I had a good friend call me on Christmas to catch up. He’s missed me the last few times he’s tried. He might try earlier in the evening, or not smack dab in the middle of a holiday. Timing’s not his thing.
He told me the wife (he’s been married longer than I was) has told him when their last kid moves, she’s filing for divorce.
Fuck me, what’s wrong with these fifties women? She sounds like my ex did. What is this? A virus? A contagious one? They all sound alike. Travel, Fun, yada yada yada. I must know, personally, a half dozen dudes this has happened, or is happening to and it all sounds very, very familiar.
Good lord.
My advice for her is; don’t. Work it out. What’s coming isn’t what you think it will be.
First, your adult children may not be on board. It’ll make interaction with them tough, and since they are adults you may never know what they think. They probably won’t tell you.
Second, there’s the mechanics of it all.
- One of you will have to leave.
- There’s a 60 day ‘cooling off’ period in Texas. Nothing happens for 60 days. Only negotiations if you move fast.
- You’ll need a lawyer. In DFW, that may be $7K-$10K or better – cash on the barrel head. And not all lawyers offer the same services for that do-re-mi. Mine had two fixed fees – $7K, which included everything including mediation. Litigation was another $3K. That’s for an uncontested divorce. Contest it, and the hoover starts vacuuming your bank accounts. By the way, if you’re a dude, you don’t want to be in the…uh…gynocentric family court in downtown Dallas for sure. I nearly wanted to fight until I got a load of how the field was striped.
- They’ll give you the Dallas County Standing Order. I’m sure there’s similar around. It’s the rules you have to abide by. A toe outside those rules, and you’ll be in court.
- Then the fun begins. Texas is a community property state so:
- You aren’t keeping the house, unless you want to pay for it. Look at realtor.com. prices are going down all over here, and only investors are buying. So, that house you think it worth 300K? It’ll be under $200k when all is said and done. It’s a super bad time to do this. Ask me how I know. One of my friends is wealthy. His wife thought she’d stay in the 4500 sq ft house. Yeah…nope. That’s a big nope unless your husband, who probably isn’t on board with this, agrees to it. It still may be all you get. I know a few that the old lady opted for that and found out, real fast, that she couldn’t afford it.
- Debt gets split down the middle. Doesn’t matter if it’s yours or hers. It’s combined, split, a number is reached and shuffling happens.
- Money gets split down the middle. Doesn’t matter if it’s your account or hers. It gets added up, split, a number is reached, and digits flow one way or the other.
- 401k or IRAs? Same as above.
- Property? You can work it out yourselves, or the lawyers will assign a value to every last item, and you’ll split them down the middle. Better work it out.
If you do nothing, the court will do it for you.
I told him I’d happily tell her she’s nuts. Sit down and meditate on what your life will be like five years from now, ten years. You can’t predict the collateral damage. Leaving will cause ripples that you cannot see.
And look at that person you’ve spent those decades with. You pull that trigger, and at the end of the process you’ll be lucky if that person only sees you as a stranger and doesn’t hate your guts.
I see these things, because I’m on the other side. I’m certain my ex cannot. Only I know where I’m going and I’ve shared only a piece of it with the kids. I have a plan. My friend will have one a few months after she pulls the trigger.
My advice is work it out. With a priest, with a pastor, with someone like that that knows you both before you get that ticket for the pain train.
Try and fix it first. Come to the conclusion together.
That advice is for the wife, BTW, not him. Advice for my buddy is here. Vox was right in every way.
At least she told him well in advance.
Inspected By Pat 