Semi-legal, non-politically-correct rant.
It has come to my attention that many women (even nowadays), caught up in planning their wedding, dinner, reception and making sure the carpet doesn't clash with the bridesmaids' dresses are (still) leaving everything else up their prospective grooms to sort out. The little things they simply could not be bothered with, like, oh; I don't know...the contract for the purchase of their house, perhaps? And so off the dutiful man goes to the attorney's, and off your resignation letter goes (with a gleeful note to it, too) to your employer.
2.5 kids and a promotion later, he decides it's time to swap you in for a newer model.
So. You're 43, newly-divorced, without a house or job, or even good employment prospects because there's a 12-year gap in your resume which you might possibly be able to fill in with such entries as "Has a particular knack for removing baby-food stains from ceilings". The family court looks at this homeless, jobless, skill-less woman and thinks: You want us to leave the kids with who?
Still, let's say you manage to get custody, shared or otherwise. So you have wrangled alimony, custody and child support. So what? Alimony and child support is all good and well: until he doesn't want to pay it. If he wakes up one morning and decides the kids are a necessary sacrifice for him to get that lovely new BMW X7 he's been eyeing at the dealer's; tough luck - Shit Creek has just become that much wider, deeper, and stinkier for you.
Yes, there can be serious legal consequences for a dead-beat parent. But the thing is, while the government's busy squeezing money out of him, you *still* don't have a decent place to live, or a good job. And to get back at you for suing him for child support, he sues you for custody. Again. Worse yet, he quite simply declares bankruptcy.
Ultimately it's all horribly draining, protracted legal and emotional nightmare. You'll know more legal jargon at the end of it than a 3rd-year law student, even. From your divorce, to your division of assets, to your custody hearings, to your suit for child support...
LGBT folks are just as much as risk. (Remember that bitch so-and-so was telling you about? The one who ripped off her other so-and-so? Yeah, that's the one.) Don't let the other person talk you into putting only his/her name on the paper 'because it wouldn't look good otherwise', not if you're making significant contributions. Of course, if you want an easy-in-easy-out relationship that's fine. You've got a career - why give it up?
What's the solution? The system isn't about to change anytime soon. All the advice I can offer is this: at the end, at least half the house is yours. That's that. Even if you have to sell, you've got a fair bit of cash with which retain that hotshot lawyer.
ETA: *The above post may or may not apply to residents of the UK only, and is only the opinion of the author. The aforementioned opinion being non-legal in nature, the author thereby disclaims any and all liability which may arise as a result of having followed this obvious over-simplification of a complicated legal process in the current system of justice; including offence taken as a result of perceving that the author appears to be unaware of alternative complications arising in a separation of family affairs, and/or the use of stereotyped divorce situations casting the male in an unsavoury light and the female as a brainless idiot.
There are also situations where it's the other way around.
Now buzz the fuck off and leave me the hell alone.
2.5 kids and a promotion later, he decides it's time to swap you in for a newer model.
So. You're 43, newly-divorced, without a house or job, or even good employment prospects because there's a 12-year gap in your resume which you might possibly be able to fill in with such entries as "Has a particular knack for removing baby-food stains from ceilings". The family court looks at this homeless, jobless, skill-less woman and thinks: You want us to leave the kids with who?
Still, let's say you manage to get custody, shared or otherwise. So you have wrangled alimony, custody and child support. So what? Alimony and child support is all good and well: until he doesn't want to pay it. If he wakes up one morning and decides the kids are a necessary sacrifice for him to get that lovely new BMW X7 he's been eyeing at the dealer's; tough luck - Shit Creek has just become that much wider, deeper, and stinkier for you.
Yes, there can be serious legal consequences for a dead-beat parent. But the thing is, while the government's busy squeezing money out of him, you *still* don't have a decent place to live, or a good job. And to get back at you for suing him for child support, he sues you for custody. Again. Worse yet, he quite simply declares bankruptcy.
Ultimately it's all horribly draining, protracted legal and emotional nightmare. You'll know more legal jargon at the end of it than a 3rd-year law student, even. From your divorce, to your division of assets, to your custody hearings, to your suit for child support...
LGBT folks are just as much as risk. (Remember that bitch so-and-so was telling you about? The one who ripped off her other so-and-so? Yeah, that's the one.) Don't let the other person talk you into putting only his/her name on the paper 'because it wouldn't look good otherwise', not if you're making significant contributions. Of course, if you want an easy-in-easy-out relationship that's fine. You've got a career - why give it up?
What's the solution? The system isn't about to change anytime soon. All the advice I can offer is this: at the end, at least half the house is yours. That's that. Even if you have to sell, you've got a fair bit of cash with which retain that hotshot lawyer.
ETA: *The above post may or may not apply to residents of the UK only, and is only the opinion of the author. The aforementioned opinion being non-legal in nature, the author thereby disclaims any and all liability which may arise as a result of having followed this obvious over-simplification of a complicated legal process in the current system of justice; including offence taken as a result of perceving that the author appears to be unaware of alternative complications arising in a separation of family affairs, and/or the use of stereotyped divorce situations casting the male in an unsavoury light and the female as a brainless idiot.
There are also situations where it's the other way around.
Now buzz the fuck off and leave me the hell alone.