Purposeful delays in Mediation

North Carolina Divorce Law Divorce and Separation Answers
1

I moved out of the home with my children when my husband became increasingly verbally, emotionally abusive to my children and I. Tried to separate amicably and that wasn’t what he wanted. House sold, he moved in with a friend, pays nothing so has money from the sale of the home and his current salary. Over the last few years out of 20 I made more than he did but that was by his own choice he took a low paying job. When he decided to work. He gave up on the family while I remained stable and supportive for my children. I am already $$ in the hole, racking up more $$, and I’ve got nothing to show for it. My attorney is nice, supportive from a big firm he sent a few letters for separation terms. My husbands attorney ignored us. His attorney sent nasty letters making false accusations. They filed a lawsuit. He wants alimony, PSS, 50/50 with the kids (which is not in their best interests) and he wants them while this is being settled), child support. My attorney hasn’t given any advice, asks me what I want to do but doesn’t tell me what he thinks we should do. We were to go to paid mediation, my financial paperwork was sent in, my husband has sent nothing. Now the attorney wants to cancel mediation and go to court to save money but how is that saving me anything? Esp emotionally. I do not have the funds to do this and still support my children!

How and why does the law not protect against this? Don’t the delays and attacks and refusals to mediate say anything to a judge or mediator? Don’t they count for something? How does anyone survive this process, it seems to me that it drags on and lawyers (no disrespect) get rich while I’ll literally be left bankrupt in order to care for my family. If it starts at $10k does that mean it doubles with Rosen too? Yes, I get charged for every email to current attorney, I get charged to provide the information, then to have them talk to me about, and we aren’t even in court yet but I’ll pay again to prepare all the information it took hours and a lot of tears and pain to gather. ALL I was asking for was child support and a fair split of marital debt and it comes to this. He is not paying his lawyer much at all and has been living his life like a single man, with no responsibility or accountability and if he loses all his money he still comes out ok because he isn’t paying to live where he is now and still hasn’t paid a dime for his children.

The law is black and white but peoples lives aren’t.

2

It sounds like you have a lot of conflict going on and issues that need to be addressed. You need a consultation so you can discuss your ongoing issues, both with your husband and with your current attorney, and see whether Rosen would be a good fit for you. Please contact your local office so we can schedule a time to meet with you.

3

Thank you for your response, I did have one more question and yes it looks like I may need to consider a change in representation.
I left, there was no other party on my part. He is living with friends and he has now moved onto another woman.
Appears to be after I left however, she is the neighbors daughter so availability was there and he had been friends with the neighbor for years spending a great deal of time there. No concrete proof obviously which is what I should have found before I left but it was so bad it was time for us to go.
Does Adultery not count because I moved out? How do judges treat that? Especially knowing I had to leave for my own emotional and mental health which I realize now he purposefully executed the harassment for that reason.

4

Adultery can come into consideration when dealing with alimony. It is not usually affected by who moves out of the marital residence first.