Published on:

Divorce can feel like a full-time job. It can be all-consuming, affecting every aspect of your life. Between the (sometimes) contentious texts with your ex-partner, phone calls to your attorney and figuring out child custody, where you are going to live and how your new life will look, there is almost always a sense of uncertainty or fear just below the surface. And regardless of how affluent the couple is, there is often a great deal of worry about the financial future.

Once separated or divorced, the informed spouse already has the experience and relationships to transition financially, but the other spouse has to start from scratch. In my experiences as a divorce financial planner who has specialized in working with the “out” spouse, three fears have emerged as most common. While some degree of worry and apprehension is to be expected, with a little work and planning, these three common divorce fears can be eliminated and can help the out spouse feel more confident and secure.

1. Fear of not getting a fair share. If your finances are simple, it can be easy to evenly divide the assets, but if your finances are more complex (e.g., multiple homes, employer stock options, closely held business, illiquid investments, separate property), this can become much more difficult. The solution is to answer these two questions: What do we own and what is it worth? If you are concerned that assets are not being disclosed, discuss this with your attorney and consider hiring a forensic accountant — basically a financial detective — to help uncover any undisclosed assets. The next issue is to arrive at a fair value for each asset. This is an area that is ripe for abuse. The valuation of family-owned or other privately held companies is inherently prone to subjectivity and, particularly in the divorce context, manipulation.

Published on:

Falling in love with a person with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is an emotional roller coaster ride. The relationship involves never-ending emotional blackmails, hurtful criticisms, threats, manipulations, verbal attacks and silent treatments. Borderlines are known to call you at work more than 20 times in a day. Borderlines need constant reassurance. Borderlines feel the need to check up on you all the time. Borderlines also wake you up in the middle of the night because of their concerns.

How can you continue to love a person who will give you the responsibility for anything and everything bad that happens to them? You are accused as the source of all their pains, heartbreaks, anger, frustrations and hardships? The Borderline will emotionally wear you out by their insults and accusations.

Borderlines have a problem with regulating their emotions. They feel real pain and fear of abandonment.

Published on:

1. Fight as hard as you can to get the most time possible from the very start. Whether you want the kids to live with you (as primary residential custodial parent) or you simply want to have an “aggressive” visitation access schedule, be clear about your goals and push for what you want. If you want equal time (or any decent amount of time), you need to push for more from the very beginning of the case.

2. Find an attorney who gets it. (Blog Author’s Note: Illinois Attorney Michael F. Roe “gets it!”) Many divorce lawyers just don’t understand why dads want more access time. You are dealing with a system that has historically favored mothers’ custody wishes, and is only now very slowly changing.

3. Do not bring child support issues up in custody conversations. Period. Many people — even some lawyers — will assume you want more time with your kids because you want to pay less child support, even when faced with facts that you are the more nurturing parent. While some states tie access time to pro rata support (like New Jersey), some, like Illinois, do not.

Published on:

How to Recover from an Affair Involving Borderline Personality Disorder

By Tommy (http://youmebpd.com/)

The feeling of pain and betrayal that an affair causes is something I would wish on almost no one, but when you add in the addition of borderline personality disorder it throws in a whole new set of variables. Our particular story is one that has a lot of mitigating circumstances, but that makes it no less painful to go through. In June of 2011 I lost my wife (at least that is what it felt like). June, 2011; I checked my wife into Prairie St. John’s facility in Fargo, ND for depression and manic behavior. She went into the facility a loving wife, devoted mother and successful business owner. She spent the first night there crying asking to be sent home to her family. She was met with doctors telling her that if she did not stop crying, asking to go home and start taking all the medicine they had for her that they would hold her indefinitely.

Published on:

Experienced divorce practitioners have come to develop ideas about certain issues or triggers that can cause the contested divorce process to spiral into chaos or high costs. I have my own ideas about these triggers, one of them involving the parties believing that more negative conflict and more “bomb throwing” leads to better results. “Pit bull” reckless behavior by litigants or lawyers only raises costs, elevates stress, and usually results in the judge developing a chip on her shoulder against the litigant. The art of divorce is much like the Art of War…employing experience, creativity, and sophisticated strategy is the pathway to good results. That’s my opinion, and now let’s hear from another lawyer’s perspective:

By Diana Mercer

” When I have friends who are getting divorced, and they ask me for advice, here’s what I tell them. The real deal, the confidential, back-channel skinny. Beyond legal advice, which they can get anywhere.

Published on:

A Father posted this photo from his Son. If anyone wonders why Illinois needs statutory presumptive shared parenting, or why competent and loving Fathers are necessary to the daily lives of their children, this picture tells a thousand words:

father%20card.jpg

Published on:

Tips to co-parenting after divorce

Byline: Our Family Wizard Software

After a divorce, the idea of communicating with an ex may seem near to impossible. While dealing with that person is the last thing you feel like doing, trying to build an amicable relationship with that person is the best thing you can do for your children. Here are a few helpful tips to co-parenting after divorce:

Contact Information