Not Just Me

As I have stated before, people have a hard time believing the situation I am in. Many are surprised that lifetime alimony or even any alimony still exists. When I tell them that I am required to pay Spring alimony until the day I die despite the fact that the custody evaluator ruled she was not the primary parent, a vocational evaluation that determined she could earn just as much money as me, the fact that she left me, good evidence of crime on her part and absolute evidence of crime by her lawyer not to mention all the assets and money she took as part of the divorce as well as the fact that she has never provided a dime for the kids and, despite joint custody, that they spend most most of their time with me, the response I get is typically, "how is that possible?"

The next false assumption is that my case is somehow unique. It isn't. Unfortunately, no one really knows how many people are in similar situations because there simply are no good statistics.

The Minnesota Alimony Reform site has a nightmare stories section where people can post their experiences. A recent posting by a woman demonstrates pretty clearly that I am not alone.

My husband had a stroke in November 2015 and was paying $13,000 a month to his ex-wife from his divorce in 2002. A year before his stroke (2014) the judge clearly saw the injustice from the divorce and reduced his ex-wife’s alimony to $5800 a month. She quit her $100,000+/year job a few months before the divorce so she could get a substantial amount of alimony for life. Finally, after paying well over $1,000,000 to her since 2002, the reduction to $5800 a month was a great relief, but after years of working many more hours than he would have, had he not needed to pay $13,000 a month in alimony, he suffered a stroke in November of 2015. Believe it or not, his ex-wife has now appealed the reduction in support, even after he suffered a stroke less than a year after the reduction in spousal maintenance. Now we have to not only go back and fight the appeal, but we have to go through the legal process of an additional reduction based on his inability to work any longer. He is 65 years old and unable to work, but she still wants $13,000 a month, which was never intended to be a lifetime amount. She has hardly worked a day since the divorce and basically became entitled and chose to remain unemployed even after the children graduated from high school in 2008. It is as though she still expects the alimony to be paid to her forever and has chosen to live as though it is welfare. My husband did not miss a payment in over 15 years of alimony and now, after having a stroke, we have to fight this for our own survival. It is truly unbelievable.