Emily was open and honest about the amount it was going to cost and the time it would take to do a contested divorce. In
the first conversation I ever had with her she told me it would probably cost $20-50K, and take maybe a year or longer. I was hoping for the lower end of each but it took 2 years and cost about $50K. There were 2 mediations, a GAL, police, CPS and many other crazy things that happened during the course of the 2 years, like COVID and all ZOOM meetings. I was active duty military and retired during the case which changed my income completely, my spouse was living in housing on the military base while I lived off base, but she had to move when I retired, both of my children have learning disabilitties and me and my spouse didn’t agree on any aspects of their treatment, there were problems serving my spouse because of military base regulations, and every single decision from child custody to after school activities for the children was contested during the entire 2 years.
I may be the neediest client Emily has ever had because of the constant disagreements me and my spouse had over every daily aspect of our children’s lives. I went in to the divorce thinking I would be lucky to get partial, every other week end, custody of my children, that if I wanted to see them I would have to follow my spouse to a different state after my retirement and that I was going to give her all my money in child support and my retirement. I assumed she would take, or make me sell, all my assets.
I ended up with 50% custody and tiebreaking authority in education and medical decisions. Because of the 50% custody she can’t take my children out of Georgia. I am paying 34.5% of my retirement to my spouse for life, but that is something that is standard military stuff, I was with her on active duty for 15 years. We divided our marital assests equally and I didn’t have to liquidate anything except my house in NY, which was expected going in.
My case was rediculous, with details that I can’t list. I sent her thousands of emails and thousands of pages of documents and asked her before every decision I made. She gave me sound advice and I paid for the advice. If you think you can have a lawyer at your call everyday for 2 years with constant contact for under $40,000 you are probably wrong. I would recommend Emily to anyone who is having a serious conflict with their spouse, just understand it’s going to take money and time if you understand that going in you will be more pleased with the end result.
