MLC? Let it Be.

[Nitty]

If your H asks you if what he proposes is okay with you, say, "That's a lot to think about. I don't feel comfortable deciding right now."

What if he pressures you for an answer?

The financial planner people rehearsed this response with me until I knew it by heart:

"I want what I'm entitled to under the law." That's all you ever have to say. You say it calmly and forthrightly. It's not a challenge, it's a fact.

You need an attorney, or a certified divorce financial planner to look at your finances and determine the best way to split things up. Interview a couple of them. I didn't have to deal with custody issues so I focused on finding a good financial planner, and asked them for recommendations for attnys who worked in a collaborative or mediation environment.

(I cried through every interview. I did not want to D. But my H seemed gung ho to D me and I refused to let everything we worked so hard for three decades to be eaten up by taxes, combative lawyers or H's tantrums.)

You've got to look at the long term: say you spend X amount of dollars on an attny or a financial planner, where X = several mortgage payments. That's terrifying, but the financial planner will probably save you that much in child support/alimony within one or two years. In my case, they would've saved me more than that much every year until my support ran out. So it's worth it.

Until you have someone to review your stuff, don't agree to anything.

They told me: it's better for my H to offer first. I was to bring his offer back to them for review and they would help me decide. His offer may or may not have been equitable; if they decided it WAS it equitable, then I could accept it and would've avoided a lot of hassle and cost. If not, I would've brought it back to the table.

They also told me that if H was going to throw too many tantrums, that it would be more cost-effective in the long run to go from mediation to collaborative D. I hired the financial planners to keep our costs as low as possible, and after the lecture on how divorce is the most expensive financial transaction of a couple's lives, that's what they did: strategize so it would be less expensive all around.

Even in mediation you shouldn't agree until a consulting professional (attorney or divorce financial planner) reviews the proposal. Say you all come up with a proposal in mediation. It's perfectly normal to say, "All right, I'm going to take this to an attny for review and will get back to you."