Kim Korven

10/11/2025

05/15/2025

Trauma doesn't always roar.

38 years ago, my grandpa died. I was away working when he passed. We'd said our goodbyes before I left, with him telling me, from his hospital bed, "Kim, I'm just so tired of this." I knew what he meant.

Thus, his passing didn't surprise me. I went to work the next morning, and experienced deja-vu from a dream I'd had three months earlier. Freaky.

I never attended his funeral. His death was expected. Do big deal, right?

This morning, the trauma I'd experienced from his cancer diagnosis, restrictions on his life, and his death hit me.

Once he was diagnosed and struggled with his immune system, we couldn't take the trip to Norway that we'd planned. I drove him 3 hours for chemo treatments. A few years later, I saw the light go out of his eyes when his mom died. The year he died, a good friend let me stay at her apartment for two weeks that felt like a year. She lived in the community where he was in hospital. I'd spend every day with him, and then I'd return to her home and cry myself to sleep.

All examples of trauma that I never saw as trauma, before now. In seeing these experiences for what they are, I can begin to heal.

11/05/2024

Tuesday teaching on conflict management

10/31/2024

Didn't you know that there is no separation agreement or parenting order for 20% of all children of separated or divorced parents in Canada?

I was shocked when I read that on StatsCanada's website a few years ago.

Yet it no longer surprises me. After all, I was terrified of divorce because I knew it would harm my children. Other parents are too.

Many parents know in their guts that interacting with lawyers will harm their children.

There's support for this. In her book "High Conflict", Amanda Ripley identifies 4 factors that are present when any dispute turns high conflict.

One is the presence of a "conflictpreneur" - a person who benefits from the dispute. Guess who that usually is in divorce cases?

The second factor is when one of the people feel humiliated by the other. This happens when one parent is served with divorce papers. I see this all the time when the legal proceeding has already started before the parents begin working with me.

Once one parent feels humiliated, settlement and peaceful resolution become very difficult.

If a parent truly loves their children, they need to do everything possible to avoid traditional divorce processes. I guess this explains the statistics I shared at the start of this post.

Recognizing this, I'm changing up my services, and am providing training that empowers parents and helps them keep their children front and centre as they navigate the divorce process.

It's a Kids 1st In Divorce 🫶 5-week bootcamp starting November 9.

Thus, I have an ask.

I’m looking for 9 parents who haven't divorced yet because they know traditional divorce will harm their children and they don't want to spend a fortune on lawyers. Yet, they want to file for divorce, doing as much of the work themselves to keep it peaceful, so everyone in their family can enjoy Christmas.

"Students" will also gain the skills to discuss their children with the other parent, without the conversation turning into an argument with ongoing support.

They'll be able to plan Christmas dinner, and decide together on the best course of action, knowing what they can do themselves and when they may want to involve professionals.

So if you ...

🤠Are really ready to separate or divorce peacefully
🦹‍♀️capable of sitting down to Christmas dinner ❆ your former spouse and your children
👻 100% committed to doing the work
🤡 you are coachable (in that you recognize that with help you can have those conversations with your spouse that will benefit your children)

Then this might be for you. 🧞‍♂️

Drop the word ... (fun, results-orientated word) below and I’ll send you the next steps.

10/30/2024

Time to be Vulnerable.🥵

Even though I have been a lawyer 🏆 the Deputy Director of Land Titles in our province, I know what it’s like to struggle with the low self-esteem that keeps one in a relationship even when they know it isn’t life affirming for them or their children.

Low self-esteem started consuming my life in childhood. The only person I was sure loved me unconditionally was my great grandma. To avoid criticism and to fit in with my family, I became an overachiever who secretly was consumed with anxiety. I always wore a mask.

This pattern continued in my marriage, and in my career.

I know what it’s like to wake up and immediately experience a debilitating panic attack, and then to ignore your feelings, powering through the day, because that is what you do.

Low self-esteem and anxiety breed a lack of intimacy in one's marriage, and a lot of silent conflict.

I know the impact of that on my children. They were acting out, which was a cry for help. For the longest time, I refused to see it.

It got so bad that my son was suspended from school. He was in grade 1. In addition to everything else, I felt like a failure as a parent, and was even known to cry myself to sleep.

I felt trapped and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t believe I deserved better, and divorce terrified me. I stayed and it only got worse. We really weren't well suited (part of the cycle of low self-esteem).

So, I know how painful it can be.

And, I know what it’s like to be on the other side of it. 👩‍👧‍👦

Once I realized that my children were being harmed by us staying married, I could act. It wasn’t for my benefit; it was for theirs.

I loved them enough to ignore the negative inner chatter. I committed to ending my marriage in a way that would improve their lives. I wanted them having the best relationship possible with their dad. This became my north star, and it shifted all our lives.

Acting with love during this difficult transition, and acknowledging the importance of a person whom the traditional divorce model would label as an enemy, started breaking the chains of low self-esteem that had paralyzed me since childhood.

The best part is the changes I’ve seen in my children.

Living with her dad and me, my daughter was clingy and didn’t want me out of her sight. Now she’s confident and outgoing.

My son graduated from high school and university with distinction. He’s following his dreams.

And .... each of them enjoys chatting with me, and with their dad!! Divorce improved their lives, and their relationships with each of us! It even let me believe I could climb a mountain with my son!!!🥰

And, I want this kind of experience for every child! That’s why I do the work that I do. It isn’t about divorce. It’s about happy kids who grow into respectful and high functioning adults. It's about creating a space where kids can develop healthy self-esteem, and thrive.

Even though there’s a part of me that thinks I’m sharing too much about my life’s work and about my personal health, my deeper truth is that I care way too much about helping parents improve their children’s lives to let that fear stop me.

Imagine what would happen to our world if more children experienced happy parents and lived largely free of conflict. Their self-esteem would increase. If we improve children’s lives, society will improve. And so I’ve dedicated myself to helping thousands of parents divorce peacefully. I want their children to thrive!

If you (or anyone you know) feels like they’re walking on eggshells in their marriage and are staying because they suffer with low self-esteem and don’t want to hurt their children, I’m offering 5 free Fair & Family-Focused Divorce Consults to help you start moving toward using divorce as a tool to improve your children's lives.

Your children are too important to let your low self-esteem stop you. Acting out of love for them, good things will happen. I’d be honored to support you (or someone you care about), even simply by listening.

LMK in a DM if I can be of service to or someone you care about.

10/29/2024

I've been hiding from you.

Even though I’ve helped hundreds of unhappy spouses stop walking on eggshells and divorce peacefully, first as a lawyer and now as a mediator and divorce guide ...

I have to admit that I’ve been playing small and not yet making the positive impact that I know the world needs.

But that changes this week!

My coaches have challenged me to be more VISIBLE and AUTHENTIC (read vulnerable), and share more of my story with you ...

You see, I DON'T CARE ABOUT DIVORCE. This is the secret I’ve been hiding. I care about the wellbeing of children. Sometimes divorce is the best option, the one that can create the best outcomes for children.

I’ll share more of my why, and my story, tomorrow ...

But for today, if you would like to see me make a bigger and more positive difference in the lives of a LOT more parents and their children ...

Will you please drop me a note below? Even if you only write, “Kids deserve the best”, it will mean a great deal to me.

10/28/2024

Yesterday was the 12th anniversary of me graduating with a Masters degree in law. My daughter asked if getting my Masters in Law was a waste of time, since I no longer practice law.

The answer came easily: "Not at all. It was something I'd wanted to do for more than 15 years, but didn't believe in myself enough to pursue. Divorce cracked open my heart. It reconnected me to my dreams, after I'd been lost. Going back to school was a way of reclaiming me."

In this busy world with so much stuff coming at us, we all lose ourselves. It could be in a career, as a parent, in a relationship. Where have you lost yourself?

09/18/2024

I wasn't sure I could do it.

After I separated, with my self esteem almost non-existent, a dream I'd had while in law school rose to the surface. I'd been out of university for 15 years, yet still, I wanted to get my Masters in Law degree.

In another city. My kids were young.

Who did I think I was?

Yet the dream wouldn't go away. It just got bigger.

I was granted a leave of absence from my job, I got my former spouse to agree, a person to take my cockatiel, and, at the last minute, I found tenants for my house.

The first class was legal theory. That's heady stuff. It was taking me an hour to read 6 pages.

I remember bursting into tears, as I was reading, wanting desperately to go home.

Who did I think I was, indeed?

But my tenants had signed a one year lease. There was no place for me to go.

It was a do or die moment.

I remembered my grandmother. She had returned to university to finish her education degree when she was 53 years old. She took a leave of absence for a year, and then she and my grandpa moved from the farm to a furnished apartment.

She'd been nearly 10 years older than me when she returned to university full time.

I told myself she'd been older than me when she did it. If she did it, I could do it too.

Thinking of her experience, I found the courage to continue.

I knew though, that to succeed, I'd need to be kind to me. I'd need to give myself space to adjust to reading legal texts and peer-reviewed journal articles.

I did it. Being kind to me made all the difference in the world.

I didn't just do it. I was awarded the Graduate Teaching Fellowship at the College of Law in my second year of studies. This meant I created and taught an upper year class.

Then, I was the first person from my cohort, to finish.

Succeeding with that challenge, has given me the strength to continue to do hard things.

A wilderness canoe adventure to Grey Owl's Cabin. Ceasing to be a lawyer and helping people approach divorce differently. A TEDx talk on how divorce fosters reslience in children.

It's as if divorce opened me up to my strength, and to my purpose.

I can't wait to see what's possible with my next big challenge. That's the Camino Del Norte, starting in Bayonne France, and ending in Bilbao, Spain. I'm not doing it all. I think approximately 160 km is enough, don't you?

The lesson from this: hard times are the fertilizer that lets us bloom.

09/16/2024

If you could only take 3 things with you on a dream vacation, what would they be?

In one week, I'll be landing in Spain to begin a pilgrimage on Camino Del. Norte, travelling with a 25L pack. That's very small because I have to carry it for 3 days as I walk.

[photo credit by Ian Yates, Unsplash]