Spousal Maintenance

[NeedsAdvice2017]

Apologies in advance, but this is going to be a long one.

Your ex sounds extremely reasonable.

Your requests are outrageous.

I think you earn more than enough.

but it doesn't seem outrageous at all to me.

Thankfully most judges would disagree with you!

What was your contribution towards his career? What kind of life style are we talking about here?
I have seen marriages where women literally helped in every possible way by sacrificing their own career growth and got a divorce and nowt in the end and had to build from there. I think that's outrageously unfair on women who end up becoming the primary career for children and suffer all sorts of losses.
I think you need to go to lawyers. Mumsnet won't help you in this.

An acquaintance got spousal maintenance. Took her ex all the way to court because he earned 3x as much as she did.

She got:

5p per year. She remarried within the year (om broke the marriage up) so never got anything. Judge said she'd made no sacrifice to her own career to further his.

Honestly, I can't say that I sacrificed anything for his career. He sort of worked his way up, and I have always worked full time. I took off three months when our son was born and went back to the same job at the same level, but that was it. I mean, he isnt always the easiest guy to get along with, so I put up with him for all of those years. He traveled sometimes for work (a few nights every couple months), so I would have had to handle more of the nursery drop offs and pickups, so that onviously helped him.

Are you for real?

I don't understand spousal maintenance, I really don't. Why the hell should your exh fund your lifestyle after you're divorced? The ONLY thing he should be paying is some child maintenance which is calculated fairly, based on the amount of time that you both have your son.

So what if he earns more than you? When you're divorced, you're just that; separated, not together. That means you fund your own lifestyles. You earn 51k ffs. Plenty to support you and your child.

You sound greedy, grabby and monumentally entitled.

Yes totally sounds like all that is worth thousands in SM. Poor you

I understand people looking at my salary and thinking that it is a lot, but his is 4 times as much. I was with him and supported him for 10 years, so I do think I should have some stake in his success.

Why? You said yourself that you didn't sacrifice anything for his career. You went back to work and earned money when your son was 3 months old.

If you earned 4 times as much as him, would you be prepared to pay him spousal maintenance to fund his lifestyle?

Did he not support you during those 10 years? I think you're being very unfair.

Poor guy.

No wonder he is petitioning based on her unreasonable behaviour!

Surely you are not serious? This is the grabbiest, greediest thread I have seen

so I do think I should have some stake in his success

For a stake in his success, you need to have contributed or been at least partly responsible for it.

By your logic he equally has a stake in your career then, and is entitled to spousal maintenance from you.

For this questioning the very existence of spousal maintenance

What about my situation?

I was 29, on £45k plus 8% bonus a year (7 years ago) and shortly about to make a leap up the ladder. I fell pregnant accidentally. Not an issue as we weee both keen and happy.

Ex was very keen for me not to return to work. At the time, he earned double what I did. I was quite relaxed so went along, plus getting a decent nursery place in our area of London was like gold dust.

Roll on 7 years. His salary is now c £150k plus £40k bonus.

Me? I've been out of financial services, single mum of two young children (one pre school). No family support.

Why the heck isn't SM relevant in this situation? I will return to work but no way will it be at the level I was at 7 years ago (and had I not had a child I estimate I would be on £80k now, easily). Plus i will have childcare costs. So it's not going to be a pound for a pound, that's for sure

Op, your situation is very soffeeemt to mine.

Get yourself to a solicitor.

He will tell you straight. SM is highly unlikely in your situation.

Blinky
Your case is of clear financial and emotional abuse. It's unjust for anyone to consider it otherwise. And you are not the only one I hve seen.
However, you sound a different story altogether op. You admit he didn't hinder you or you didn't sacrifice for his career. It's women like you who make it difficult for the genuine cases.

Financial and emotional abuse?? Wtf

Your case is of clear financial and emotional abuse.

Egh how exactly

Blinky My situation is similar to yours. I gave up my job to be a sahm but that was 16 years ago, not 7. And to be fair, my job would never have paid as much as you earned.

My Dh has worked his way up through his company and is now a Partner and earns a similar salary to the OP's exDh. If Dh and I were to separate, I wouldn't dream of trying to get him to pay me spousal maintenance. It was my choice to give up work and all my Dh would be responsible for would be supporting our children. Not me.

I'm lucky in that we own property that would be divided between us, but he would still be financially considerably better off than me when all was said and done.

I would have to get a job. I wouldn't expect him to fund my lifestyle after we were divorced.

As for the OP, I think she's thoroughly taking the piss.

Brer, you're awesome