Carolyn Andersen Cadem

My story is long but Ms. Cadem has been through everything with me for the last ten years. She is extremely professional and knowledgeable of every legal topic that has been presented to her. Not only do I feel supported professionally, but I also feel personally supported as a parent to my children....

Carolyn came into my case with many obstacles and over came them all with ease. Her and her staff were continually available with every question or concern, and always made me feel like my case was a priority. She is professional, knowledgeable, and understands what to do when you feel like you have ...exhausted all other efforts.

My initial review was much better, but this is restricted to 4,000 characters... Before Carolyn, I called all around and got free phone consultations which lead to them conveniently not knowing anything until I gave them money. Every lawyer I talked to made me feel like I was another routine crap...py dad trying to get out of child support with minimal effort. Feeling defeated already before starting several times, I decided to give up and not worry about legal things and try to work it out with my ex. Needless to say that didn’t work out so well. When I first entered Carolyn’s office, I was terrified. I had never been in a lawyers office before, I automatically assumed that since nearly every other separated dad I know out there has abandoned their family that this place would judge me as the same, and drag me through mud before letting “the system” teach me a lesson about parenting. I shook her hand and it’s as if she sent a wave of reassurance in that handshake as to say “It’s going to be alright, I’m here now” I told her of all my worries, fears, unknowns and it was like she snapped right to it as possibly the most empathetic lawyer I’ve ever encountered. My ex dealt the first blow by nearly crippling me financially. Right after that we went into negotiating time to try to alleviate some of the nonsense that was just passed by officials that are presumably “for the people?” Carolyn was so calm and was able to retain all that wonderful lawyer knowledge where I was blind with emotion. I went in guns blazing saying “She’s not fit to be the primary parent after all she’s done! Roar! *rampage* She's just after my money and doesn't care about my daughter! I want full custody!” Carolyn, more than likely used to this sort of reaction, talked some much needed sense into me. She helped me to get an evaluation where I had to sit down face to face and talk stuff out with my ex, I could tell the entire time she was mad at this entire thing she didn't want to give up any time to me. Our first negotiation didn't go that well, it was 5 hours and I was talking to a wall. My ex had barely agreed to what the evaluators had said. There were recommendations in there to quit my job and get a new one, put off school, all sorts of things I needed to do to my life and my schedule but she was fine as is as long as I bent to her schedule. Carolyn did a great job at keeping me calm and played hard ball with my ex and her attorney. Over the course of probably another 7 months, Carolyn and I would see what my ex's not sticking to grounds were still at, and made recommendations so I could see my daughter. Carolyn worked hard to get me every single extra hour. Slowly but surely we got more and more time, my ex was bending more and more becoming more civil and human in the matter. We got close to getting an evaluator (Carolyn won our Motion to appoint one) to hang out with us and evaluate us as parents. Once my ex and I saw the bill for that though I feel like something clicked with her where it was time to stop fighting over senseless garbage and just start focusing on “our” daughters future. My favorite part of this, when we got to the hearing to discuss who would be paying for a child evaluator if we got that far (I wanted to split the cost and she wanted me to pay 100%). We went to court, paid a good amount of money to witness some other odd cases only to spend 10 minutes for the judge to say that it was ridiculous to have me pay 100% and that we would split it.  Afterwards speaking to my ex, she said to me "I hate your lawyer, she's too good" Carolyn was such a mentor in this entire process, keeping me in check emotionally and financially. I can’t imagine any other lawyer caring about my situation and my well being as much as Carolyn was able to. Honestly, no joke, I am sad in a way that my custody battle is over as, I no longer will be working closely with Carolyn. Thanks for reading. A peacefully minded former-client

Carolyn has been there through the many ups and downs with my divorce. She answered my many concerns, even on evenings and weekends when crises came up. She was highly flexible and kept providing the legal advice I needed to make decisions in a very tough case involving verbal and emotional abuse, ...and other life threatening circumstances. She made sure I knew what I needed to get this roller coaster ride of a divorce done after a year of failed mediation with another lawyer, when my ex -husband kept trying to sabotage the sale of the house numerous times. She gave me the power of persuasion so that the divorce finally went through without having to even finish up in court, and promptly finished up the work so that the divorce happened very quickly. Her personal touch and willingness to play hardball gave me the courage to finish things up. I would recommend her highly to anyone who needs to get something tough done quickly and legally.