Husband doesn't want to get divorced as doesn't want to have to give me anything

[Frenchtoast99]

Basically my husband has ignored the first 2 attempts at sending him the divorce petition, he didn't sign either of them.
My solicitor has since sent 2 letters asking for him to disclose bank statements which he won't do. This has all dragged out over the space of a year. He got his solicitor to write back to mine and to say he wanted to sort it out amicably however when I brought it up with him , it was evident that he has no intention of me getting anything from him.
When I said I could be entitled to £20k , he almost had a heart attack and vowed I would never get that sort of money off him.
So I have no choice now but to go down the Ancillary relief route and the court will then order him to hand over his bank statements.
I've been told this could cost about 10 grand each, if not more.
I really don't know what to do, I just want to get divorced but can't as he won't sign anything, so now I have to go down the aggressive route which I never wanted.
Part of me thinks, should I just stay married for a quiet life as it looks like the lawyers are going to get a good bit out of the settlement, is it worth it?
However I really want a clean slate and if we don't get divorced he can claim things off me in the future, inheritance, any property I buy.
I wanted the settlement to use as a deposit for a house for myself and my son.
For background knowledge, we have one 7 year old son with special needs, who my husband has half the time . The house was his before we met but is still classed as a marital home and I have given up my career to look after my son while my ex worked. We were married for 4 years and then I left for good reason.
My ex is extremely tight fisted with money as it is but I didn't know he would be this bad.
What should I do, soldier on with the divorce or for a quiet life, just give up what I might be owed.
Also to mention I am entitled to more than 20k but I just threw that figure out at him to see his reaction.

He should be doing on ‘his’ days what you do on yours. That he isn’t is because you are doing him a favour.

No he doesn't chip in for uniform, clothes or shoes. I suppose his maintenance helps to pay for that.

Right. So don’t be giving up bits of his maintenance. If he wants to not give you any money then he should be providing clothes and uniform and the likes for his house…

You work part time to facilitate your son’s care. your ex works full time without the need for organised childcare because you facilitate that. That has a worth.

CMS use the blunt tools of nights. That’s not the same as CB or carers and it’s not the same for starting point of your divorce.

Don’t short change yourself.

@YetMoreNewBeginnings you are a lifesaver, thank you. I am screenshotting your posts for future reference. He has already said this week that maybe he should be getting a share of the money I get for our son

Hi, I've been in a similar situation and am also a carer with an SN child. My ex walked out and told me house needed to go on the market immediately as he and OW needed the money. We went to mediation and he didn't like the facts being presented to him one bit. He was abusive to the mediator and she called a halt. He couldn't understand why I couldn't just uproot the kids and go into rented because he wanted his money. I wasn't working at the time either.

Long story short, I made an application to court myself. I bought "how to" books from Amazon and learned the law myself. I self repped. The court was extremely sympathetic to my situation. Ex and OW ensured it dragged out because they refused to cooperate. However, I won. By a large margin. It can be done. You have to go via the court route because men like this think they can walk all over you. He'll have a shock and realise how much it's going to cost him won't he? I suggest you suggest mediation as a starting point where the realities of the situation can be spelled out to him. Good luck.

This is a very short marriage. I’d be wary of getting too excited about how much you’ll get @Frenchtoast99

They have a SEN child. That makes a huge difference.

Stop facilitating him, if he has ds in the week he has to sort out picking him up from school and dropping him back there in the morning. In the holidays if he has him then he needs to sort out childcare on his days

And he shouldn't be getting all the weekends

Assets are usually calculated at the date of separation rather than what you have in the bank now.

My daughter is going through more or less the same thing and she is having to take him to court. He wanted to go mediation and settle but then he didn’t just playing for time. Meanwhile we know he is dripping poison about her into his two kids, which is an absolute bloody disgrace. (7 &5)

Again. Given he had the house before you married and were together a relatively short time and now has your son close to 50 percent of the time. You need really good advise . Half the equity isn't necessarily a given particularly as your son is in full time education.

I don’t think that happens often these days. And op is entitled to half his salary whilst still married and he is entitled to half of op’s.

How long before you married did you live together op? People have said it’s a short marriage. But living together is counted on top of the length of marriage. Plus as others have said, you have a dc with SEN.

My friend is getting divorced. She told me the courts now take a dim view of people, who are obstructive during a divorce.

I also would be playing hard ball with him. He’s trying to scare you and you’re already thinking of acquiescing by asking for less CM. No more picking your dc up and dropping off from school. No more looking after your dc if they’re ill on his days. He either wants the days or you take them back.

There is a lot to unpick here, but as a starting-point he needs to arrange care for your DC on "his" days.

Tell him you will no longer be doing school drop-offs and pick-ups/holiday care on his days.

Mine did this. You need to find a better solicitor, one who has a contact for someone who can serve him the papers. We also had to threaten contempt of court at one point. But basically you need a solicitor who has seen this shit before. I spent a year with a solicitor fannying around like yours then found a bulldog and got it done. And don’t settle for too low - get what you need.

Mine was a short marriage and I got 60pc and the judge said he was lucky I settled for that. And my dd doesn’t have SEN.

Sorry I’m reading backwards but this makes me so incensed. You’ve got the wonderful @TheFormidableMrsC on your thread. Go and find her divorce threads. They are what sorted me out and made me fight .

One more thing (I promise), my first solicitor kept saying I had to get him to agree as I couldn’t afford court. This would never ever have worked. So my bulldog solicitor took credit card , I got an interest free credit card and paid all the costs on that. It cost 10k. I didn’t go to final hearing. And then I paid it off from the settlement. But it was worth the price to have my life back .

@Mummyoflittledragon we lived together for about 3 and a half years before we got married and I worked full time up until then and contributed toward food, bills etc during that time.
To be honest, I'm just glad that he takes my son , as with his special needs it can be so tiring and full on if I was to have him full time without a break.
Thank you for the advice , it's definitely something for me to think about

@Countrylife2002 thank you so much for sharing your experience, it really inspires me to go for it and get the job done. I'm so pleased that you got things sorted. I was told that going to court would cost minimum 10k each.
I will definitely have a look at @TheFormidableMrsC other threads.
I'm getting so much strength and motivation from these posts.

My friend is getting divorced. She told me the courts now take a dim view of people, who are obstructive during a divorce.

It's a very long time since I got divorced - roughly 25 years ago, but my ex Dh was such a dick, dragging things out for about 4 years that his legal costs were about £25k and mine were about £15k. When we went to court the judge said that as Ex had been so obstructive he was ordering a costs hearing.

My solicitor told me that they would probably order Ex to pay the legal costs - I suspect his solicitor told him the same because they wrote to me in a panic before the hearing and offered to pay £7.5k of my costs which I accepted.

So his pissing about cost him over £32,000 in legal fees, on top of my clean break settlement.

What's annoying is that my ex has a solicitor but I think he must be useless as he doesn't appear to have told my ex how much the Ancillary relief route is going to cost. I feel like if my ex knew it would cost a minimum 10k then he might think twice. All this because he refuses to sign anything or give me anything.
I could understand this if we had no children but we have a son together who has special needs

Gosh I’m sorry, dealing with partners like this can be so frustrating. Please don’t listen to the thoughts telling you to stay, this is not something you deserve to stay in. You deserve happiness too and to live a peaceful life. It might be difficult now but your future self will thank you for taking the steps to leave.
For a clean slate, please definitely get a clean break. Then your ex can’t claim anything on you in the future. It’s also really frustrating how much solicitors can cost, but you taking the court route is still an option worth taking as you deserve to have access to what is your money too. Not only his. The only help I can give is to recommend free help guides online to help alleviate the solicitor costs by doing some yourself e.g. forms. It’s not as bad as many think when you follow guides. Or you could just use it to help you understand your options more. I remember how confused I was at the whole process. I used this one - https://iamlip.com/
Also, due to you staying home to care for the children, that would be a factor in deciding how everything is split so this page may also help because it has some cases where in the past judges factored that into their decision - https://iamlip.com/family-finances-of-relationship-legislation/
I hope you are well and it works out for you in the end. Don’t regret taking this step, you’ll be better of for it.

@EmmW14 thank you so much for your kind words and for the link, this forum is full of fantastic women like you who have already been through divorce and are trying to help other women through it ❤️

This.

You need that bulldog.