Don't panic if you find that your marriage exhibits some of these characteristics because you're not necessarily headed for divorce court. However, you do have cause for concern; you and your spouse need to assess your options - first separately and then together - and decide what to do next.

TIP

Marital problems can trigger depression, feelings of vulnerability, powerlessness, anger, and sleep disturbances, any of which can impede clear thinking and sound decision-making. A mental health professional can help you or your spouse deal with these problems so that you can move forward. If your spouse is struggling emotionally, suggest that he or she get mental health counseling, assuming that you think your spouse will be receptive to advice coming from you given the state of your marriage.

Getting Prepared Financially for a Divorce

Pre-divorce financial planning is essential to minimizing the cost of your divorce and increasing the likelihood that when your divorce is over, you will have a settlement agreement that meets your short- and long-term post-divorce financial needs. (We discuss how to prepare yourself emotionally in the "Surviving the Emotional Roller Coaster" section, later in this chapter, as well as in Chapter 7.) The amount and type of planning you need to do depends on how involved you have been in managing your family's financial life, whether you have a good credit history in your own name, and whether you have maintained a career outside your home during your marriage. See Chapter 3 for advice about evaluating your family's finances.

WARNING

If your spouse totally surprises you with plans for a divorce, pre-divorce planning may be impossible, especially if you're clueless about your family's finances. If that's the case, your divorce teaches you a painful lesson: That not being an informed and active partner in your family's financial life is risky because you're at an immediate disadvantage if your marriage ends (or if you become widowed).

Ideally, before your divorce begins, you will have

TIP

Making It Official

Before your divorce can begin, you must take care of some preliminary divorce matters. For example, you must make certain that you meet the divorce requirements of the state where you want to get divorced. Also, you or your divorce attorney must file legal paperwork with the court to officially set your divorce in motion and you must decide whether you will file a no-fault or fault divorce, assuming fault divorces are permitted in the state where you are divorcing.

TIP

If you don't want to live with your spouse anymore, but you don't want to get divorced, either, you and your spouse can separate. You can separate temporarily while you decide what to do about your relationship or you can make your separation permanent and finalize it with a legal separation agreement, which addresses the same kind of issues you would address in a divorce. We discuss the pros and cons of separation in Chapter 4.

Meeting the requirements

To get a divorce, you must meet certain minimum requirements set by your state. Although those requirements vary somewhat from state to state, the most common ones are

You can find out the particular divorce requirements in your state in several ways. You can do an Internet search using key words like "requirements for divorce in [your state]." You can call your local family court, check with your local bar association, or contact a divorce attorney in your area. If any of these resources can't or won't provide you with the information that you're looking for, they should be able to tell you where you can get it.

Filing a divorce petition

No matter what state you live in and regardless of whether you and your spouse agree that ending your marriage is for the best, your divorce begins when one of you files a divorce petition with the court. If you and your spouse have already hired divorce attorneys, one of the attorneys files the divorce petition. (See the later section in this chapter, "Involving a divorce attorney," as well as Chapters 13 and 14, for more information about working with a divorce attorney.) Otherwise, one of you can go to your local courthouse and file a divorce petition yourself.

After someone files a divorce petition, the nonfiling spouse is legally notified about the petition, which usually involves a sheriff or constable hand delivering the notice or the nonfiling spouse receiving it in the mail. The nonfiling spouse isn't served at all if he or she waives notification, which is most likely to occur if both spouses agreed to an amicable divorce and are already familiar with everything in the divorce petition. If the nonfiling spouse disagrees with anything in the petition, such as the grounds for the divorce, the request by the filing spouse for sole custody of the couple's children, and so on, he or she will file an answer with the court, stating his or her side of those issues.

Deciding who's at fault

Depending on the state you live in, if you initiated your divorce, you must decide whether to file a fault or a no-fault divorce. As of this writing, about 70 percent of all states allow couples to get either an old-fashioned fault divorce or a no-fault divorce, which is a kinder, gentler type of divorce.

When you file a fault divorce, you must provide a very specific reason, or grounds, for wanting to end your marriage. In other words, you must accuse your spouse of some sort of unacceptable behavior, such as adultery, physical abuse, mental cruelty, drunkenness, drug addiction, or insanity. Depending on your state, you may also be able to get a fault divorce if your spouse has been in prison for a minimum period of time or has deserted your marriage.

When you allege fault, you must also prove that the grounds actually exist. Proving fault can involve having a friend or relative who witnessed your spouse's bad behavior testify to it, although they may be reluctant to get involved in your divorce, especially if they like your spouse. Or you may need to hire a detective to document your spouse's bad behavior on video. Although a fault divorce can provide the grist for a lurid soap opera, some spouses feel that the drama is worth it because if they can prove that what they allege about their partner is true, they can get a better divorce settlement.

Currently, all states recognize some form of no-fault divorce. If you opt for this kind of divorce, you don't have to prove that your spouse did anything to cause you to seek a divorce. Instead, all you really need to do is acknowledge that things "just didn't work out" between the two of you. Common grounds for obtaining a no-fault divorce include "incompatibility," "irretrievable breakdown," or "irreconcilable differences." Because you don't need to prove fault, this kind of divorce is usually less expensive, quicker to complete, and easier on spouses and their children than most fault divorces. As a result, no-fault divorces are much more frequent than fault divorces.

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Excerpted from Divorce For Dummies by John Ventura Excerpted by permission.
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