ULPT: Help me get through my divorce and leave some distruction after
I’m nearing the end of a brutal divorce where I’ve been on the wrong side of almost everything with barely any leverage. By the time it’s over, I’ll have paid over $1.2M. In the early years, I slept in a friend’s sunroom with my kids because I couldn’t afford anything else and my business fell apart. Just when I got back on my feet and stabilized financially, she took me back to court and got more money from me. When she tried again last year, it blew up in her face with the court finally showing their frustration with her.
I’m still driving an old beater with 220,000 miles on it while she has two brand‑new vehicles worth over $115,000 and a 1/2 million dollar house. Through all of it, I never gave up (although I came close a few times) and I’ve kept a great relationship with my kids. Now that the end is close, I need to protect my finances, save for retirement, and stop being on the losing end.
Today pushed me over the edge again. I told her I was going to take the kids on vacation over the Fourth of July (my day), and she informed me she’d already be out of town and had already booked flights and hotels and I wouldn’t be able to have them that day.
I'm here because I've played everything by the book and that has not helped me at all. I’m looking for some good ways to level the playing field when I finally have some leverage, I don't have to pay her $3,000/mo, and put an end to this sense of entitlement. Because our contact info is still a little intertwined, I got a text that I shouldn't have and found out her credit score is in the 500s and she was trying to get a cash out mortgage refinance recently. How do I help her find the bottom that I was in for so long and not allow her to use the kids to get more money from in the future?