Do It Yourself Divorce

Very much to my frustration and cost I found the experience of employing lawers to execute my divorce from my first ex wife excruciatingly painful. That's largely due to the fact that many lawers want to extract the maximum amount of money they can from you. In my experience I found that lots of lawers just want to prolonge the battle between you and your soon to be ex and bill you for extortionate amounts of money for every nano second spent on the case. I actually tried two different firms of lawers and got nowhere. The second one even sent a letter I specifically told him not to send until the New Year so as not to ruin Christmas for my children, and he sent it anyway. As you can guess I paid dearly with my wife for that asshole move.

I dont know where I got the idea from, but one day I thought to myself "Well it can't be that difficult, even for a fool like me." I wasn't wrong. Anyway, with that thought in mind I went to my local magistrates court to find out what was involved and I have to say I was amazed at how simple it all was.

At court I found lots of leaflets explaining the process and it appeared highly do-able. I asked the receptionist how much it would all cost and was pleasantly surprised to hear her say fifty pounds document fees and that was it. So I took the application form home and set to. The one very simple form simply asked for the name and address details for all parties involved and the reason for the divorce. So I filled in mine and my wife's details, as well as the details of her lover (he was married and I wanted his wife to know what had been going on) and put the reason down as adultery. It took about ten minutes in all and so I went back to the court to hand the document in and paid my fifty big ones.

A few days later I got a letter from the judge at the court stating that I could not cite adultery and here's why. One, adultery is so common place these days, and since many couples manage to get past that and save the marriage, it is not deemed as an accepptable reason.

Also, if you wanted to cite adultery, like anything else you accuse somebody of, you have to be able to prove it. A photograph of your other half having a coffee at some romantic French coffee house won't do it. That could easily be a social meeting about just about anything. No, what you would need is a set of full technicolour, highly detailed and in focus photographs of your partner and their lover, totally naked and bang at it in the throes of having unimaginable sex. You have more chance of flying a domestic pyrotechnic rocket to the moon and back in less than a day.

Thankfully the judge advised me that I could cite 'Unreasonable behaviour' and still list the adultery as an example of that unreasonable behaviour. Duly amended, I re-sent the document and it was dealt with in no time at all.

The court sent copies of the document along with a questionaire asking for confirmation of name and address and the question "Did the alleged adultery actually take place." My wife's lover replied "No." My wife left the question blank, not yes nor no. I think she thought she was being smart, not so. I imagine the judge, like any half intelligent person, would take her answer as a "Yes." on the basis that it most certainly wasn't a "No." She didn't want to say yes because that would be admitting guilt. However, saying no would be telling a lie, so best to leave it blank she figured. You cannot box clever with judges, you can try, but it will not get you anywhere.

In about two weeks it was all done and dusted, and all for just fifty pounds. I have to say I was elated and quite pleased with myself because during a really horrible time I had managed to achieve something expensive lawers couldn't do, or wouldn't I should say. You live and learn, quite often the hard way, but there is always an easier way if you give it some thought.