PERSONAL BACKGROUND
Cat Dellaire LICSW, CDC
From Therapist to Family Court Advocate
After decades supporting children and families as a therapist, Cat’s own high-conflict custody experience transformed her path—leading her into mediation, custody work, and helping families navigate divorce and co-parenting with greater clarity, strategy, and support.
Cat Dellaire, LICSW, CDC has more than thirty years of experience providing counseling and support services to children and families. Her professional background includes work in public schools, juvenile justice, adoption, mental health clinics, and private practice, first in New York City and later in Massachusetts.
In 2010, Cat experienced her own high-conflict divorce and custody battle involving coercive control dynamics. Despite her years of clinical training and experience, she quickly realized how emotionally overwhelming and legally complex the family court process could become for parents and children alike.
Through that experience, Cat gained firsthand insight into the emotional strain, communication challenges, and systemic difficulties many families face during prolonged custody disputes. What began as a deeply personal experience ultimately inspired her to expand her professional focus into divorce support, co-parenting dynamics, mediation, and family court-related services.
Motivated to better support families navigating these challenges, Cat pursued additional training as a divorce mediator and Certified Divorce Coach. She became passionate about helping individuals better understand both the emotional and practical realities of divorce, especially in high-conflict situations where traditional therapy alone may not fully address the complexities involved.
Through advanced training with experts including Dr. Ramani and Bill Eddy, Cat deepened her understanding of high-conflict personalities, coercive control, trauma responses, and emotional regulation. She also incorporated approaches such as Internal Family Systems (IFS), EMDR-informed techniques, somatic work, and mindfulness-based strategies into her practice. A central part of her work focuses on helping clients become less emotionally reactive so they can navigate difficult situations with greater clarity, stability, and confidence.
After relocating to Maine in 2023, Cat began focusing more directly on family court-related work. She developed specialized expertise in identifying coercive control dynamics and now consults with attorneys and legal professionals on these cases. Her work expanded into roles including Guardian ad Litem, custody evaluator, co-parenting mediator, and family systems consultant.
Cat is known for her ability to quickly assess family dynamics, identify patterns contributing to conflict, and provide clear, thoughtful recommendations centered around the well-being of children. Her court reports have been recognized for their thoroughness, organization, and balanced perspective. As one magistrate shared, “She does a great job of helping me clearly see the system and understand the child’s experience, which provides clarity in decision-making for the family.”
What drives Cat’s work is her passion for helping children and parents move through high-conflict situations in healthier ways. She believes that when parents are given the right tools, support, and perspective, families can reduce conflict, improve communication, and create more stable long-term outcomes for children. Her work ultimately aims to help clients recognize and change unhealthy relational patterns so future generations can experience healthier relationships and emotional well-being.
Today, Cat is happily remarried and enjoys hiking the woods of Maine, traveling, cooking, and spending time with her husband and their dog, Carmen. Her personal and professional experiences have reinforced her belief that healing, growth, and healthier relationships are possible—even after difficult transitions.