the middle category. It’s a four hour parenting course through Johnson County Mental Health, and it’s a little bit difficult, but not very difficult. It’s normal. And if you will, if there is a normal then there’s pathway three. And pathway three is we’re going to get them in really quickly. There’s allegations of IPv, there’s been arrests, there’s been police involvement, and we’re going to get them in really, really quickly. And then you are ordered into a six hour parenting course through Johns County Mental Health. So the Layne Project offers supervised parenting time, supervised exchange court involved therapy, and I’ve created for psycho-educational programs. So in April 2023 I wasn’t really certain what had happened, but all of a sudden the Layne Project had this influx like it was crazy. And I called the court, and I was like, what happened? Oh, you, you didn’t realize, Trina, we started triage. And I was like, Oh my gosh. Like, we were overloaded. But that went on for about four or five months.
Krista Nash 15:58
But were you getting the level threes? Most learning a
Trina Nudson 16:01
We were just getting massive amount of work because they were seeing them very quickly. You know, hindsight is 20/20, so then I look back, and now I’m in October of 2023, and all of a sudden, the referrals dropped significantly. But also there were tons of allegations of no access to justice, so the courts were ordering families to services that the families couldn’t afford, and then they so the court was trying to do good, but the families couldn’t afford it. The lane project had completely, fully staffed itself to meet all these needs. And then the bottom fell out. And then the land project was in a little bit of a conundrum with all the staff. So I pulled together many, many professionals, because we were founded in 2008 in January of 2024 and saying, Look, we need to do something. There is a real problem here. About 60% of our population needs these services. They are ALICE. Have you heard of ALICE? No, so they’re ALICE families. They’re asset limited and constrained, employed (ALICE), so they make just enough so they’re not getting state assistance, but they’re still struggling with their grocery bill.
Krista Nash 17:24
Yeah, right, right, a vast majority of the middle right, yeah.
Trina Nudson 17:28
And then you get divorced and separated, right? Then your expenses are increasing by at least 25%, so 25% of our population is ALICE. 5% of our population is in poverty. We multiply that by 25% where they get 60% of the population that needs the services, can’t afford them. Yeah, and I said, we have to do something. The Layne Project can’t shut down because there’s no services available. What are we going to do?
Krista Nash 17:57
Okay, so the services that you’re offering there, then I want to hear about your other project, which I’m going to look up again. What is it called? BeH2O right. Yes, let’s actually talk about that now and then we can get into the details, like, how does BeH2O interact at all with what you just talked about, or dovetail. So
Trina Nudson 18:16
The Layne Project, as it was originally built, was a, b to see. So it was serving individuals.
Krista Nash 18:24
You mean, like, business to consumer, right? Yes, yeah, okay, so
Trina Nudson 18:27
The consumers are the clients, yeah. And so during COVID, the Layne Project got paycheck protection funds, and because we were shut down. And ultimately, what happened was I found it very difficult to pay people for not working. So ultimately, what I did is I interviewed all our employees and said, What do you want to do? How can I support you in being successful? What do you want to do? And one of them wanted to be an administrative like, like an executive director, if you will. So she helped create SOPs, our operating procedures. She helped us do that. Another one really was excited about running children’s groups. So she helped me create Lokahi, which is our children’s group. I am passionate about PAUSE, which is my family cohesion curriculum. Someone else created KeyFrame, which is psycho educational, individualized support group for parents going through a program. And then another employee and myself created the BeH2O, which is our 16 week co parenting curriculum. So before COVID, we were teaching an eight week curriculum that we had pieced together, and the CO parents were court ordered into our program. So Krista court ordered participants who didn’t want to be here when it peaks came up, said it. Not long enough? We were like, Oh, really. Oh, wow, it’s not long enough. And they were like, yes, just so long as we started to make progress around week six or seven. At week eight, it was over, and the bottom fell out again. And so that’s when we decided we were going to create the BeH2O, which is our 16 week co parenting curriculum, and so the individual that helped me draft that curriculum left in 2021 and I had a choice, either I was going to hire someone on to do that curriculum, or I was just going to do it myself. And I did it myself, Krista, and that’s when I stopped practicing so much law, because I learned so much and Krista what I learned is I was using my why to undermine my why. What does that even mean? Well, my Why is safeguarding childhoods so parents of the children I was representing would come into my office, and I’d be like, Why the hell would you do that to your kids? Are you kidding me? And then I would judge them and shame them. And then they leave my office, and I expected them to, you know, be the best parents they possibly could be when I just cut them off at the knees and ask them to run faster. And as I started to understand, I listened to a presentation by Judge Cohen, which I think you’ll interview, yeah, and the best quote I have from him is, “parents don’t do this in spite of their children. They do it for their children, and they’re scared”. And I don’t know why I was so blinded before Krista, but once I made that shift, it was crazy, the impact that I started to have. At the same time, I told you, I didn’t know how to run business right, and they didn’t teach me in law school. They didn’t teach me in social welfare. So around 2015 I was like, I have to figure this out, like I do. And so I just started eating entrepreneurial literature, and the more I went to workshops and trainings and presentations, I was like, if I could get parents to do this holy head, everything would change. Their bottom line, their well being of themselves and their children would improve significantly. So BeH2O, is not necessarily written on your typical co-parenting literature. It’s written on entrepreneurial literature, and where most curriculums teach behaviors these parents are incapable of performing those behaviors because they’re in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn. So then we the court system, attorneys, myself included. JLS, at times, are keeping them stuck because we’re shaming and blaming them for not doing these behaviors that they’re incapable of doing, until we shift their mindset. So through BH two, oh, we truly believe in the paradigm shift and shifting their paradigms so they’re actually able to perform these behaviors. And that’s how we create our co-parenting commitment, which becomes our paradigm shift, so they can use that and being able to perform the behavior self protect their kids. So all of these programs that the Layne Project built, TLP for families, the new nonprofit will receive through licensing. So they they’re lucky. They already know how to run them. They get around them. And so now the Layne Project will still exist, but the Layne Project will need more of a, B2B, in which I will train other jurisdictions, other professionals, how to run the groups that the Layne Project created, BeH2O being one of them. And I think, you know, Karey O’Hara, right, yes, yes, she’s
Krista Nash 23:53
Yes, she’s been on the podcast, and I think that’s how we got introduced. Because isn’t she researching your program? Yes, tell me about that.
Trina Nudson 24:01
She’s researching the H 2o so she finished the research, and so we’re waiting on that. And then Kansas State University, Anthony Ferraro, they have a certification program for co parenting programs, so they’re certifying the BeH2O.
Krista Nash 24:16
So that’s a way that various entities could communicate to both parents simultaneously.
Trina Nudson 24:23
Yes, but it’s more of a guided platform, okay, based on strategies that are within the training of the age. Tool like one of our strategies is the negotiation from the why or the I feel statement, which is beyond a typical I feel statement, and so it’s helping and asks as more of a scaffolding where someone names the issue, like the schools having the problem, or whatever, and then bringing more collaborative efforts together.
Krista Nash 24:55
Okay, so let’s talk about this BeH2O Program, because, I know, especially because you’re now training the trainers, right, and you’re getting some national interest in that, right, with people learning how to do this and take it into their state. Can people, is it in person, or is it virtual? Can people from other states do the courses that you have or the program that you have, or do they have to have a local one where they go in person.
Trina Nudson 25:20
So our program, the one in Kansas that will be transferring over to TLP for families, is in person. But my coaches have the option, do they want to do it virtually, or do they want to do it in person? Some of my coaches are doing it in person. Some of them are doing it virtually. It’s completely up to them. I had my first beta group in October. I just finished my second beta group this April, and they go through a 32 hour training where we go through the curriculum, we go through the theory, we do all of that. But that’s not enough to actually run the program. I didn’t want to just give someone a book and say, Here you go. Or a 32 hour training and just say, Go, because it’s so much more than that. So then, if you the certification process is, as you go through your first cohort, you have 10 one-n-one sessions with me. So throughout the 16 week program, you are doing one-on-ones with me to prepare yourself before your first class, before your first joint meeting, before your individual meetings, and then we have joint consultations. So our coaches meet twice a month for joint consultations, and then we have office hours on the alternating weeks. And then we also do a marketing mastermind once a month. So it’s a movement Krista, like it is, yeah, amazing, because we’re all working together as a family. There’s a bunch of us going to the AFCC conference, and BeH2O has a table this May, and you’re not required to come to all the joint consultations. I just ask that you do six a year. But my first cohort comes religiously, not just to the joint consultations, but also to the weekly office hours. So we’re seeing each other once a week. At least some weeks, we’re seeing each other twice a week. And then we’re doing Gather For Good events to share the word about b, h 12. And so my last the ones that just graduated, are joining my current beta group, but we only plan on doing them in August. I mean, sorry, October and October and April each and every year, we only want to train 10 to 12 coaches. Our goal is to touch every state within the next two and a half years, and then for my beta coaches to ultimately become my master coaches. So they’ll start training coaches.
Krista Nash 27:57
How many states are you touching? 14. What’s the right background? Or, I’m sure there’s a variety about what type of people, variety? Yeah, what are you seeing like? Who do you think are good candidates for
Trina Nudson 28:06
I interview them. One of the key components I want to make sure is we have some mediation type background. We get trained in ADR experience in that some are trained therapists, some are trained coaches. We have trained attorneys. What’s really important Krista, the most powerful piece is we are the third side. And what do I mean by that? We are not going to shame, blame or judge or criticize any extremes. So there’s lots of extremes out there. There’s lots of advocacy groups one way or another, our mission is safeguarding childhoods. That’s what our Why is, that’s what we want to do. And so we may have different ends of the spectrum feel like that. We’re not on their side, but we’re on the third side. So we want to make sure that our coaches aren’t in their own trauma. We really live by the word practice. So whatever we’re teaching our co-parents, we need to do ourselves. So at the beginning of each of our joint meetings and in the beginning of each of our classes, we do three minutes of tone therapy. It’s a mindful moment. It is just as much for us as it is for our clients, because we don’t want to bring our baggage into our sessions together, and we don’t want them to be- we want to be fully present. And so we have to challenge ourselves to be outside the box, not in the box, to think everyone has needs, objectives and challenges, so when we’re struggling because we think we might have this difficult co-parenting pair come in. This is an opportunity to exercise patience. This is an opportunity to help these individuals feel seen. And heard, and we have to be mindful of that. So we think that’s the biggest piece. We have to make sure there’s that good fit, and if there’s not, it’s totally okay, right, right, that’s totally okay. It’s not right for you.
Krista Nash 30:15
So walk me through the program a little bit. I mean, I assume it kind of builds on some of the things you learned when you were doing the Layne Project, with all of the vast information you got from families being, being both a guardian ad litem and, you know, doing your attorney work, doing your supervision, all this court involved, therapy work, when you built all of this walk me through, if you’re a parent or a professional who is looking for solutions, who are the right consumers of it, and I know you’re now basically selling to other people so they can set up their own businesses, like you said, business to business, right? In addition to running your own business to consumer. Do I have that right?
Trina Nudson 30:52
Yeah, I won’t be running the Layneroject for families and gifting that to them, so I’ll be their strongest advocate, right? I’ll be championing them along the way, they can consult with me, just like my BeH2O coaches can consult with me, because they need a free up time to do this, right? So what does that look like? Well, that’s why I have beta groups Krista, because here in Johnson County, they already knew me as they’ve already known item. They already knew my experience, and they’ve already had people ordered in toBeH2O so they know the outcomes. And so my cases are court ordered, the Layned Project for families cases will be court ordered. What he did discover Krista is my why is safeguarding childhoods? And it was a struggle for me that if they have to be court ordered. I didn’t safeguard childhoods because they already had to go to court to get ordered. So it was really struggling with, how am I going to get them not court ordered? How am I going to get voluntarily them to come? And I had one of those aha moments. I have parents in front of me right now. They could be my ambassadors. And so that’s when I started asking people that were coming through the program to become my ambassadors. So if you see on social media, you may see recordings from some of my graduates. Well, they come to classes and talk to the new participants. They do videos. They post on social media about, you know, BeH2O and so then it decreased from about 99% of our cases were court ordered to about 75% of our cases are court ordered over the last 18 months, once we made that shift. But when I was working with my coaches, what we found is their courts weren’t jumping on right? Like, how do they get into their courts? I got into mine because I appeared in front of them. How did they get into their court? Right? Yeah. And then the other thing we found is people don’t want to be that happy couple. They got divorced. They don’t want to get in the same room together. So they started recording people that weren’t just one of them, because it only takes one. And co-parenting doesn’t mean that you have to talk every day. Actually, I don’t want you talking every day. For you not talk every day. If we can talk once a week or every other week, whatever system we set up for success, that’s all better. And so we started changing our presentation to the parent side by saying, getting along doesn’t mean you have to talk every day, right? It just means creating a system that works for your kids. And then I’ve started helping my coaches go out to their court ordered programs. Most courts have a court ordered program where you go for an hour and then there’s nothing after that, like there’s the gap starting to ask them. So then those providers can say, hey, there’s something after this program. Here it is. It’s BeH2O and we can get out that way. So however they get ordered in to BeH2O.It’s a 16 week curriculum. And our values are, they rock. We’re resilient, we’re open minded, we’re competent, and we keep it real. So I want to talk about keep it real because we say, I’m not going to change your coherent I have no magic fairy dust. I have no magic theory on it’s not going to happen, right, right? It’s not going to happen. And guess what? When things are going great, they want to go great forever. Someone’s going to fall down, someone’s going to fall down, and you have a choice. Are you going to reach down and pull that person up, or are you going to roll on the dust with them? Are you going to cut them off at the knees and ask them to run faster? That’s your choice. And so number one, we tell them that. Number two, we say the research is showing there will be no change for six to seven weeks. Don’t get passed off at me in four weeks and be like, hey, Trina, this isn’t working. I’m telling you it’s not going to work. Well, it takes time. It takes 66 days to form a habit. We’re building new neural pathways. So don’t expect immediate results. And so we’re very realistic in that regard. And quite frankly, Krista, we celebrate when they fall down. If they don’t fall down, we are sad because I want them to fall down, because if they fall down, I can show them they can get back up. So we get most worried about those cases that at week two, they’re doing so much better, because literally, I’m like, I’m going to push you guys down. I’m going to push you down so I can show you can get back up. And then we also tell them their old model is obsolete. Your business is bankrupt. We’re building a new one. Right? Don’t expect us to solve what you argued about last week, last month or last year, because all due respect, we really don’t care. We’re not trying to figure out who’s telling the truth. You will try to pull us in the water, and we will not go. We will drown. If we get in the water with you, we will drown. So we have strong boundaries, not because we don’t care, but because we do care. So we’re not getting in the weeds. So the first eight weeks are foundation building. So we have a class, a joint meeting, a class, a joint meeting. There are presently seven co-parenting pairs in our current cohort, and I think there’s eight co-parenting pairs in our upcoming cohort, which means, right now, our cohort has 15 participants, seven co-parenting pairs. Okay, they become a community Krista. They begin to rely on each other, so they go to class together. Class, we don’t talk about case specific stuff, joint meetings, we do and it’s skill based. So we’re practicing what we learned in the class, in our joint meetings, and then the second half of the program, we divide up our classes into divided groups. Half of them go with one facilitator. Half of them go with me, and they’re not with their CO parent, and they talk about what’s working, what’s not working. They’re starting to learn from them one another. About 45% of our cases are making really huge progress at this point, because now we’re at week nine, and we ask them to not only safeguard their own children’s childhoods, but others, and teach the others what they’ve learned, because if they’re just hearing it from us, they’re not going to listen. So they start to learn from one another. After divided group, the parents come together. They do an activity together. All of them do these different activities together, and in our joint meetings, we’re building our co-parenting commitment, which is not a parenting plan, it’s a two page document that consists of goals, communication and boundaries. In week 15, we send commitment to our kids. Oh my gosh, you’re bringing your kids in. Holy heck. Why would you do it? Your kids already know. So this is actually beneficial for the kids, and then in week 16, they graduate.
Krista Nash 37:44
Wow, so is the research that Dr O’Hara is doing. Tell me a little bit about that, about what she’s actually looking into.
Trina Nudson 37:51
So my number one concern is, or what I wanted to research, is, what I was seeing is parents saying this didn’t just change my co parenting relationship, it changed my life. And so I have one of the recording says, like, my road rage is so much better. And when I was reading all the work on co parenting, what I read is that not many of the programs were addressing well being. And so that’s what I really wanted to address. We only had our program, which we do six times a year. We start one every eight weeks, and we have anywhere from seven to eight co parenting pairs in it. There wasn’t a lot of people to be able to do the research, because not everyone was wanting to sign up for the research, right? And so ultimately, the model she did is she researched, I think 11 parents, but they tested daily Krista, so they started testing before they got into the program, and then they started testing throughout the program, and then they tested in the end, and there, I don’t even know who was through the program. I have no idea. Which makes me anxious, Krista, because I don’t have 100% success rate. I saw an 85% success rate. So I’m like, blue is the 15% Yeah, yeah. Tested. I have no idea. I have no idea. And so I’m still anxious. But according to period, there’s multiple testing points. So since they tested so much if I had to guess, they started to see improvement between week seven to 10, because that’s what my research showed, if I had to guess, it’s about an 80 to 90% success rate if, if I had to guess, just based on my experience, but I’m not a researcher, and that’s just based on doing it over the past five years, and what we have tested, because every graduating class completes a test that a pre and post test, and so we’re able to evaluate that as well. So all my. Research on BeH2O right now, that’s on BeH2Ocoaching.com is what we have researched internally from our pre and post tests.
Krista Nash 40:09
So as you look at this across all the work you’ve done over the years, why do you think this is so different, this approach, than the other solutions or lack of solutions out there. You know, there’s a lot of parenting classes. I talked with Dr Karey O’Hara about that as well, that, you know, a lot of them aren’t evidence based. I think something like 46 states make parents take these little co parenting online courses or things, you know, that sort of check that box so that they’ve at least thought about the fact that children need you to still work together and at least gives a little bit of thought to it. She said a lot of them have a lot of bells and whistles, but don’t have a lot of, you know, actual meat to them in terms of what they’re providing. So how do you feel like yours is set up differently than that, so that it’s actually effective,
Trina Nudson 40:57
it’s experiential. So I don’t know if you like the one that comes to mind is a book called Startup, and it’s now I’m not even going to remember since romantic Diana Candor wrote the book, and all in Startup at its name, and you read it, and it tells a story. And it’s not instructional. It tells a story. You experience it, so you take that emotional journey. So we’re not providing just instruction, we’re providing an experiential experience, and so then you’re really developing it, and we’re not telling you what to do, because one co-parenting pair could graduate from BeH2O and they could never see each other again. They could decide that alternating who takes the children to soccer games is the best thing for their family, because the cost of being at the same place at the same time is too high, and they would present it to their kids in a way that mom and dad work together, that you are number one focus, and we decided this is how we’re doing it. Another co parenting pair could graduate from BeH2O and be just as successful. But they are actually going to a soccer game together, sitting next to each other and having ice cream afterwards, and they’re presenting that to their kids, saying, You know what we’re doing, this just doesn’t mean we’re going getting back together. So we’re clearly describing what’s happening to the kids, so there’s no unknowns in reference to that. They’re not making up stuff. But both of these families are successful, and I will champion both of them, because neither of them are worse, neither of them are bad, because what they’re doing is what is the cost of conflict, and so what works for one family isn’t going to work for another. So the other thing is, we’re not trying to pigeonhole the families. And as really, if you want to qualify it successful as a guardian ad litem, the judges said you want the case done, send it to Trina. And you know what? Krista, I got a lot of shit done, but 5,3,4,5, years later, they all coming back, right? Because I was telling them what to do. They were doing it, but they didn’t own it. And so it’s that experience that’s theirs. It’s also the community. They hold one another up. They’re presenting to their kids, they’re presenting to other people in their group. There’s that community connection, which is a lot, which is a really big thing. They’re not in it alone. I’m no genius Krista. I’m just, over the past quarter of a century, I know what works and I know what didn’t work, and I just started putting together what worked. And then, lo and behold, there’s research to back everything that I have put together. And the results not only transform our clients, but they transform us. And I think you could talk to any coach that just went through the last beta group, or this current beta group, and I think you would definitely get the same answer, that it’s transforming. It’s transformative.
Krista Nash 44:09
So a couple things. One, when the parents are actually presenting to the kids, are you doing that in a big group setting where multiple parents are presenting to multiple kids? Or is it like each family? Does it separately?
Trina Nudson 44:21
Well, it’s a family meeting. So they have joint meetings every other week, and so their joint meeting number eight is actually a family meeting, but then they present their commitment to their entire class in week, in their final graduation class. So they’re sharing their commitment with the class. They spent eight weeks writing this commitment eight weeks they’re focusing on the top three to five goals. What is our why? What do we want to do to support our children? We want them to have a balance between structure and flexibility. That was my most favorite, because they. Like, Oh my gosh, you’re not. It’s BeH2O, because B E stands for beryllium, which is a strong but flexible medal. And so I was that was very profound. Or we want to demonstrate for our children how to be in The Now, or we want to support one another in being peaceful and at ease. And so then it becomes, if I do this action, will it support my co parent being peaceful and at ease, or will it undermine it? Then? Then it’s communication. What are we going to communicate about? When are we going to communicate it about? How often are we going to communicate about it. There is Annie Duke. She’s written a lot of books, and she’s poker player, actually, but I just did a blog post on thinking and bets, and she calls it pre mortems. And what is a pre mortem? It’s actually, what do we want this to look like, and what is it going to get in the way of it looking like this. And so in our joint meeting, number 5,6, 7, what’s going to get in the way? What’s going to put us back in court? Let’s address that now, because we’ve already established our goal. What’s going to prevent us from achieving this goal? What’s going to support us in getting there? So we talk about those things, rather than the past, and then the boundaries are what, what is. So our communication is how we’re going to communicate, and then our What, what’s going to get in the way of us communicating in this way and achieving our goals.
Krista Nash 46:32
So what phase of divorce is this best suited to? You know, you’re getting people who have been at post decree fights for years, and they’ve gotta clean it up now because they’ve made such a mess of it. And getting free decree people who are actually, is it, all of it, and kind of, where do you wish? I know I always wish I could get people earlier. It’s like an oncologist who wishes you could catch it earlier so that it’s a little easier to fix.
Trina Nudson 46:57
Because our mission is safeguarding childhoods, but one of my I say one of my favorites, because I have so many of them. But there was a case where I had a mom and a dad and they hadn’t talked for 10 years, and their daughter was stopped seeing dad and hadn’t seen dad for a year, and they were ordered and to family therapy, reintegration therapy and be H 2o and so they were at another facility getting their reintegration therapy, and they were doing be H 2o they completely and totally transformed, but they also create this new narrative that they share with their kids. And the new narrative that they shared with her was, you know what? Mom and dad didn’t do this right for 10 years, you saw what happens when people don’t do it right, and you’ve also seen that people can change. So what we want you to take from this is, we went through all this so you wouldn’t have to. So you need to learn from us. So that was how they turned the 10 years of hell to absolute beauty. Now she was 16 at the time and not going to cry, and that next year, so about 18 months later, I got an invitation to go to her high school graduation from both mom and dad, and they invited me there, and I went and the stepdad, who I never had met, mom’s husband, started clapping when I came in, and I was like, what’s this about? He goes, this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for you. And I was like, No, this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for them. Like, all I did is provide a framework, but some of my strongest advocates go out and talk to anyone about it, their daughter will talk to anyone about it, about the experience that she had. So that’s when I was 10 years old, and that’s just one story. And then there’s ones that were never together, like it was a paternity action I honestly cannot tell you, like, who is the best fit for it? What I can tell you is, if the coach goes in with an open mind and not like, holy shit, this one’s going to be really hard, you are more likely than not to do an amazing job just trusting the process. And we tell them at the beginning, don’t trust us. Why would you? Why would you? Your court order doesn’t trust is, I don’t want you to trust me. I just want you to be curious. We ask them, because we also do two one on ones. We ask them what worked for you, what didn’t work for you. In session, we’re going to learn just as much from you as you’re going to learn from us. So I how I work with you is going to be completely different than how I work with someone else. Now, Krista, they’re human, and now they’re engaging because we’re not in judgment, and then they start to trust us, because we earned it.
Krista Nash 49:53
So do you also do boosters after or anything like that? You know where people come back and say, We need a little bit. We need a little tune up.
Trina Nudson 50:01
We do quarterly meetings. We advocate for quarterly meetings, not that we do them. We’re happy to do them. Or we give them a framework to do their own quarterly meetings. If they so choose. They could do it and report it on OFW. They could go to Starbucks and do it. They maybe don’t even talk and do it. They just send their quarterly note via OFW, but we work that out in the communication session. But every about 60 days, people are 60 to 90 days, people have a tendency to fall off. That’s what the research says. So the Entrepreneur Operating System (EOS), we kind of model that. That’s what my business is run off of. And we always in EOS, you have quarterly meetings, you have weekly, quarterly and annual meetings. And so through BeH2O you have weekly, if that’s what works for you, quarterly and annual meetings, they also can request to come back. But we talk about in the communication section, at what point like, what does it look like? So I just did one yesterday. And so what does it look like when you guys disagree? And so they said, well, first step is we’ll do an I Feel statement, okay? And it’s not your typical I Feel statement, so it sounds but anyway, I won’t go into huge details about that. And I said, what if that doesn’t work. What are you going to do next? And they said, well, then at that point we might ask to talk on the phone. Can we have a minute to just talk to make sure we’re on the same page? Great, wonderful. What is that doesn’t work? What are you going to do next? Well, then we’ll probably ask for a joint meeting with you, Trina. And I said, Well, can we do something else, right? Right? And they’re like, I don’t know. I said, What are we working on right now? And then they decided, oh, we’ll pull out our co-parenting commitment and see if that answers the question. Love it. Then we can put on you would have a joint meeting. And so we set them up for it’s going to happen. They’re going to piss one another off. I can’t make it go away. If you guys weren’t going to you’d still be married, you’d probably piss each other off. Then too, life happens. So we don’t expect perfection, actually, we don’t want it, because our children are more well rounded because of our differences. So rather than the paradigm I want him to parent like me or I want her to parent like me, it’s that our children are more well rounded because of our differences. If we were model examples of one another, the world would be such a boring place. So we start to look at what are each of our strengths, and how can we look at that to benefit our kids?
Krista Nash 52:45
You know, I love so much you’ve you’re like a kindred spirit, because I love that you’re an attorney, and you could just be playing in court all day, doing that role, but you are just more interested in flourishing and giving actual solutions to people so they can, so you can protect childhood, and parents can protect childhood, because even when a parent is getting divorced, they want their kids childhoods protected, and it’s so vitally important to that family, that child and society. So I just commend you for pivoting in this really innovative way, because a lot of attorneys just don’t do that, and I think it is just really to be commended. And you obviously have so much energy. I just don’t know when you sleep. Half the people I have on the podcast. I’m like, Man girl, you just like, don’t stop your Energizer Bunny, little business creator. So you’ve certainly caught up from not getting that training in school. But I just am so grateful. So a couple little questions. I’ll let you go, because I know we’re running out of time. Does the cost vary depending on who does it? Do people set their own rates?
Trina Nudson 53:48
What should be talking about my coaches?
Krista Nash 53:51
Yeah. I mean, if parents wanted to do it, yeah, well, I guess that’s twofold. So one, if you’re a professional and you want to go do this, you’d have to apply right through your and I can provide your coaching website, and people can do the either April or October. They can apply to be privileged to become a coach, right? Trina Nudson 54:09
We already have, I think I have six interviews for our October session already, so going up.
Krista Nash 54:15
Okay so that’s one model, and that’s for the kind of professionals we talked about before, who want to make that kind of part of their practice. I was looking at some of your coaches who are linked on your website, and it looks like they are a wide variety of places, backgrounds, company names,
Trina Nudson 54:29
We are putting at least six more up there, maybe eight more up there next week. So graduates, that’s right, but it’s up to them what they want to charge. I don’t require anything. What the Layne Project for families will be charging, and what the Layne Project presently charges, but won’t be doing it anymore, right? Because it’s going project for families is 1750 per parent. So it’s $3,500 Dollars, and that actually equates to them getting 24 hours of direct service. And so it’s pretty good deal. When you figure it out, if they pay upfront, we reduce it by $150 a parent, so it’s $1750 per parent. But if they pay the $1,600 we waive their intake fee. We divide it over 16 weeks, so they pay $100 a week. That’s how we do it, right? But since it’s going non profit, like presently, I have 14 families in our cohort, and eight of our parents only paid $550 for the program because there was funding through four families that they applied for scholarships for, and when they were able to get some of that funded, so they didn’t have the full expense, got it okay.
Krista Nash 55:50
And then in terms of finding them, it sounded like you just answered that, that they can find these resources all I’ll link to your sites on my show notes and on my website, but they can find, if there’s one in your state, like you said, you’re potentially touching 14 and hoping to touch 50 in the next couple years, right?
Trina Nudson 56:10
We will touch 50.
Krista Nash 56:14
So they can find those on your website. Is that we know how many in Colorado, though? I know I know I was thinking about doing it, not that I’m over extended at all in my own practice, but I do think that it’s something that we need in Colorado. And I’m also thinking about, remember, we talked about, I tried to get my staff to do it, and I have somebody who would be great who could do it, so I still might make her slip an application in there to provide this. Because I really, you know, as a best interest attorney, I don’t have very many resources of great places to send people to actually get the kind of work I know they need. I’m such a broken record saying, what do you need to do? You need to stay out of court. You need to co-parent better, like you said, you know, lecturing them on what they need to do. A lot of times, I become the parenting coordinator for them when my role ends, so that I can stay on and keep kind of helping, nudging, you know, but this kind of actual sophisticated training so they can do this themselves, they don’t need a babysitter the whole time is so much more effective. And I think what I also love about what you’re doing is how much it teaches the children in those families. I say to people all the time, can we not just be team Kids?Name, insert kids name?
Trina Nudson 57:20
One of the magic things that we do is we ask them to outline what values do they want to instill in their kids, like, what are the top three to five values? And how are they consistently modeling them? Because if they’re only modeling them in interactions with their child, but non interactions with their co-parent, they lessen the likelihood that the child is going to have those values. So I embody the value of kindness because I want to instill it in my child, right? And so that’s the mindset shift we do, the loving kindness meditation, may I be happy, may I be well, may I be safe, may I be peaceful and at ease. And then I ask them to think of their co-parent. May you be happy, may you be well, May you be safe, May you be peaceful and at ease. And then I say, I don’t want you to want that for your co-parent, because they deserve it, but because your child deserves two parents who are peaceful and at ease. So we always end all of our time together with that, and it becomes and that’s why a lot of them put as one of their goals to support one another being peaceful and at ease. Because for the past 15 weeks, right? That’s what we just kept reinforcing.
Krista Nash 58:30
It’s great. And because it’s not therapy, but it’s coaching, it really could be done. So even if it isn’t touching all 50 states, I would think that the work could be done across state lines.
Trina Nudson 58:40
Oh, no, it can be there. I mean, it is not therapy. I have several therapists who are certified coaches. They would do a much better job explaining to what the difference is, yeah, but it is very much more. And it’s different than coaching Krista, because a typical coaching session, the client leads the show. You’re guiding them, but we’re talking about what they’re talking about. It’s up to them. And in therapy, you know, you have a treatment plan goal, but it’s going on them. We are guiding you. So it’s more this is what we’re going to do today. It’s curriculum based, but then you coach them through it as well. Okay, we do talk about feelings because we utilize strategic empathy, and it’s not I’m asking you to connect with them, to truly understand how they feel so you can connect. I’m asking you to strategically be empathetic with them, so you have all the information necessary to make the best decisions for your child. So it’s just really a different paradigm.
Krista Nash 59:50
I love it. Okay. Well, lastly, I am going to say, like, I would love for you to put me in touch with people who would want to be on the show to talk about, like. Maybe, for example, the 10 year don’t talk to each other. Now we’ve transformed people or their and or their kid, because I think those voices are so important in this dialogue, right? So that’ll just be an open invitation for you. If there’s anybody who is a great success story or you think would be able to speak well to the audience of what they lost by not being better as co-parents for so many years, and what they’ve gained for what they’ve learned, that would be amazing. So I’ll just give you an open door to that, and then I also want to have you maybe on with Dr O’Hara, once you get all your results, and we get that wonderful I’m sure it’s going to be amazing outcome. And you’re probably doing so many new things all the time that you’ll have to just come back and keep talking to us, and I am going to consider bringing this to Colorado, because it’s so important. And you give me energy just by hearing you talk about all these things, actually, you make me tired, but it makes me want to do more energy. That’s
Trina Nudson 1:00:52
That’s why you need to become a BeH2O coach Krista, because you will have so much energy, because it completely changes you like I can’t. I can’t tell you how amazing it is. I’m frustrated because I want to refer them to the BeH2O, but I can’t, because there’s a conflict.
Krista Nash 1:01:11
And yeah, I mean, I tell lawyers a lot that I can’t imagine just being a divorce attorney. I mean, people say I’m not a divorce attorney. I’m a Family defense attorney, if anything, and I am a child advocate, and I want flourishing humans despite divorce, and it’s such a passionate way to practice in this area, right? It’s so it is life giving, because you’re you are helping people. You are giving them solutions so that they can get to the other side of this tragic thing that they didn’t ever anticipate and or ever wish at least for themselves or for their children, and finding helping them find a way through it that works for them, which is why you and I are kindred in that way. So I also should send you a bunch of podcast, you know, QR codes, so your people can go listen, because I am trying to bring all those researchers, and it certainly fortifies what you’re doing by giving people this information about how vital it is, like I just had Michael Saini on again, talking about incremental trust building and why it’s so important, and how to go about getting incremental trust built back. You know, I’m sure those are nice dovetails to what you to what you teach. So, all right, well, Trina, thank you so much. It’s a pleasure, and I will look, look for you at the conference. I will be there too, and excellent. Stop by our table. I will, I will I have one as well to try to get people to sign up listen to the podcast. So we will be neighbors
Trina Nudson 1:02:30
And come to BeH2O workshop, because I’m putting one on. Oh, okay, okay,
Krista Nash 1:02:35
Great, wonderful. I’m actually presenting too. And so we will watch for each other, and I will see you there. Thanks for doing this with me. All right, we’ll talk to you later. Bye.
Intro/Outro 1:02:45
Krista is licensed in Colorado and Wyoming. So if you are in those states and seek legal services, please feel free to reach out via ChildrenFirstFamilylaw.com that is our website where everyone can find additional resources to help navigate family law as always, be sure to like, subscribe and share the podcast with others you think would benefit from this content.