Divorce Process

[SuperTed75]

Hi all – just after some advice regarding the process of separation / divorce.

It’s looking like my marriage is over so we will either separate or divorce.
I have met with a solicitor (my god they’re expensive!) so I’m a lot clearer where I stand and what will happen.

However, there is one question I didn’t think of and I don’t want to book another hour consultation just to ask it.

If I was to instruct a solicitor to start separation/divorce proceedings, would they contact my wife straight away? Basically, will she know?

Or, does the solicitor get all the paper work ready and when I’m at the point I want to go through with it, I hand the paperwork over to my wife or I then instruct them to contact her?

If it’s the second one, it’s what I will do. The second she sees I’ve started separation/divorce proceedings there will be no going back, even if she desperately wanted to save our marriage, she would be too stubborn.

There is only a small glimmer of hope we can survive but only if she gets help to get her head straight. Therefore, I want to be the one that initiates the proceedings so I’m in control of it.

Hope that all makes sense.

I didn't use a Solicitor for my Divorce, but the 1st my ExH knew about it was when the Court sent him the Divorce Petition & associated paperwork.......if you use a Solicitor, they can send a draft petition to your Wife's solicitor for approval, or send it straight to the Divorce Centre who will process it & send it to your Wife.......

Yes, she won’t hear until you send back the paperwork. But I’d tell her you’re divorcing first before you start the admin!

If you thought the first appointment was expensive you’ve ain’t seen nothing yet! It will go on and on.

You can start the form rolling for the divorce yourself. The forms are all available on the .gov.uk website.

Then unless you have difficulty writing, your affairs are really complex and/or at least one of you earns over 100K to save some money hire a solicitor to advise you but not to formally represent you. So if you are divorcing on unreasonable behaviour you may want a solicitor's guidance on what to put on the petition though to be fair loads of people online can help you for free.

The only time you definitely should get solicitor's input is drafting the consent order.

Hello - thank you for the responses.

If it all looks like it will be amicable - i'm trying to be positive here, i dont want a long drawn out fight, although I will not be be messed around if she decides to get difficult - and we separate first rather than divorce, can anyone recommend an online company for seperation? One that wouldn't require using a solicitor unless guidance was required.

In my head, neither of us could take on the family house so we'd need to sell it and it would be split 50/50 on whatever is left after paying off mortgage and fees.

Same with our two children, although i'd want them as much as possible with me, i dont believe i could take anymore than 50/50, it also wouldn't be fair on the boys.

I think she'd be on the same page but you never know. We'd have to go to mediation just to talk it all through.

She's not having my dog!

Hi everyone,

I split from my husband of 5 years (20 years together) last feb, tbh, it was a long time coming. His eventual infidelity was the final straw. After we broke up, it became apparent that he was using cocaine, to the extent that he put a huge hole up his nose! I wasn’t aware he was doing this in our home with our young daughter present. I believe he is addicted to prescription meds too and is also a heavy cannabis user. His mental health is also bad, he’s been diagnosed with a split personality disorder as well as depression and anxiety and he’s got really bad paranoia. He’s had on and off contact with our 3 year old, under my supervision. This has now ended due to an incident where he had us both in tears. I’ve just had a letter from his solicitor asking for contact every Saturday via a contact centre, which I’m ok with, as long as it’s supervised. He however has asked to have this in supervised. I wanted to ask if anyone else has an ex like this and what the courts may have forced on you. I absolutely do not want him to have unsupervised access but I’m worried because under the law he has the same rights as me. Can I be forced to allow her to stay with him for instance? He’s currently homeless but is living in a temporary accomodation which is a small cottage. Any help, advice would be appreciated. Many thanks

SuperTed you can DIY and save yourselves lots of £££