Klm, My long ramble and I didn't answer what Pro Se is. It means for yourself or do it your self divorce. It works best for cooperative couples who want to both divorce or if you have a simple straight forward deal with few assets. You can do and save a lot of money. Our courthouse here has a self help center and you can download or buy all the paperwork either for free on line or 10.00. Filing with no children is 185.00 in my county and it is a fairly simple petition to fill out. You can file jointly or separately. After you file you can get a temporary hearing to set up temporary financial arrangements, child support etc. We could waive that as we are set up and it is working for now. Then the 120 day cooling off period starts. The petition can be set aside at any time but only if you both agreed to it. Then you get a court date. If it went that far I would get an attorney and stall.
I am afraid of this filing step. H has backed down a bit but only because now he is looking for a lawyer to go over the paperwork at the end which is what you can do. Most people file and deal with this stuff later. It is like he wants all in place way ahead of time. Some of that is his detail orientated stuff, some say it is his way of not doing it. His free consult lawyer wanted a 3000. retainer. Ours may be a bit more complicated, pensions, 401ks,maintenance, social security etc. and we will need lawyers at some point and maybe a financial planner to set up the money side. We also have a house that would need to be transfered to me. H is letting me use my share of 401k for house. Not sure I am going to do that either. T told me not to push him to file or do it for him but try and keep him away from the lawyer by us doing the filing ourselves. Afraid once a lawyer got a hold of him may push him to do things and T thinks that it will just be more money down the drain to a retainer as he does not think H will really do this. T has not let me down in this round 4 years. I have seen him almost every week since Sept of 03.... we have really good insurance. I have to go with his instincts and my own. Then a 120 wait period and we will see if he wants to return. Risky but this needs to be fixed or we end it. I have to hope for the best and be prepared for the worst.