The third lawyer I spoke with (just today) I really liked. I may hire him. He spent nearly one hour on the phone with me for free on his end, and explained everything thoroughly, he made a lot of sense, he was compassionate and took my unique circumstances all into consideration.

It apparently would cost (potentially) a lot less for me to hire an attorney who will write up the divorce agreement rather than go through mediation. I still need and want to consider mediation, but since my husband will probably explode, be unreasonable, and may even try to leave the state, my gut feeling is that I should hire my own lawyer.