foundhervoiceatlast, thanks for taking the time to share your story again for Ulla's sake. I appreciate it.

How are you hanging in there?

Now some of you in here that boo-hood my advice to everyone happily married now or not to put something away in a private account or your sock, whatever you're comfortable with because none of us knows what will happen down the road with our daring husbands. I have seen far too may women devasted both emotionally and financially when a husband gets itchy feet...They are scoundrels and don't give a hoot about fairness. I received this advice while in my twenties and I followed it faithfully so when I got divorced fourteen years later, I had a nice nest egg for my sons and myself and it was a good thing too because he turned into "MR. POOR" in front of the judge. Any single gals or newly married ones or any of you heed these words or they may come back one day to bite you in the a**!!!

[ January 25, 2006, 05:02 PM: Message edited by: chatty lady ]

I always thought pre-nuptial agreements were a terrible way to start a marriage--not anymore! I will NEVER be caught without again. Chatty is absolutely right!

I did not get married until I was 32 (he was 6 years younger)and my fiancee at the time did ask me to sign a pre-nup before the wedding. I refused because I was such a romantic idealist and felt that it would be the wrong way to start off a new marriage, kind of keeping one eye on its demise, you know? Who wants to think about failure when you have stars in your eyes?

As it turned out, it was a good thing I did not agree to sign it because he recently ran all of our joint resources into the ground (retirement, savings & everything...) and kept a private investment account on the side that he started shortly before our marriage. That he kept it in his name only came as a surprise to me: our agreement had been to merge all of our individual assets and investments into a joint family account when we tied the knot. Over the years he showed me the statements regularly, acting as if the money was joint and the account in both our names. What he failed to divulge was that my name was never put on the account as promised. So had I actually signed that prenup I would not be entitled to one red cent of it now, and he kept that money separate and invested for the last 20 years. At this point it looks like I stand a fairly good chance of being awarded 50% of whatever money has accrued in the account while we were married because we live in an equitable distribution state and the interest/gains in the fund are considered a marital asset. I hope and pray that this is true, because it is all that is left from everything we worked so hard for over the years.

In the unlikely event that I would ever marry again, I would make darned sure that my assets are safe, whether it be in the form of a prenup, or some other vehicle, so that I am never in this awful financial position again.

foundhervoice-atlast

My heart goes out to each of you who've endured so much! I pray the Lord strengthens you physically & emotionally, that you may find peace amidst all this turbulence and remember you are not alone.

It's amazing how ugly what once was love can turn. Hugs!

I emailed Ulaa to see how she is doing. Hopefully she will be back.

To everyone who has been replying, I am so grateful. This whole divorce is so upsetting. Last week my husband wanted to make me an out of court offer, in exchange for him withdrawing his divorce forms and me submitting mine ? - I think my lawyer regarded that as blackmail. Its really been stressing me out. I thought about it as his offer seemed good - but then I have no idea how much he's really worth. I guess it's all going through the courts now and he has to declare all his finances, and I guess this drags an already painful situation out further ?

I am not familiar with your circumstances, Ulaa. Are there children involved?

Hi Bluebird,

No we didn't have children. I guess lots of people will say thats a good thing, but its all I ever wanted. He always promised we would have kids as soon as he felt his business was stable, but then always seemed to be away from home at the right times to get me pregnant. Not having kids is more of a loss than loosing him.