This one is dedicated to spousal support in the 21st century. A wonderful plot twist I never saw coming, as a 28-year-old woman. When I tell people I’m going through a divorce and that he is asking for spousal support, they can’t believe it. We have no kids. He is a PhD, 35 years old; I am a 28-year-old lawyer, still paying off my own law school debt (which, by the way, he took $10k out of to invest in crypto against my will, and lost it all). I paid 75-80% of all our expenses during our married life. And yet, somehow, he now wants more money from me.
He was financially controlling — the credit cards, what I could or should spend money on… even puzzles. Yes, puzzles. Clothes. Colors. Hair products. Furniture. Food. I digress. Now, every financial change that happens over the next 33 months, I have to report to him. Lose my job, get sick, land a bonus, get promoted; he’s entitled to a cut of my wins and my losses. Like a very well-dressed leech that simply refuses to let go. Ten years together, and he still managed to take a little more than I had planned on giving — emotionally, financially, and otherwise. Apparently that doesn’t end just because I left.
I do think he’s powerless, anxious, and a little unraveled. The loss of control over me seems to be driving him slightly feral. That he’s essentially asking me for money is, frankly, a small delicious form of justice. My sword, thankfully, is my legal background, paired with an utter lack of urgency to make this easy for him. But I do want him gone. I left abruptly, for reasons he still can’t quite wrap his head around.
Girls, women, witches — get yourself a prenup. Don’t, like me, fall for the “if you want a prenup, you don’t really love me” line. Independence is worth its weight in gold, and then some. Heading into a holiday weekend, I’ll be pondering the exact decision that will cost me tens of thousands of dollars — because I am, and will continue, bankrolling his lifestyle: coffees, bills, dinners out, vacations, gas, whatever else he fancies, to the tune of about $2,000 a month. A law designed to protect women left behind after years spent raising the next generation is now being used against a childless 28-year-old with a law degree. The irony writes itself. Anyway, I’m not here to reform community property law. I’m simply here to deliver one piece of wisdom: get. a. prenup.
Women With Swords 