Brook Stuntebeck

Brook Stuntebeck wants to know where you’re trying to go. 

Not just who gets the house or how the retirement accounts should be divided. She wants to know what you want your life to look like when the divorce is over. 

Then she wants to help you figure out how to get there. 

Family law wasn’t where Brook’s career started. After graduating from Georgia State University College of Law, she joined a large firm where she worked primarily on civil matters with very little Client contact. She was good at the work. She just wasn’t convinced she wanted to spend her career doing it. 

Then a senior partner asked her to help with a few family law cases. 

Brook discovered she liked the strategy and negotiation. More importantly, she loved working directly with Clients and families. 

When Brook later moved to Texas and asked that partner for a recommendation, he agreed on one condition: she needed to practice family law full time. He told her she was a natural at it, she loved the Clients, and the Clients loved her. 

It turns out he was onto something. 

Brook built her family law practice in Texas before eventually bringing decades of experience to Triangle Smart Divorce. She has handled divorce, custody, support, property division, and the many other issues that come with the end of a marriage. But much of her work today reflects something she believes matters just as much as the issues themselves: how families resolve them. 

Brook spends a significant part of her practice in mediation, and she understands the process from both sides of the table. 

Sometimes she is there as the attorney, advocating for her Client and helping them evaluate possible solutions. Other times, Brook is the mediator, helping both sides work through what is keeping them apart and find a resolution they can live with. 

Having both perspectives makes her better at each role. As an attorney, she knows how to prepare Clients to use mediation effectively. As a mediator, she sees what moves negotiations forward, what gets people stuck, and how important it is for people to feel heard along the way. 

Brook also practices Collaborative Law, giving families another way to resolve their divorce without going to court. 

All of it reflects something Brook believes deeply: whenever possible, families should have a say in what the rest of their lives are going to look like. 

Sometimes going to court is necessary. But when people can reach a thoughtful resolution themselves, they have the opportunity to build something around the realities of their own lives rather than asking a judge to decide for them. 

Brook likes helping Clients find that path. 

She has summed up her philosophy pretty simply: “Tell me your ultimate goals, and we’ll figure out how to get you there in the best possible way.” 

And she means the we part. 

Brook is the kind of attorney who wants Clients to feel like someone is beside them through the process, not simply handling their legal work from a distance. She knows divorce can be overwhelming, and she doesn’t believe Clients should have to navigate it while wondering what is happening or whether anyone understands how hard it is. 

Apparently, that comes through. 

Clients have described Brook as “warm and reassuring,” praised her for making sure they understood their options, and written about feeling supported throughout difficult separations and divorces. One Client described Brook and her Team as a “great support system.” Another said Brook’s professionalism and compassion made the divorce process easier. 

That’s exactly how Brook wants it. 

Her work has also earned recognition from the legal community, including selections to Texas Super Lawyers Rising Stars and recognition by Best Lawyers in America for her work in family law. But the part of family law that first pulled Brook away from the big-firm world is still the part that matters most to her: the people. 

Outside the office, Brook spends much of her time doing what parents of kids in sports do: going to practices, games, tournaments, and whatever else happens to be on the family calendar that week. She also has two dogs, because apparently multiple human schedules weren’t quite enough to keep track of. 

With all those games on the calendar, Brook does have one college sports allegiance of her own. Brook is a Georgia football fan, making her one of the relatively rare SEC representatives in the TSD college sports debate. This gives her the opportunity to watch the UNC, Duke, NC State, and ECU factions make their respective cases while remaining confident that the entire conversation may be missing the point. 

At work, though, Brook is much more interested in helping people find common ground. 

Divorce will change things. Brook can’t make every part of it easy, and she won’t pretend otherwise. What she can do is make sure her Clients understand their choices, have a voice in the decisions that will shape what comes next, and know they have someone beside them while they get there. 

Tell Brook where you’re trying to go. Then the two of you can start figuring out how to get there.