My current series features Buck$ome Boomer who’s been divorced now for eighteen years. It’s interesting to hear how someone’s perspective changes over time. Although she was devastated at first when her husband wanted to end their marriage, she later came to see the divorce as a favor. Adjusting to the post-divorce financial reality was the hardest challenge for Buck$ome. Here’s why:
I couldn’t do for my kids what I wanted and what I had done previously. I had always worked but my salary alone, at the time of the divorce, was not enough to really support them. I did get child support and because my ex was in the military, I always got it. However, I wasn’t very aggressive. I never got the amount changed in the all the years we were divorced.
The biggest, maybe foolish mistake was that I did not make sure I got a percentage of his retirement. At the time, I just didn’t have the mental energy to fight him about it.
I didn’t adapt to the money situation very well. I racked up way too much credit card debt at first and that took me a few years after I married my second husband to get rid of. I think the kids would have been fine if I had adjusted but I felt really guilty. I let guilt drive the financial decisions.
One of my sons was very good at ice hockey and right after we got divorced, he was invited to be on a traveling team. Those are expensive! You’re paying for all the ice time and driving. I didn’t want to deny him that even though, in reality, I couldn’t afford it. So I paid a lot of money for a couple of years until I finally said,
“We can’t afford this.”
My ex used to always complain about child support. One of the things that helped was that he got remarried a couple of years after me. He married someone with kids and she got child support. I think that helped him see child support from my perspective. He understood that child support wasn’t making us rich and that it wasn’t enough to support the kids alone.
The Divorce Coach Says
As an emptynester, Buck$ome is now working hard towards her retirement (read about her journey at Buck$ome Boomer) and I’m sure that’s why she now regrets not asking for a percentage of her husband’s retirement but I understand her comment about mental energy.
My husband and I both had retirement plans with similar net worths at the time we divorced. The difference however, was that his is a state pension arrangement so it’s fixed benefit. Mine was a 401(k) and subject to market fluctuation. We each kept our own arrangement. I liked the upside potential of mine but that was before the recent financial crisis. I also felt that splitting both would incur more legal and professional fees and that was something we both wanted to avoid. I think it would also have prolonged the settlement negotiations and I wanted them over. With hindsight, dividing both plans would have lessened the market risk for me and may have been the smarter option.
There’s so much emotion caught up with our financial decisions – like Buck$ome feeling guilty or like Pippi who knew she couldn’t face a legal battle with her ex and spent more than five years working out a way to leave her marriage. We don’t make the best decisions when we’re under emotional stress and that’s another reason why I like the idea of a divorce coach – someone who’s got your back and who can guide you through the process.
Is there a financial decision about around your divorce, you wish you’d handled differently? Any words of advice for people going through the process now?
Photo Credit: battlecreekcvb at Flickr