When tensions start to escalate, and it looks like you might be headed towards a divorce or custody case, it’s tempting to want to use whatever methods are available to you to gather the evidence you might need – up to and including recording conversations. But what’s legal varies pretty dramatically from state to state,...
Can I record a conversation in Virginia?
Debt is challenging under the best of circumstances, but when you’re considering a legal separation or a divorce, it can be a particularly challenging extra layer of complication. On its face, dividing debt is the same as dividing assets – in most cases, we look to the source of the debt, classify it as...
In the law, we like to use terms that other people don’t understand. “Manifest injustice,” “best interests of the child,” “continued cohabitation in a relationship analogous to marriage,” “material change of circumstances,” on and on, ad nauseum. Oh, right – and the Latin! Pendente lite, habeas corpus, pro bono, a mensa et thoro, ad litem,...
One of the things that I find the most interesting about suicide, and the people who either commit it or don’t, is that it’s often a question of opportunity. For someone like, say, Sylvia Plath, who died of carbon monoxide poisoning after sticking her head in the oven, it was an opportunity. In that time,...
Divorce is a trauma. It’s a trauma for you, and, in many cases, it’s a trauma for your children, too. But, then again, probably many of the events leading up to your divorce and/or custody case were pretty traumatic, too. It’s not like you just showed up at a divorce attorney’s office unscathed, and suddenly...
There are just some conversations that are difficult to have, and this one is a good example. I talk about divorce every single day, and, somehow, that never really gets to me. I have a fundamental belief that there’s no reason to stay in an unsuccessful, unhappy, unfulfilling, and/or abusive marriage. That, for me,...
Pregnancy can be wonderful, but it can also be really challenging – especially if you’re also starting to think that your marriage may not last past (or even up until) the birth. Expecting women are particularly vulnerable, especially if you’re currently unemployed, because childbirth is both personally and professionally complicated. Not only that, but caring...
A “Gray Divorce” is the term that is used nowadays to describe divorces where the parties are over the age of 50. You may not prefer the term – because, hey, JLo is over 50, and she’s TOTALLY not gray – but the reality is that we often lump these types of cases together...