Hey Eric, glad you stopped by!
I really feel that this time it's more about my wanting to just get some things out. Whatever her reaction to those things is really doesn't matter. In fact if I have any expectation, it would be that she won't care or even allow herself to change anything she thinks (actually, not thinks, more "feels") about anything having to do with our sitch. I get what you are saying and in the past I would have expected some kind of reaction but not this time.

So, had my meeting with my lawyer this morning. It actually went better than I thought it would (see, expectations!). The basic thing that is getting in the way of coming to some sort of resolution in our D is this...My W's lawyer is a "friend" of my lawyer. My lawyer says that her L is very good at keeping his clients in check when they are asking for too much. The problem is that my W hasn't been forthcoming with her L about everything that she needs to. Her lawyer had no idea that we have a large number of antiques that need to be divided. He had no idea that my W had been sued for non payment of student loans that she incurred before we were married. As far as her L knew, my W tried to stop me from cashing in my retirement from my job I left BEFORE we were M and that the money was kept separate from our joint accounts when it actually went to pay for living expenses and bills that we incurred together. As far as her lawyer knew, I was getting a sweet deal just being allowed to live in our house until D turned 18 as I never had to make any sacrifice at all. I had a feeling that my W wasn't being totally open about all this. She never even read the last two decrees that were sent to me and seemed surprised about what was in them. I have a feeling that she has allowed her father to take the lead with her D process and he really has no idea what has happened over the last 21 years.

The question now is a simple one....what did I bring into the M that was separate from my W and what did she bring into the M separate from me, assets and debts. Well, I had no debt coming into the M and had almost $50,000 in retirement funds from a job I left before we got M. My W brought only her student loan debt and very little else as she had just graduated a few months before we got M. Her SL debt was large and for all of our M life, we only got half the tax return money we should have because it went to pay off her SL's. I also paid off a lawsuit she had from the college she went to to pay off her debt with them. What he needs from me is a list of what debt she brought into the M, she had no assets like retirement (very small) and what debts and assets I brought into the M. He said that since the M is now ending, I have a legal expectation to recoup what I lost from those amounts. My W is also disputing how much our house is worth right now in the condition it is in. My L said that we can use the county tax assessment for that. It is higher than what we actually could get since it doesn't take repairs into account but is still only $56,000 and change. That would make my W's share $28K. Just half the value of the retirement I cashed in is $23K and that doesn't include the value of the antiques nor the amount of her SL debt we had to pay over the years.

The problem I now have is that I need to find the exact amounts of her student loans and she took all that paperwork with her. Since I never expected to get D'd, I never thought to sit down and add up all the different loans and find a total amount. I guess I'm learning "things to do if I ever get M again"! According to my L he thinks that my W is either naive and just didn't want to give her L any info that isn't a positive for her case or she feels "entitled" to much more than half. He's seen many women especially who get that attitude. (I thought "Yeah, they were probably having an MLC at the time!"). So, now I'm going to need to find a way to get that info. Just what I need, more things on my plate! Oh, well. At least I know that I may have a chance to at least keep my home. We also talked about the fact that my W leaves our D14 alone until late almost every night and he has the same thoughts about that as me, it's a bad idea. Nothing we can do about it unless my D14 is willing to say that she wants to live with me. We also talked about the fact my W moved so far and put D14 in school so far. It may be best for me to sell the house so I could live closer. But that's in future.

So, back to trying to make as much $ as I can and maybe find a better job. One step at a time!