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Divorce/separation

Here you'll find divorce help and support from other Mners. For legal advice, you may find Advice Now guides useful.

Original poster

Has anyone used a divorce coach?

2 replies

edemamequeen · 11/09/2023 11:50

Just that really. Namechanged for this, but I've been here a while. REALLY struggling to make the decision to divorce partly because things have improved since I said I wanted to (we agreed to try again and he has been coming to counselling and working at it) so it feels like I am now possibly in the wrong. But the other issue for me is that I am completely overwhelmed by all the decisions I'll have to make if I do decide to do it. I have a lawyer but I can't ring her every five minutes. There's a complicated financial situation, potentially complex family stuff & there was a lot of emotional abuse (confirmed by WA), now a lot less but it is likely he will make things as difficult as he can. He also hates change so I will be driving it all, if I go ahead. Would a divorce coach help with that or am I just procrastinating from what I need to be doing myself?

OP posts:
Appleofmyeye2023 · 11/09/2023 14:18

No didn’t use a coach. But 4 things helped me decide, after a 32 year marriage

  1. informing myself of the divorce process, including financial agreements and what I would end up with based on the “fair settlement” criteria laid out in marriage act. This fair settlement has to be met, even if you mutually agree as courts can refuse to approve settlements that don’t meet these criteria. I used ADVICE NOW diy guides to help me, plus the uk gov divorce web site. The link to ADVICE NOW site is at top of this board. For me this meant a big adjustment to releasing that I’d come out of divorce still paying penalty for an ex who’d not financially contributed (or any contribution) to the marriage for years - and understanding settlements are not based on past behavoiurs but future needs. that was extremely hard to accept, but once I did it did allow me to move forwards.
  2. looking at “grief pathway” (or any other impact of “change” on human psychology). This helped me understand my emotions and what was holding me back and why I had such conflicting emotions
  3. removing the “fear” by really visualising my future as divorced in 5,10,20 years time. Where would I live, how would I manage financially, what would I do socially without a partner, etc etc. I could only do that once I knew likely financial outcome, and it helped me in knowing what sort of house I could afford, what area I’d move to etc. the “fear “ of the divorce and being on my own was holding me back. And like all fears it comes from the unknown. Once you replace the “unknown” (“I don’t know what to do”, “what’ll happen to me””how can I manage”, “the process is so overwhelming I can’t cope” type stuff) with the known, and can really visualise your future as divorced, you are in a much , much better place to rationally consider the alternative of staying or divorcing. Only then will you even be able to contemplate divorce properly and be able to move forwards
  4. once I could do that visualising, I used a good friend who’d divorced themselves to just listen to me explaining the pros and cons of divorcing. I asked them never to tell anyone about conversation in case outcome was that I decided to stay in marriage. They were very good at asking me questions, getting me to think about things I’d not considered, but the end of that long conversation I’d made my mind up.

I’ve not heard of a divorce coach but I assume they’d help you with that whole “accepting change” process emotionally.

my biggest advice, if you decide to go forwards, is to park anger, resentment and bitterness through the process. You can vent that when all done🤷🏼‍♀️. Try to work amicably through settlement. Use ADVICE NOW and similar sites to do a DIY divorce using solicitors only for the actual tasks you need them for. That way divorce will be quicker, cheaper and less stressful. You’ll need to accept that you’ll both come out worse off- figure out how and how much and get used to this asap, so that you know which battles are worth fighting for. Solicitors cost around £3.50 for every minute they’re even pushing your divorce papers around - you need to use them sparingly and carefully or you’ll be running up sort of bills people come on here to deal with in £10ks . Ours cost (combined all in) around £1400.

Original poster
edemamequeen · 11/09/2023 14:23

Appleofmyeye2023 · 11/09/2023 14:18

No didn’t use a coach. But 4 things helped me decide, after a 32 year marriage

  1. informing myself of the divorce process, including financial agreements and what I would end up with based on the “fair settlement” criteria laid out in marriage act. This fair settlement has to be met, even if you mutually agree as courts can refuse to approve settlements that don’t meet these criteria. I used ADVICE NOW diy guides to help me, plus the uk gov divorce web site. The link to ADVICE NOW site is at top of this board. For me this meant a big adjustment to releasing that I’d come out of divorce still paying penalty for an ex who’d not financially contributed (or any contribution) to the marriage for years - and understanding settlements are not based on past behavoiurs but future needs. that was extremely hard to accept, but once I did it did allow me to move forwards.
  2. looking at “grief pathway” (or any other impact of “change” on human psychology). This helped me understand my emotions and what was holding me back and why I had such conflicting emotions
  3. removing the “fear” by really visualising my future as divorced in 5,10,20 years time. Where would I live, how would I manage financially, what would I do socially without a partner, etc etc. I could only do that once I knew likely financial outcome, and it helped me in knowing what sort of house I could afford, what area I’d move to etc. the “fear “ of the divorce and being on my own was holding me back. And like all fears it comes from the unknown. Once you replace the “unknown” (“I don’t know what to do”, “what’ll happen to me””how can I manage”, “the process is so overwhelming I can’t cope” type stuff) with the known, and can really visualise your future as divorced, you are in a much , much better place to rationally consider the alternative of staying or divorcing. Only then will you even be able to contemplate divorce properly and be able to move forwards
  4. once I could do that visualising, I used a good friend who’d divorced themselves to just listen to me explaining the pros and cons of divorcing. I asked them never to tell anyone about conversation in case outcome was that I decided to stay in marriage. They were very good at asking me questions, getting me to think about things I’d not considered, but the end of that long conversation I’d made my mind up.

I’ve not heard of a divorce coach but I assume they’d help you with that whole “accepting change” process emotionally.

my biggest advice, if you decide to go forwards, is to park anger, resentment and bitterness through the process. You can vent that when all done🤷🏼‍♀️. Try to work amicably through settlement. Use ADVICE NOW and similar sites to do a DIY divorce using solicitors only for the actual tasks you need them for. That way divorce will be quicker, cheaper and less stressful. You’ll need to accept that you’ll both come out worse off- figure out how and how much and get used to this asap, so that you know which battles are worth fighting for. Solicitors cost around £3.50 for every minute they’re even pushing your divorce papers around - you need to use them sparingly and carefully or you’ll be running up sort of bills people come on here to deal with in £10ks . Ours cost (combined all in) around £1400.

Thank you. This is amazing. (You could set up as a divorce coach yourself!)
Will look into the grief pathway especially & the visualising.

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