Support through a major life transition.
Divorce, separation, and the endings that reshape a family. Coaching for you as an individual. Mediation for two people who need to reach agreement. Both under one roof, in Cape Town and online.
Nikki Duchenne
Mediator, coach & psychology graduate
My path to becoming a Divorce Coach and Mediator was shaped by both a personal experience and a deep desire to help others. After my third child was born, I felt a calling to pursue a career that would allow me to make a meaningful difference in people's lives.
This led me to obtain a Bachelor's degree in Social Sciences, psychology, providing a strong foundation in understanding human behaviour and relationships. However, it was my own experience navigating divorce after 20 years of marriage that truly ignited my passion for this field.
Faced with a lack of information and support, I took the initiative to empower myself by studying ADR (alternative dispute resolution) through Mediation Academy, gaining expertise in family law and mediation. I became a SAAM accredited mediator, equipped to facilitate constructive dialogue and help couples reach mutually agreeable solutions.
Driven by a desire to provide more comprehensive support, I furthered my training through CDC to become a Certified Divorce Coach. This certification allows me to provide personalised guidance, support, and strategies to help individual clients navigate the emotional, practical, and legal aspects of divorce.
I can proudly say that I am the first Certified Divorce Coach in South Africa, and together with my mediation training, I offer a unique service of understanding and assisting individuals and couples through this chapter.
How I help
Some of this work is one-on-one. Some of it happens with both of you in the room. You don't need to work out which before you get in touch — that's what the first phone call is for.
Thinking of divorce. Now what?
One-on-one · or togetherIt's the number one enquiry I get, and it may be the most important session I hold — because it happens before anything becomes irreversible.
You don't have to be in the middle of a divorce to have this conversation. You don't have to have decided, or said the word out loud. Some people come on their own; some come together, still working out whether there's a marriage to save. Both are the right way to arrive.
What changes things isn't the decision. It's having accurate information before you make one — which is why this is an empowering conversation rather than a frightening one.
Coaching through a life transition
One-on-one · confidentialDivorce is the ending I know best. It isn't the only one that does this to a person.
The same work applies when a long relationship ends without a marriage certificate, when a role you'd built your identity around disappears, when the last child leaves home, when you're rebuilding after a death, or when you've relocated and every routine that held you steady has gone with it.
The mechanics are consistent: grief that arrives out of order, an identity shaped around something that no longer exists, and practical decisions that won't wait until you feel ready. Coaching here is about sequencing those, and building something that belongs to you on the other side.
The process of divorce and children
Both parents · child-centredChildren don't experience the divorce. They experience the arrangements — where they sleep on a Tuesday, who fetches them from cricket, whose house holds the school shoes. Whatever the two of you settle between yourselves, what they live is the schedule.
Parenting plans
Care and contact, holidays and special days, schooling, medical decisions, travel consent, and how the two of you communicate. Drafted in line with the Children's Act 38 of 2005, ready to be registered with the Office of the Family Advocate or made an order of court.
Post-separation parenting mediation
The plan is in place and the reality has moved on — new schools, new partners, a teenager whose life no longer fits the schedule. Rather than going back to court every time something changes, we work it through and revise it. Most families need this every few years.
Where sitting in the same room isn't workable, we can do this in separate sessions instead. That's a normal adjustment, not a failure.
Mediation
Both parties · structured & facilitatedTrying to talk to someone you're in conflict with can feel impossible. Emotions are high, you're each living your own version of it, and misunderstanding fills whatever space is left. That's true whether it's the person you're separating from, an adult child you've stopped being able to reach, a sibling, a blended family finding its footing, or a decision about an ageing parent that nobody can agree on.
A calm, structured third party changes what's possible in that room. I facilitate the conversation so it stays on the questions that actually need answering, make sure each person can speak openly and be properly heard, and keep it moving when it stalls. The goal isn't forced reconciliation — sometimes it's repair, sometimes it's a decision made together, and sometimes it's simply a workable way to co-exist.
I've worked with couples who arrived unable to agree on the smallest thing and left with something workable. It's faster than litigation, it costs considerably less, it stays private, and the decisions remain yours rather than a court's.
Thinking of divorce. Now what?
This is the conversation people wish they'd had first. Not because it decides anything — because it replaces guesswork with accurate information, at the point where that still changes what happens next.
Most people arrive here having done a great deal of reading and come away more uncertain than when they started. Some of what's out there is American. Some of it is written to frighten you into hiring someone. Almost none of it is about your marriage, your children, or the way you are actually married.
So we start with where you are, and we go from there.
You don't have to have decided. You don't have to have said the word out loud.
Some people come on their own. Some come together, still working out whether there's a marriage to save. Both are the right way to arrive.
The Foundation Phase
There's a stage before anything legal begins, and it has no name in most people's minds — which is exactly why it gets skipped. I call it the Foundation Phase: the period in which you work out what you're dealing with, what you want, and in what order things need to happen.
Decisions made in this phase quietly shape everything downstream. Which route you take. What it costs. How your children experience the next two years. Whether you and the other person can still speak to each other by the end of it. It is the cheapest and most useful part of the whole process, and it is the part almost nobody plans for.
What we cover
- Where you actually are. Not the version you'd give a friend. What's happening, what's already been said, and what has and hasn't been set in motion.
- How you're married, and what that means. Your marital regime determines a great deal about what happens to what you own. Most people are unclear on theirs, and a surprising number are wrong about it.
- What the process looks like in South Africa. The realistic routes, what each one involves, roughly how long each takes, and what each tends to cost.
- Your children. What they need from the next year, what a parenting plan is, and what the two of you will need to agree.
- The financial picture in broad terms. Enough to see the shape of it and to know which questions to take to a specialist.
- What to do first. You leave with a sequence, not a to-do list. Order matters more than effort here.
How you can be married
This is orientation, not legal advice — but knowing which of these applies to you changes the entire conversation.
- In community of property
- The default if you married without an antenuptial contract. You share a single joint estate — assets and debts alike, including debts incurred by one of you alone.
- Out of community, with accrual
- You each keep your own estate, and on divorce the growth accumulated during the marriage is shared. Whatever was declared as commencement value at the start sits outside that calculation.
- Out of community, without accrual
- Complete separation. What is in your name is yours; what is in theirs is theirs. There is no sharing of growth.
- Customary marriage or civil union
- Both are recognised in law and both have property consequences of their own. Worth establishing early rather than assuming.
If you have an antenuptial contract and can't find it, that is retrievable. If you don't know whether you have one, that's answerable too.
The routes available to you
- Agreement between you. The two of you settle the terms and an attorney puts the settlement agreement before the court. Fastest and least expensive by a wide margin, where it's achievable.
- Mediation. A neutral third party works through the open questions with both of you until there is something both can sign. Private, considerably cheaper than litigation, and the outcome stays yours rather than a court's.
- Attorney negotiation. Each of you instructs a lawyer and they negotiate on your behalf. Appropriate in some circumstances, and slower and costlier than the two above.
- Litigation. The court decides. It exists for good reason, and it is the route most people assume is the only one.
Knowing all four exist, and which one fits your situation, is often the single most valuable thing that comes out of a first conversation.
What this session is not
I am not an attorney and I do not give legal advice. I do not draft your settlement agreement, value your business, or advise on your pension interest. What I do is get you oriented, so that when you sit down with the specialists you need, you arrive knowing what you're asking and why.
Where you need an attorney, a financial specialist or a therapist, I'll say so and point you to colleagues I trust.
How it runs
- A phone callTell me what's going on. I'll ask a few questions and explain what would actually help. There's no cost to this.
- Two hours togetherThe first session is best at two hours. There is background to cover, and moving through it too quickly tends to cost more further along. In person in Cape Town, or online.
- You leave with a sequenceWhat to do, in what order, and who to speak to. Some people need nothing further. Others carry on into coaching or bring the other person into mediation.
An agreement your children can live inside
Children don't experience the separation. They experience the arrangements — where they sleep on a Tuesday, who fetches them from cricket, whose house holds the school shoes. A parenting plan is what turns two people's intentions into something a child can rely on.
What it is
A parenting plan is a written agreement between people who hold parental responsibilities and rights, setting out how each of them will exercise those rights and care for the child. It is provided for in sections 33 and 34 of the Children's Act 38 of 2005, and it applies whether or not you were ever married.
It is not a statement of who was right. It is an operating document — specific enough that neither of you has to negotiate a Wednesday afternoon ever again.
When one is required
Where co-holders of parental responsibilities and rights are having difficulty exercising them, the Act requires them to attempt to agree on a parenting plan before approaching a court — and to do so with the assistance of a family advocate, social worker or psychologist, or through mediation by a suitably qualified person.
Where you are able to agree between yourselves without difficulty, a plan is optional. Most separating parents still choose to have one, because the value isn't in the requirement. It's in the clarity.
What goes into it
- Care and residence. Where the children live, and on which days.
- Contact. Term time, weekends, and how handovers happen — including where and by whom.
- Holidays and special days. School holidays, birthdays, Christmas, Eid, Mother's and Father's Day, and how they rotate.
- Schooling. Which school, who attends meetings, who receives the reports, and how a change of school is decided.
- Medical. Routine care, medical aid, and how decisions get made in an emergency.
- Travel and relocation. Consent for travel abroad, and what happens if one of you wants to move.
- Religion, culture and extramurals. Where these matter to your family, they belong in writing.
- Communication. How the two of you exchange information, through which channel, and how quickly.
- Review and dispute resolution. When the plan gets revisited, and what you do when you disagree — before anyone reaches for a court.
Making it enforceable
A parenting plan must be in writing and signed by both of you. To carry legal weight it is then either registered with the Office of the Family Advocate or made an order of court, in the prescribed format and with the required supporting documents.
Where the plan has come out of mediation, that is confirmed in a statement from the mediator that accompanies the application. As a SAAM-accredited mediator I provide that statement as part of the work.
How I run it
- A call with each of youSeparately, before we begin. It lets me hear from each of you properly and understand what matters most to you both. This is standard neutral practice, and it makes the joint work considerably faster.
- Working sessionsUsually two to four, of 60 to 90 minutes. We work through the plan point by point. Keeping to that length is deliberate — it keeps each session productive and stops the work drifting.
- A drafted planI draft it as we go, so you both see the document forming rather than receiving something at the end you didn't expect.
- Signature and registrationOnce you're both satisfied, the plan is signed and taken forward for registration with the Family Advocate or to be made an order of court.
Where being in the same room isn't workable
It sometimes isn't, and that is a practical fact rather than a failure. We can work in separate sessions, in separate rooms, or online. The plan that comes out of it is exactly as valid.
For families where communication between households is consistently difficult, a plan can be built to minimise the number of decisions that need discussing at all — schedules fixed well in advance, information exchanged through one written channel, and each household running its own routine. This is a deliberate, well-established approach, and for many families it is the arrangement that finally lets everyone breathe.
Revisiting it
The plan is in place and life moves on — a new school, a new partner, a teenager whose week no longer fits the schedule. Rather than returning to court every time something changes, we work it through and revise it. Most families need this every few years, and it takes a fraction of the time the original did.
In their words
“Before I worked with Nikki, every week felt like chaos.”
My ex and I couldn't agree on anything, and our kids were caught in the middle. Nikki helped us create a parenting plan and contact schedule that finally brought order and predictability. Our kids now know exactly where they'll be and when, and that stability has made such a difference.
“Nikki brought us to the realisation that it's not about us, but our children.”
She helped us deal with the difficult questions around our little boy when emotions were high and we felt we couldn't come to a compromise on our own. After only a few sessions, we felt we could move forward together — knowing she was there to circle back to if needed.
“I reached out to Nikki when I finally hit rock bottom.”
Divorce has been the loneliest, scariest, saddest life transition I've ever experienced. Looking back, I wish I had reached out sooner. Thank you, Nikki, for helping me through this chapter of my life. You'll always be a part of my story.
“I didn't expect it would get emotional — but it did.”
We came to Nikki at the start of our divorce. When things became difficult and we stopped seeing eye to eye, her calm kept us focused. By the time we reached the legal stage, our parenting plan and our finances were organised and ready to go. It wasn't easy, but her support kept us moving.
“We didn't know where to start — only that we had to.”
Nikki gave us practical guidance and a real understanding of what matters. She kept bringing us back to one question: is this in our children's best interest? She helped us handle the everyday decisions that don't need a lawyer but make an enormous difference.
“Sitting at the same table wasn't something I could face.”
Nikki started us in joint mediation and saw quickly that it wasn't going to work. She moved us into separate sessions so we could work through the issues without having to speak directly to each other, and we reached the resolutions we needed — particularly for our children. I keep going back to her as things change.
Clients are named with their permission, and only where they were happy to be. Much of this work is confidential by its nature, and most of the people I've worked with would rather it stayed that way — which is as it should be.
A phone call
You don't need to arrive knowing which of these you need. Give me a ring and tell me what's going on. I'll ask a few questions, get a proper sense of your situation, and explain what would actually help.
From there, most people begin with a consultation — one session, long enough to properly get somewhere. If what you need is an attorney, a therapist or a financial specialist, I'll tell you that and point you to colleagues I trust.
Where I fit alongside the professionals
My work covers communication, clarity and agreement-building, including parenting plans. It doesn't cover legal advice, financial settlement or the division of assets.
Coaching sits alongside legal and psychological care rather than replacing it. When your matter needs an attorney, a therapist or a financial specialist, I'll say so and refer you to colleagues I trust.
Start with a conversation
Tell me where you are and we'll work out the rest together. Nothing is decided on the first call.
Thank you — that's come through.
I'll be in touch within one working day. If it's urgent, call or WhatsApp me on +27 73 877 0802.
- Phone & WhatsApp+27 73 877 0802
- Emailnikki@reclaimcoaching.co.za
- HoursMon–Fri 8:00–16:00 · Sat 8:00–12:00
- SessionsIn person in the Cape Town area, or online anywhere in South Africa