How typical is it for a spouse to completely cut off communication?<P>I came home from work one day last July to find all of my wife's things gone from our house (no prior discussion of divorce), replaced by a note saying we would always be friends, but asking me to sign papers ending our marriage. My wife called me later that night to find out if I was going to sign the papers. I said no, and asked for an explanation. She talked vaguely about her feelings, but the only explanation she seemed able to offer was that it was "necessary", and she threatened me with a "nasty divorce" if I wouldn't cooperate. Since we had an an appointment with the psychotherapist we had been seeing set for two days later, I asked her to come and tell him what she was trying to tell me, hoping that we could make some sense out of what was happening. She agreed to do so.<P>My wife did not show up for the appointment, but I had a talk with the therapist, and the next day I had a talk with my mother-in-law, who shocked me by urging me to give my wife what she wanted. After thinking it about it some more, though, I reluctantly concluded that nothing good could come of trying to hold my wife against her will, and so the next day I left her a note saying that if she would come with me to the therapist and satisfy him that she understood the meaning and ramifications of what she was asking for, I would work with her on a dissolution.<P>Subsequent attempts to contact my wife by phone failed. A week later, however, I tracked my wife down and asked her what was going on. I had thought I was offering to give her what she asked for, but instead she told me that my note had convinced her that we could not be friends and could not talk except through lawyers. I tried to talk with her further, asking her what moral principles she was living by (since both of us had professed to believe that marriage made before God was for a lifetime), and she responded that she lived "by reality". She then threatened to call the police if I didn't leave. We were in a public place, and I have no idea what charges she could have made against me, but it was pretty clear at that point that further communication was not likely to be fruitful.<P>On two other occasions in July I spoke to my wife briefly, but that's been it. She filed for divorce in September, on entirely fictitious grounds, and demanded spousal support, both temporary and permanent, making some rather bizarre claims regarding her expenses.<P>Attempts to open negotiations for a settlement have been entirely unsuccessful. Everything either I or my lawyer has sent to my wife's lawyer has simply vanished, as if down a black hole. Even the interrogatory we sent is now past due.<P>So tell me, please, how typical is this kind of behavior?<BR>

GDP<BR>When you find out how normal this is let me know. Our situations are almost identical with actions, dates and times.<BR>My W cleaned out our house with the assistance of our 3 BILs on July 28. It took me two weeks to establish contact with her, at which time she informed me she had instructed a lawyer to file for divorce. I received the lawyer's letter six weeks later and responded with a conditional acceptance. To this day I have heard nothing back from her or her lawyer. My sense is she has run out of gas (financially and emotionally)with the decision that led her to move out, but I have no way of knowing for sure.<P>Quite frankly, it's time to start pushing some buttons and will be doing so tomorrow.I intend to have one our major creditors contact her lawyer to put some presure on to find out what is going on. The silence is deafening, but at this point has no meaning.<P>It sounds like our situations have much in common, so I am interested to see how this thread develops.

I've been on these boards for two years. I don't think it's typical behavior, but I've seen it here at least half a dozen times. I have experienced a variation of this same theme myself. I've been separated since Sept. 98 and I still haven't been told what was wrong with the marriage, why it's not fixable, or anything else. I did eventually initiate the divorce. My husband won't respond to my settlement offer and still hasn't done the disclosure forms, which were due 60 days from the filing back in August. He cannot use the word divorce and hasn't told his family yet. They invited us all to Christmas dinner, which I obviously refused. My husband pretty much dropped his kids as well, including a newborn at the time he left (now a healthy toddler).<P>I don't think it's typical behavior, BUT, I also haven't seen the few examples of it here on these boards reach positive outcomes. You didn't indicate whether you have children - I think that's a very important issue. If there are children and she's dropped them too, I think someone really needs to get her into therapy and I also think your marriage is worth more work/time. If you don't have children, I think you should be seriously thinking about how much effort you're willing to put into this. It could easily take five years or longer, with no guaranteed success at the end.<P>I'd bet big money a third party is involved and your wife is emotionally connected elsewhere. That seems to be a prerequisite to being able to completely emotionally disconnect from one's prior life. The need to justify is extremely strong. She's probably completely convinced yourself that your situation is unsalvagable, that's how she can live with making no effort to fix things. She's also probably blaming you for a vast array of things, thus the anger about your completely reasonable behavior. Frankly, whatever you do is likely to be perceived as unreasonable.<P>My strong advice is to go to Plan B, completely cut her off and start living your own life, while you put some serious thought into what you really want in the future. Plan A is a total bust in this situation and will hurt you further. I know this from experience. It doesn't work with someone so disconnected. The only hope is for her to become disillusioned with whatever pulled her away (the likely affair) and for her to see what she's done, with some compassion for you. Until that happens, you've got nothing.<P>I wish you much luck. It's a hard road ahead. Don't forget to take care of yourself along the way.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by TrueNorth:<BR><B>GDP<BR>...My sense is she has run out of gas (financially and emotionally)with the decision that led her to move out, but I have no way of knowing for sure.<BR>...It sounds like our situations have much in common, so I am interested to see how this thread develops.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>I'm not sure how similar our situations really are. The courts in my case aren't waiting around, and I am already being required to pay temporary spousal support at an unsustainable rate. (My wife is apparently being rewarded for not working, although she is quite capable of doing so.) I suspect that my wife is not cooperating because negotiating a settlement would require her to (a) think about what she wants and (b) ask for something. It might be difficult to reconcile that with her self-assigned victim role. Far better to blame me and the courts for everything that happens. Her lawyer has a reputation for liking to fight, and he is certainly not going to encourage her to settle. I suspect he may even be encouraging her not to respond to anything.<BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Distressed:<BR><B>...You didn't indicate whether you have children - I think that's a very important issue. ...If you don't have children, I think you should be seriously thinking about how much effort you're willing to put into this. It could easily take five years or longer, with no guaranteed success at the end.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Thank God, no children. Effort? With no communication and no contact, there is nothing for me to do except wait. And I am fully aware that I could wait for decades. Of course, I wouldn't just be sitting around while I was waiting...<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>I'd bet big money a third party is involved and your wife is emotionally connected elsewhere. That seems to be a prerequisite to being able to completely emotionally disconnect from one's prior life. The need to justify is extremely strong.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Actually, I think it's highly unlikely that a third party is involved. I believe that she experienced a bonding crisis in which she literally felt that she would lose her sense of identity if she stayed with me. She ran because she felt her very survival as a person was at stake. This is about a fear of intimacy, and she doesn't dare let <I>anyone</I> inside the walls she has erected around herself.<P>The need to justify is indeed strong. My wife's willingness to discard her convictions and values, her apparent initial expectation that I would be happy or relieved to be rid of her (despite constant demonstrations of the opposite by word and deed), and her strange fears and fabrications all bespeak a monumental desperation and self-delusion. (Perhaps even more astonishing is her family's apparent inability to see that anything's wrong. But then, they had many years of practice pretending to themselves and the world that nothing was wrong in their family. I guess some skills you never forget.)<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>My strong advice is to go to Plan B, completely cut her off and start living your own life, while you put some serious thought into what you really want in the future. Plan A is a total bust in this situation and will hurt you further. I know this from experience. It doesn't work with someone so disconnected.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Neither Plan A nor Plan B are relevant, I think. My wife has already cut <I>me</I> off. With no communication and no contact, my wife would have no way of even knowing what plan I intended to put into effect.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>The only hope is for her to become disillusioned with whatever pulled her away (the likely affair) and for her to see what she's done, with some compassion for you. Until that happens, you've got nothing.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>I agree that this is my only hope. The emotional effort required to sustain the level of denial and self-delusion she requires must be enormous. I can't imagine how she can sustain it, and what I really worry about is what she will do when her delusions begin to break down. There are many more self-destructive strategies she could pursue (including that affair you suspect).<P>Fortunately, I spent twelve years of marriage consistently demonstrating my love and trustworthiness to my wife; so if she does finally wake up, I think the prospects of rebuilding our marriage are excellent.<BR><p>[This message has been edited by GnomeDePlume (edited January 01, 2001).]

I saw a lot of the same things, but when my wife left me, I was the one who became non-communicative (Plan B). Not a perfect Plan B, but still Plan B. No affair that I know of. <P>Here's an interesting article: <A HREF="http://clearinghouse.mwsc.edu/manuscripts/61.asp" TARGET=_blank>http://clearinghouse.mwsc.edu/manuscripts/61.asp</A>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Sisyphus:<BR><B>Here's an interesting article: <A HREF="http://clearinghouse.mwsc.edu/manuscripts/61.asp" TARGET=_blank>http://clearinghouse.mwsc.edu/manuscripts/61.asp</A> </B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Yeah, I found this article some time ago. I actually found Bennett's book <I>Sudden Endings</I> before I found the article, and that was the book that started me on the way to understanding what was going on with my wife.<BR>

GnomeDePlume...<P>Your W is taking you to the cleaners...<P>Get the absolute best attorney you can!!!!<P>I usually make the recommendation of finding a <B>good</B> attorney. A good place to start off is at the <A HREF="http://lawyers.martindale.com/marhub/form/by.html" TARGET=_blank>Martindale-Hubbell Lawyer Search</A> site. Do a search within your county... look for only "family law" specialists(>80% in divorce/custody/etc.)... make sure they do a lot of "family law committee work"... if they know the judges all the better... You can normally find a few that will give initial counseling free of charge.<BR><A HREF="http://www.uslaw.com" TARGET=_blank>USLaw.com</A> (an alternative search site)<P>Protect yourself.<P>My W did it to me...<BR>...and I have 3 kids... and she went the [i]pretend[/b] Child custody battle route!<P>Get an attorney who can reduce the spousal support to a reasonable level...<BR>...you'll need to document your actual expenditures to an incredible level of detail...<BR>...but it's worth it!<P>Yes... for you... it is Plan B time!<P> <P>Jim

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by NSR:<BR><B>Your W is taking you to the cleaners...</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Indeed she is. I still don't think she is doing it intentionally. I suspect she is just pretending she is not responsible and is letting her lawyer call all the shots. But the effect is the same.<P>I believe I have good lawyers, and that I am doing everything possible to protect myself. Unfortunately, my wife holds all the cards.<P>For twelve years of marriage, I indulged her. Whatever she wanted to do, she did, and she never worked full-time because it was never necessary. Nonetheless, she has two college degrees and recent work experience, and I believe she could more than meet her expenses with little trouble, if she would just work full-time. (But I suppose then she wouldn't be able to take so many dance classes.)<P>The courts, however, are procrustean, and they don't care. All they tend to see is a disparity in income. When determining temporary spousal support, the only income they imputed to her was from the quarter-time position she resigned from two weeks before filing for divorce.<P>I am acutely aware that without a good lawyer I am certain to lose everything I have. With a good lawyer, I am still subject to the whim of the courts.<BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by NSR:<BR><B>Your W is taking you to the cleaners...</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Indeed she is. I still don't think she is doing it intentionally. I suspect she is just pretending she is not responsible and is letting her lawyer call all the shots. But the effect is the same.<P>I believe I have good lawyers, and that I am doing everything possible to protect myself. Unfortunately, my wife holds all the cards.<P>For twelve years of marriage, I indulged her. Whatever she wanted to do, she did, and she never worked full-time because it was never necessary. Nonetheless, she has two college degrees and recent work experience, and I believe she could more than meet her expenses with little trouble, if she would just work full-time. (But I suppose then she wouldn't be able to take so many dance classes.)<P>The courts, however, are procrustean, and they don't care. All they tend to see is a disparity in income. When determining temporary spousal support, the only income they imputed to her was from the quarter-time position she resigned from two weeks before filing for divorce.<P>I am acutely aware that without a good lawyer I am certain to lose everything I have. With a good lawyer, I am still subject to the whim of the courts.<BR>

Did she contribute in any way to your material success? I would think so. Tally up those ways, and make sure to argue that they be subtracted from your income if there's legal precedent for it in your state (or even if there's not, but your attorney thinks it's reasonable). Will your expenses go up while you're alone? ... I would think so. This is the flip-side of the wife's argument with respect to her worth as a homemaker. Will being single adversely affect your career advancement? Argue that issue too. <P>Is there a lot of property? There may be things your divorce attorney would be afraid to tell a court he advised you to do in order to protect it, but another attorney may be able to speak more freely. Your divorce attorney may even feel duty bound to advise against some course of action, while not being able to say he thinks you're a pretty smart cookie. For instance, rich people have been known to buy property and settle trusts in as many states as possible in order to make pursuing the assets difficult as a practical matter, even though the other spouse may be legally entitled to do so. It might even make a court angry (judges yell loudest when they're being rendered impotent), but it can be a lever in a settlement. <P>Before I get flamed, the dissolution law in any particular state is subject to a lot of forces, and at any given time may be quite *unfair* in a particular case ... if someone has their own *good faith* ideas about what's fair, I'm not going to second guess the means they use to achieve a fair result.

Sisyphus, I don't have any trouble making rational arguments about what's fair, I have documented all sorts of factors regarding my expenses and my contributions to my wife's career, and I have yet to have anyone tell me that they think my wife is being reasonable. But the fundamental problem is that the magistrates and judges simply don't have any reason to care, and they are not obligated to consider any facts or arguments that I (or my lawyer) might try to present.<P>When my mother-in-law got divorced, the judge got impatient with the bickering of the lawyers, and made a ruling before he'd even heard any of the relevant facts.<P>All the "justice" system cares about is getting a case done with so that they can go on to the next one and get that one over with too.<P>The default position in this environment favors my wife. My salary is four times what hers was. (Never mind that hers was a quarter-time position.) Therefore, it is automatically assumed that I should pay her alimony.<P>How I'm going to be able to do that without losing my home is beyond me, especially since the house needs a new roof. (When we bought the house in 1999, we agreed that I would pay for the house and my wife would pay for the roof, but somehow I don't think that's going to happen...)<P>My wife doesn't want the house, and even assured me that I wouldn't lose it, but as long as she refuses to negotiate neither of us has any control over it. The judge has no reason to care. And we have very few significant assets, so I don't really have any bargaining chips when it comes to property.<BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by GnomeDePlume:<BR><B>My salary is four times what hers was. (Never mind that hers was a quarter-time position.) Therefore, it is automatically assumed that I should pay her alimony.<P>How I'm going to be able to do that without losing my home is beyond me, especially since the house needs a new roof. (When we bought the house in 1999, we agreed that I would pay for the house and my wife would pay for the roof, but somehow I don't think that's going to happen...)<P>My wife doesn't want the house, and even assured me that I wouldn't lose it, but as long as she refuses to negotiate neither of us has any control over it. The judge has no reason to care. And we have very few significant assets, so I don't really have any bargaining chips when it comes to property.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>If your financials *demonstrate* that what you're paying is unsustainable, I would ask your attorney to draft a letter to the other side explaining why you're cutting back to what is sustainable. If she wants to take further action to enforce that, fine, it's up to the judge to call it a ball or a strike. <P>Either you're not as bad off as you say, or you're not communcating to your attorney how dire your situation is, or he's not fighting for you.<P>If you're really in the right, tell him what you're doing; and that it's up to him to convince the other side (and the court if necessary) of the rightness of your position. <P>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Sisyphus:<BR><B> If your financials *demonstrate* that what you're paying is unsustainable, I would ask your attorney to draft a letter to the other side explaining why you're cutting back to what is sustainable. If she wants to take further action to enforce that, fine, it's up to the judge to call it a ball or a strike.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P>I can't cut it back. Where I live they automatically garnish your wages when support is awarded.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>Either you're not as bad off as you say, or you're not communcating to your attorney how dire your situation is, or he's not fighting for you.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>My attorney knows my situation and has requested an oral hearing. The original order for spousal support was made without a real hearing, and although my attorney did file a brief (which seemed very convincing to me), it was obviously ignored.<BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by GnomeDePlume:<BR><B>I can't cut it back. Where I live they automatically garnish your wages when support is awarded.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Then I'm out of legitimate ideas. In the semi-legitimate category, change jobs, go self-employed, move to another state. Make sure you don't pay a dime on the principal of any marital debts. My favorite (probably apocryphal) wily judgment debtor story is that of a debtor called to a deposition in aid of execution (what have you got, where is it?--so we can go get it) who was asked about all his real estate, jewelry, art, securities accounts, bank accounts, etc. What they forgot to ask was how much cash he had on his person. Which was his entire fortune ... he had liquidated, withdrawn everything from the bank, and assumed correctly that such a small detail would be overlooked. This was in the days before they stopped making $500 and $1000 bills on account of counterfeiting and drugs.<P>I can almost see automatic garnishment of *child support*, but marriage is much more a contractual matter (I am speaking legally here--leaving deeper feelings about its sanctity out of it) and it is unfair for a court to simply assume that (a) it knows what a temporary support figure should be without a real hearing and (b) that you won't pay it voluntarily. That hands nearly 100% of the power to the non-earning spouse, and puts the earning spouse in a tough spot because many employers *fire* workers who cause them to have to go through the hassle of complying with garnishment orders.<P>It is, I'm afraid, the fault of neanderthals who have gone before us ... the old practice, of course, was to starve the STBX into submission to a paltry property settlement and alimony, then fail to comply with even that. But talk about legislative overreaction! What state is this? And are you sure they don't have a burdizzo clamp in store for you?<BR>

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Sisyphus:<BR><B> Then I'm out of legitimate ideas. In the semi-legitimate category, change jobs, go self-employed, move to another state. Make sure you don't pay a dime on the principal of any marital debts.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>My goal is to avoid being forced out of my home, so moving isn't a solution. Changing jobs, I suspect, would only be a temporary solution, and I do not have the time or energy at this point to take the steps necessary to prepare for full-time self-employment.<P>Fortunately, we had no debts except for my wife's student loan, one car loan, and the mortgage. Unfortunately, the order for spousal support requires my wife to make the car payments (it's her car). I would rather have paid less support and continued making the car payments myself, so my credit rating would not be at risk. Of course, by the time this is all over, my credit may be ruined anyway, so maybe it doesn't matter...<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>I can almost see automatic garnishment of *child support*, but marriage is much more a contractual matter...and it is unfair for a court to simply assume that (a) it knows what a temporary support figure should be without a real hearing and (b) that you won't pay it voluntarily.</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Indeed, it is the "Child Support Enforcement Agency" which processes the support payments. Given my wife's behavior, there is actually a certain irony to this.<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><B>But talk about legislative overreaction! What state is this? And are you sure they don't have a burdizzo clamp in store for you?</B><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>I live in Ohio, but I don't know whether garnishment of wages is routine here, or whether it was just this particular magistrate's whim in my case.<P>I particularly appreciate the fact that the laws in Ohio prohibit the courts from taking the grounds for divorce into account when it comes to spousal support and the property settlement. So if I were a freeloading bum that abused my wife horribly, the courts would nevertheless be compelled to award me an "equitable" share of my wife's income and property obtained during our marriage. The law says that both of us must be considered to have contributed equally, regardless of the financial realities.<P>Of course, that's just what the law <I>says</I>. I don't know how it's actually <I>practiced</I>.<P>And as for the clamp, well, let's just say that I've already been shocked and outraged so many times by the way the legal system operates that even that wouldn't surprise me much any more.<BR>