Real World Advice to be Prepared for a Divorce

The internet is full of advice columns that provide good legal and life tips for preparing for your divorce. Many of the ideas tend to repeat each other, or be limited to strictly legal advice. Here are some practical real world things you can do to prepare yourself for a divorce.

Protect Personal Items

You never know what the other spouse may be thinking or what he or she is capable of doing. People generally know to protect passwords, cash, or other valuable property. However, you should be prepared to protect family heirlooms, or items of sentimental value as well.

Be Prepared for a Longer Process

You are only half the battle. Just because you are agreeable, or want to get the process done with quickly doesn’t mean your spouse does. Even minor arguments or disagreements can take time for courts to resolve.

Courts are Not for Emotions

Many people enter divorce proceedings with sights set on vengeance, emotional closure, or thinking that divorce will help them “let go.” Courts can’t address these kinds of emotional issues. Surely, every divorce will have some emotion. However, every spouse needs to make sure they are fighting over things worth fighting for and not fighting for emotional reasons.

The Marital Home

Many spouses want to keep the marital home for the children. Surely, there is stability to keeping kids in their homes. However, spouses need to assess whether it is worth not just the fighting, but the cost of keeping the home even after the divorce is over.

Remember that if a home has some equity, the proceeds from selling the home can act as a nest egg to start over. A smaller or less expensive home may be easier for you to maintain and afford (and have a positive emotional benefit as well)

If you do move out of the home and get another place to live, make sure that it has the space for the children to live and be comfortable in.

Help Your Attorney

Make sure you have information about bank accounts, debts, assets, the kids’ school teachers, their doctors and other information available for your attorneys. Certainly you don’t have to litigate your own divorce, or get the information yourself–that’s what attorneys are for. But start making note of important names, contact information, account numbers, and collecting vital documents that your attorney will need during your case.

Getting Advice

It seems that everybody has advice about everything, or stories about past divorce catastrophes. Not everybody’s disastrous divorce has to be yours, and not everybody knows what they are talking about.

Get advice from good professionals, including attorneys and accountants. Friends, family and even the internet can help you know what to expect emotionally, but remember that not everybody goes through divorce in a healthy state of mind. Don’t let their experiences or expectations destroy your ability to keep a healthy state of mind.

Our Tampa divorce attorneys at The Pawlowski//Mastrilli Law Group can explain every step of the process to you. Call us with any questions you may have.

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