'The fallout wasn't over though': Amicable divorce goes south when ex-wife gets greedy, she ends up with less

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Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
Jan 23, 2023 12:00 PM EST

Some people feel like everyone is out to screw them over, probably because they're out to screw everyone else over and assume everyone thinks the way that they do. 

As Ralph Waldo Emerson put it, "People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character." We project far more of ourselves than we realize when we give our opinion to others; if you think you shouldn't be trusting of other people, you're probably someone who shouldn't be trusted; if you think everyone around you is lazy, maybe you should take a look at yourself first. So much of the world around us works in this way, for, quite simply, our perception shapes our world.

Despite his best efforts to manage an amicable divorce from his ex-wife, this Redditor found himself battling her. She seemed determined to get the better deal, despite already getting a better deal anyways. He decided to play her game and let her work her way into a worse deal than she was already getting in this future classic tale of MC.

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  • 01
    Font - Posted by u/Yen1969 11 hours ago You know your rights? Ok. Go for it. XL OC I've told this story a few times elsewhere, but always get comments about posting here. Background: My ex and I were 3 months in to separation, as I kept suggesting divorce agreements, trying to find what she would accept other than "take her back and return to bring a doormat for her." I have a good head for legal documents, and understood very early that as much as I would prefer to just burn everything down and
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  • 02
    Font - So I kept re working and sending possible divisions. Every few days for months. She would object to anything that put any responsibility on her, anything that left something of value out of her hands. Any time I asked her what terms she would be ok with, she would just derail the conversation to something else. Not long into this I realized that I would need a paper trail, so everything went to email only.
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  • 03
    Font - Through all of this, I had recognized too that a court would order spousal support, so there wasn't any point in just cutting her off financially. Not a total doormat at this point though. I had moved my direct deposit to a solo account and kept up her weekly cash flow, and kept paying the bills. But my final offer in this period was the heavily unbalanced offer of splitting the cars one to each, me taking all the debt including her student loans, paying her $3-4k a month for a year so sh
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  • 04
    Font - And so we get to the meat of the story for the MC. 3 months in, I finally get her to agree to a mediator, since I'm getting nowhere. She shows up to the initial meeting, the first time we have seen each other in a while, the 2nd time since splitting. She was staying with her sister. The mediator starts out with the rules of mediation, and the agreements to sign. I sign easily, She balks, but signs it finally. One of the relevant terms is that we agree to not file any other legal paperwork
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  • 05
    Font - The mediator starts asking basic questions. And every question, to either of us, results in my ex launching into an irrelevant topic attempting emotional manipulation of me or him. I quickly resolve to grey rock her directly, and only direct my interactions to the mediator. I do my best to ignore her off topic ramblings, and reply to the mediator when she briefly crossed relevancy like someone falling from a tree and briefly being stopped by various branches on the way down. The peak was
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  • 06
    Font - The mediator called it quits at that point. He reminded her of the rules she agreed to, gave us homework to fill out, and had us schedule the next meeting with his clerk, 2 weeks out. 3 days later I get served with a summons to court for a hearing over spousal support. The summons shows the claim my ex made that all I had received from her in 3 months was $130. Oh boy. Not true at all. Not to mention in violation of the mediator terms.
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  • 07
    Font - I end up on a conference call with the ex and the mediator as he tells her that she needs to withdraw the complaint or mediation can't continue. She adamantly insists that she knows her rights. So the mediator ends his involvement, cuts us refund checks minus time worked so far, and exits stage left.
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  • 08
    Font - I prepare for the hearing. I print out 3 months of bank statements, and highlight every transfer to her. Every bill paid on her behalf. Every atm withdraw by her card. Over 100 toll bills I received from her just driving through express lane tolls so I got the elevated license plate fee mailed to me. $13,000 and change. "You missed a couple zeros in your complaint" I thought.
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  • 09
    Font - My final stack of paper was rather thick. So I made and printed an excel spreadsheet summary for the cover sheet. I also looked up the spousal support rules again. It is 40% of the difference between the income goes from the higher paid to the lower paid. Some little wiggle room, but that's it. Simple. She was currently getting up to 72% of my pay once you factored her bills in. This court hearing was a good thing. Not as good as a mediator and fast resolution, but I wasn't likely to end
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  • 10
    Font - Court date rolls around. I show up to court, waiting in the hall outside the family law section. She shows up and plops herself next to me to start going off on me again. I try to ignore her. Then to keep from engaging, I start a written transcript of her ranting using the back cover of my paperwork folder. Finally she realized what I'm doing and ends the ranting with: "oh, I guess you are writing what I'm saying so you can make your friends hate me." (They needed no encouragement). She h
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  • 11
    Font - The court officer (not a judge, just someone authorized to handle it since it is a simple and clear legal process) finally comes to get us, and we head in. The officer starts the legal speeches, yada yada, then asks my ex if she has anything to add to the complaint. She launches into a rollercoaster speech proclaiming all my bad faults (some of which were real), how mean I was to try to divorce her, and how I obviously didn't need any of the money I made "because he is just going to live
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  • 12
    Font - The court officer returns to the present like someone climbing down from the kitchen table after seeing a rat run by. And she asks me if I have anything I'd like to say. She can see the stack of paper, and eyeballs it as she is talking. I hand over the stack, tell the officer that the summary sheet on top should help clear up the financial points in question, and just verbally start going through the items. At each one, my ex interrupts to give a reason why that item shouldn't count. Ever
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  • 13
    Font - We finally finish the list. The officer is shaking her head slightly and says: "Mr Yen, this court process is to ensure that both parties are doing the right thing. So all of the" and gestures to encompass the stack of paper, "needs to stop right now. We will garnish your paychecks for the amount specified by law and send that to her instead."
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  • 14
    Font - I know it's a win. I knew it was going to be. She didn't. She sat there all smug as we get into the calculations. I asked for a couple of adjustments, to keep the amount of her car payment since I cosigned and I wanted to be sure the bill was paid. I expected that she would refuse or overspend on other stuff and be unable to pay it. I didn't want to give her the power to trash my credit. The officer agreed. I then asked to keep the insurance payment amount too, for much the same reason. A
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  • 15
    Font - Everything wrapped up, we got the totals, signed papers, I handed over a check for the first payment, and the officer got up to make copies of everything. I asked the officer if I could wait in another room while she did, and got an agreement with a bit of side eye at my ex. I got my paperwork first, with the officer saying: "it might take a few minutes for her to get her paperwork, but you are free to go." I got the hint and left immediately. I had parked a few streets away anyway, anoth
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  • 16
    Font - I got in my car and immediately called my cell carrier and cancelled her phone. "Does she want to set up her own plan?" "I can't answer that. I am obeying a court order to remove her from my accounts.","Okay." And worked down the remaining subscriptions I was paying for that she used. I even had the bills in front of me from court with account numbers and customer service numbers right there.
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  • 17
    Font - I was done and driving home when she started blowing up my phone with incoming emails demanding to know what I was doing. Then texts from her sister's phone. Then calls. I just grinned and didn't answer any of them. She stopped after an hour or so and gave me a few hours of silence. Then an all caps email with a screen shot of the Netflix inactive account message: "OMG! EVEN NETFLIX!" I admit I giggled.
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  • 18
    Font - The fallout wasn't over though. A month later after she realized how much less she has from me after "winning" her case, she files an appeal. It is denied due to lack of reason. A month later, she files a complaint that "I wasn't paying her car payment". Just an excuse to get into court. I had been paying it, and I was also pretty confident that even if I hadn't she didn't know how to get into that loan's account (she legally could, just never had cared to learn how). I had a lawyer at th
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  • 19
    Font - The call goes predictably. My ex makes irrelevant rants. The officer keeps shutting her down. Finally asks my ex for proof that I wasn't paying the car payment ... as she is holding statements and check images proving I had. My ex nearly screams: "I just know he isn't so he can hurt me!" The officer replies: "I am holding proof that he has paid it and is satisfying his legal obligation. The complaint is dismissed. Thank you." And hangs up on my ex.
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  • 20
    Font - (Divorce took another 10 months, lots more crazy, teaches her newbie lawyer a hard lesson, and I walked away with even less alimony than the spousal support, and only about 60% of the debt. I lost my dogs to her though, my only regret in the outcome. One is certainly past old age limits now, the other is in that range. I still miss them.)
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  • 21
    Font - captaincinders edited 5 min. ago +3.5 hr. ago. My brother went through a divorce and made a generous offer to pay for his kids upkeep. She decided that was not enough and insisted they went the legal route (called the CSA in this country). My brother happily agreed as he knew precisely what they would assess his payment to be. Yep, they determined he was overpaying. She tried to pull away, but once CSA is involved you cannot un-involve them. Then came the divorce. My brother offers to giv
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  • 22
    Font - Story does not end there. As part of the settlement they each had to declare all financial details to the court and my brother knew she had a secret credit card with £15,000 of debt on it that she didn't declare. If she had declared it, it would have been included in the settlement, but she kept it quiet. Why? Embarrassed we assumed. So come the divorce, she gets the house but no cash, but she has this secret debt she cannot pay off. So she panics and starts making noises about future ear
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  • 23
    Font - RbrCanty 4 hr. ago Family law attorney and mediator here. This story made me laugh and also triggered some ptsd. I hate clients like her that won't accept they got a great deal by bargaining outside of court. They insist on going to court because they just want to tell the judge what a pos their spouse is. Guess what? Nobody cares about your hurt feelings. Then they think you're a bad attorney because the judge followed the law and they ended up with less than they already had. My second
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  • 24
    Font - Yen1969 OP 3 hr. ago Maybe my mediator learns not to do that anymore from my case. :) The lawyer she ended up getting was fresh out of law school, and opened up on my lawyer with all of the lies that my ex fed her. By the time the divorce was finally ordered, her lawyer's frustration with her was bleeding through the cracks. Vote Reply Share
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  • 25
    Font - VoyagerVII 11 hr. ago Beautifully done. Never understood the power of keeping accurate records. But I'm sorry to hear about the dogs. Reply Share Vote 3-2-1-backup +2.6 hr. ago Never understood the power of keeping accurate records. Never understood, or never underestimate? Vote Reply Share
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  • 26
    Font - Idriane 10 hr. ago That sounds like a terrible time. How long were you together before her mask fell off? Also, I'm glad you gave her exactly what she asked for. Vote Yen1969 OP Reply Share 4 hr. ago Vote ... Ugh. 17 years. Childhood Emotional Neglect plus codependent as hell made me insanely vulnerable for such a person. I've been in therapy for a number of years, and things are going a lot better now. Even within myself. Reply Share
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  • 27
    Font - 11 hr. ago I'm sorry you had to go through all this and about the dogs. Delicious_Wish8712 Vote Tugonmynugz. 8 hr. ago Yeah that sucks. Atleast they can't understand her rants Vote Reply Share Vote Reply Share Quoth666 6 hr. ago I have a feeling her rants hit pitches only then can hear though Reply Share
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  • 28
    Font - mizinamo +3 11 hr. ago. edited 5 hr. ago "oh, I guess you are writing what I'm saying so you can make your friends hate me." Why? Was she saying the kind of thing that would make other people hate her? (Edit: typo) Vote Birdbraned Reply Share +39 hr. ago This is behaviour typical if a narcissist. If they can't directly overwrite a person's idea by just saying something like "I don't know what you mean, I definitely didn't do that, are you sure you didn't just _?" then they start on the ma
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  • 29
    Font - fal rose_reader. 9 hr. ago It's always nice when people show you how right you were to leave them. Reply Share Vote 4 hr. ago She asked me several times "can we be friends still?" Yen1969 OP At first I said: "that depends on how smooth the divorce goes." Later, I didn't bother replying. The question was manipulation anyway. Reply Share Vote
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revegenge marriage malicious compliance ex marriage-drama ex wife divorce just deserts marriage-issues
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