SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

A friend of mine got divorced 6 years ago when his kid was 3 or 4. They did not use lawyers to save money or because "I hate lawyers".

Now things are getting sticky because the kid needs all sorts of stuff as she grows up like braces, sports stuff, music and dance lessons and my friend and wife don't make equal $ anymore. Who pays what?

Having something on paper that is enforceable is handy when you have to deal with your XW and child for the next 18 plus years.

No doubt in my mind if your W can't afford a lawyer, her parents will foot the bill and you need to protect yourself and your kid. Get a lawyer-you need one if she has one.

While I have had limited dealings with lawyers I have had calls on a Saturday probably because she (my attorney) was doing my divorce "as a friend of a friend" not through her firm.

But in this case and others after a phone call I would get a follow up email or letter describing the topics we talked about and clarifying any questions I had.

Short marriage, both spouses working so unless you are in a place like Macomb Cty Mi I doubt that you will be on the hook for spousal support as she is employable and will likely remain employed if she is in a teacher union

Casey,

At 28--educated, talented, and driven--the world is yours.

You know that, and your stbxw knows that as well. This is her 'out' from living in your shadow. Water always finds its level.

Chase (and mom).

Like all of us you have 24 hours in a day. I want you to sleep for 8 and work for 8. I guess you need 1 for the commute and stuff, and maybe 1-2 for chores and home-work. I want you to have at least 1 hour for exercise or anything to do for YOU. You need time to work on the divorce and then you need time for your daughter… I really don’t see time here for OM.

If you want to imagine OM face on a punching-ball that’s fine. If you imagine him as the golf-ball before hammering it +200 yards great. If you are tramping on him as you run three miles, fantastic. But if you are taking time from your limited 24 hours a day to scheme or plot against him… it’s time that could have been spent constructively with your daughter.

On the exercise… Your body needs it. Many of us that have been there will attest that getting physically tired was a key-factor in recovery. That exercise can be you alone in the gym. It can also be an hour in the park with daughter, or cycling with her in a child-seat. It can be mowing the lawn or waxing your car. Just make sure you get physically tired.

Chase – Take control of what you can control. Mainly you and your life. She’s out of the house? Why not make changes? Why not paint the foyer gray instead of the white she chose. Why not rearrange the furniture? Make it your home and start removing memories of her.

By thinking revenge and payback you are allowing her and the OM free real-estate in your brain and wasting your most precious resource – your time.

Casey, while I still stand by my more hate-filled world view, you should know that Bigger is the best advisor that has ever graced the halls of SI. He has the most practical and unbiased approach (for example, many posters are biased toward divorce or reconciliation while he can remain balanced in guiding betrayed spouses out of infidelity).

Why is having Casey’s mom help exposing the OM a waste of her time? I think all of that stuff can be different based on the problem, but if she can run that game it’s the absolute definiteil of outsourcing a problem.

Put it this way, if her boyfriend has the wrath of god raining down upon him it increases Casey’s position.

Casey,

You got this.

If the inquiry from his unit is inactive, the POS has no reason to limit his contact with WW and furher poison WW mind against an amicable settlement in favor of Casey. It is not revenge but a element in course of action. All Casey has to do is provide whatever the army ask from him and forget about it.

Casey, given that you have decided that divorce is what you want, I strongly suggest that you go to the Separation and Divorce Forum, introduce yourself, and start picking the brains of the people there who are going thru this and have gone thru this. There are SO many things to think about when it comes to divorce with a child.

Who pays for what

Where can you take your child (out of state, out of country?)

When do you need permission to take your child anywhere

For costly dental/medical procedures paid out of pocket, what's the percentage and who gets to choose if the procedure is necessary or unnecessary

Right of 1st refusal if the co-parent has to travel/work/etc

and so forth, and so forth, and so forth. The more things that you get nailed down, the better. And the people in the S&D forum are walking your walk.

Thanks for more great advice. I am trying to keep things amicable, but also protect myself behind the scenes. I have taken care of the VAR, and am retaining an attorney tomorrow. As long as she plays nice, we can just do things peacefully, but as soon as she tries to do anything sneaky, I will be prepared to respond immediately and forcefully. And yes, making sure all of the sticky situations involving shared parenting are covered in our divorce agreement is a top priority (taking DD out of state, cost sharing, right of first refusal, etc.) that I will have my attorney handle.

I am considering dropping the complaint with the military... just trying to weigh the pros and cons on each side and think about what I ultimately want. Now that I have set the wheels in motion, it may be too late to drop the complaint, but I could at least withdraw from providing evidence. I think I will sleep on this and make a decision tomorrow. Right now I am focused on moving toward D and moving on with my life, but at the same time, I would still like to clear my WW's fog. It sounds like the AP and my WW are working closely together to cover their asses on all fronts, so things aren't that simple. They probably have their stories all cooked up to explain away their situation.

Had a little bit of a rough time today trying to cope. I spent about an hour looing at photos, listening to "our song," and just grieving. I allowed myself that break from hating her, and just let my guard down and allowed myself to feel the loss and how much I really miss her. I know, maybe not the best idea, but I am feeling better now and ready to get back to business.

[This message edited by CaseyA at 6:54 PM, December 3rd (Sunday)]

Casey,

You can do this.

The reason why you don’t let up on him is ideally you want to keep him busy. Right now 100% of his non-work focus is spent coaching her to optimize her returns from D.

I am considering dropping the complaint with the military... just trying to weigh the pros and cons on each side and think about what I ultimately want. Now that I have set the wheels in motion, it may be too late to drop the complaint, but I could at least withdraw from providing evidence. I think I will sleep on this and make a decision tomorrow.

Can you help me out with what you're thinking here? I'm baffled why you'd want to let off the pressure on the guy that attacked and killed your marriage when you've got your boot on his throat. In my world this is the time for more pressure, not less.

Your kid and the house are legal priorities. She's now his accordion monkey and will follow his likely instruction to settle quickly to shield him from military repercussions.

That's to your advantage.

I urge you to keep the military complaint intact; it provides leverage.

and just grieving

You have to go through the emotion. All of the emotions. Read a bit about the stages of grief. Know that they aren't linear. Your likely to hit all of them at one time or another. Likely bounced around like a pinball (20th century reference;others can give you a more relevant 21st century digital gaming reference )

I am considering dropping the complaint with the military... 

Please don't do this, Casey. Others say this is a path of "revenge". I say it is a defense sttategy from keeping the POSOM from being in your daughters life. You put the screws on him and he will weigh what's more important, his military career or your WW. You put up a fight not to win your WW back, but to keep that "Jody in disguise" out of your daughters life. All you have to do is make phone calls to ask for updates, provide info. How much of that time is really taken out of your week? Most of your efforts will be on the D process and working with your attorney anyway, not staying on top of the POSOM. But, for your daughters sake do not drop the complaint. That con artist will bail from the situation when the heat gets turned up. The military may move slow, but they move. And as a previous poster pointed out earlier, if this POSOM is already disliked the process suddenly has wheels.

This is going to knock your socks off…

Don‘t bother withdrawing your complaint to the military. Just leave it there.

I don’t have any issues with exposing to the military, what I was warning against is that you shouldn’t expect it to bear any fruit. Still think I’m correct on this one.

Your original focus was on exposing to the military and more-or-less expecting him to be drummed out. Won’t happen. But leaving it there… no issues whatsoever.

In fact, going through the process of contacting them, withdrawing the complaint and all that… that’s allowing him to consume your valuable time. Don’t bother.

It’s a bit like leaving a thorn in the side of a bear. It might not stop him but will still bother him.

Regarding the attorney: For now, make him your attorney. Don’t necessarily make your WW aware of him. Do what you are doing already – create a division of assets and a general custody agreement – but then have your attorney approve it and make sure all the caveats are covered.

Divorce costs, but what makes a divorce expensive is generally when people make unrealistic demands. Demands like sole custody or that one spouse forfeits joint assets. Sad thing is that generally people end up with what would have been a fair and cheaper solution. You can fiddle numbers around to your advantage, but ALWAYS have some explanation or logic behind your demands. You can use upper-market value for the car she takes, but depreciate the car you get, things like that.

You can also save considerably on divorce by asking the attorney what info he needs and then providing it yourself. You don’t want him to charge you for phoning the IRS for old returns or for writing your bank for account-statements.

If you think getting revenge on OM is great then go ahead. I think it’s a waste of time. Not for any moral reasons, but simply because IMHO he is a non-entity. He doesn’t matter. He is nothing. Why allow nothing to waste your time?

Coaching your wife? How?

Want revenge on your wife? Well… everything you do that is negative only reinforces her fog-based view on the marriage having been over anyway. “See how Casey reacts? This is why I had to leave him”.

Best revenge ever? Imagine your WW dropping by to pick up DD. Her key doesn’t work because you changed locks (and you did so legally after she agreed to you having prime-residence and/or keeping the house). You open the door and let her in. She notices everything is clean and organized. She notices that you have painted that wall gray, the one that was peach because she likes peach. She notices the pictures from the marriage are gone. She notices that you moved the couch. She notices DD is ready and all her stuff organized in the overnight-bag. She notices DD is clean, tidy and happy. She notices you are clean, groomed, and look OK.

She asks how you are doing. “Great”.

She asks that you stop telling others about the affair. “I’m sorry you feel that way. I think stakeholders to the marriage (friends, family…) deserve to know the truth if they ask, that’s all.”

She wants to linger on. “Here is DD, here is her stuff. I will pick her up at XX at the agreed upon time. Please – I have plans and need to be elsewhere.”

And then you go on and have a great life.

CaseyA,

Being mister nice guy right now will only bring you much more grief in the future, I’m fairly certain, no I am certain your EXW and OM are playing you for a fool, because of your known good nature, they are way ahead of you, they are, lying and devious, you know they are by what they both did to your marriage, they are planning to totally outmanoeuvre you all the way.

Get real open your eyes for goodness sake, use the advice given here on SI and fight back, get rid of or at the very least put Mr Nice Guy on the back burner until you feel safely protected me I would wait until I was divorced as far as they are concerned, get a lawyer ASAP for help in implementing your protection, time to make your own plans for you and your daughter’s best possible future, you only get one chance to get it right, so make sure you do.

Regards BJE49

Have to agree with Bigger on all of the above. Get a lawyer use them to make sure the i's are dotted the ts are crossed and the questions are answered. I'm sure you can get a good list of things to include (as far as DD) in the divorce/separation forum. Then you can send the list to WW with your thoughts on who should pay for what.

I wouldn't drop the military charges either. If they contact you I'd answer their questions but I wouldn't add them to my my daily task list. I also wouldn't expect much from them. This guy could be a real problem. Something fishy is going on with his wife and insurance, the whole dumping the ex without telling her why...and he knew your WW was married when he flew her out there. Let them continue with their investigation, if they feel he is a liability, let them deal with it. You don't have to pursue it.

Are you worried that your WW will go nuts legally when she finds out you called his command and it will make the divorce more difficult? I think that ball is already out there.

How many more days until she is out of the house?

Coaching your wife? How?

He has done this three times before. Casey’s wife is likely in some reasonable facsimile of lala land. He has the experience to guide her in doing exactly what she needs to do to maximize her returns.

By Casey doing two things:

1. Leveraging his wife’s likely clouded judgement

2. Keeping him busy

Casey will have the opportunity to come at her without her knowing this. She’s also exercised a card that she’s afraid of losing her job. Casey doesn’t want this lost because of money, she doesn’t because it’s her livelihood. Given the right situation, she could be sitting in some shitty apartment alone (having been dumped) and (afraid) of losing her job. She’s on a high right now of two men fighting over her. Hit her at that point and you’ll get the optimal settlement, and can also build towards atleast a fair coparenting relationship if done correctly.

Right now there is no way coparenting will work out. She’s just not respecting a single damn word out of Casey’s mouth that doesn’t adhere to her precise worldview. That needs to change NOW for DD’s sake.

I have numerous friends/family members who are in the military. It takes a special spouse to deal with their military SO being away on deployment. They all say it's extremely tough (and I'm sure there's numerous people on here who can speak to this).

Your wife is going to be dealing with this (a 10 month deployment) right off the bat.

I know you've already stated you're moving on from her given her actions.

That said, grab yourself a big bag of popcorn and sit back and watch this play out.