She filed!

[oak_tree]

So here goes. SO's uNPDSTBxW has filed for divorce. That's actually great news, because SO would likely have hesitated for various reasons (Including the fact that the kids would likely have been told "Look, see what he's doing now? He's forcing us into this!", and he's also been taught that anything and everything he does is an attack on her, and he has no desire to attack whatsoever.) 
I don't know what to expect with the courts. I don't have any idea how long this will take, nor am I holding my breath.
I'm also so scared the social workers/judge won't see what's happening. Already, CAS was apparently fooled, so why should I have any faith in the courts?
I know I just have to focus on being a kind, sane, good influence on the (teenaged) kids, and be there for SO.
Any words of encouragement or advice from people who've gone through this...bring 'em on. I feel like we're about to climb a massive mountain and we don't even know how high it is, where the cliffs are, if it's snowy or icy...

(A little background: She said she was done with him spring 2017, but they wanted to try to raise the kids together. SO and i met Jan 2019 and she seemed to be supportive, providing condoms (?!? lol) and giving him lifts to my place. Then in April 2019 she "split" in that respect. It went from fine to a horrendous betrayal. SO moved out Oct 2019 and they had an informal but written agreement until now. I'm just including this timeline so that the fact that they're only filing now makes just slightly more sense)

[Penny Lane]

Omg providing condoms ... I feel like there's a pretty good chance there were holes in them or something. What a bizarre thing to do.

From what I've read on here and experienced, the process of divorcing a PD is likely to be longer, more expensive, and more stressful than you expect. The best thing about it is the end: Once the divorce is finalized, your lives will be much, much better. There is more certainty and less need for communication and everyone can settle into the new normal. Even if your side doesn't "win," you at least have more certainty and stability.

One trend I've noticed is that you often have child support vs custody, meaning that the parent who has more parenting time gets more child support. The PD seems to often want custody for the sole purpose of getting more (or paying less) child support. So if you(r SO) can find a way to agree to pay more child support, or receive less child support, than they're entitled to, they might get farther on parenting time negotiations.

Another thing that we seem to hear a lot is that the non will make a basically fair offer at the beginning, the PD will totally reject it, will drag it out for months or years, and then at the end of it all they will come back and make pretty much the same offer as was on the table initially. This happened to DH exactly, and I have been surprised to see it come up again over and over. Not in every case, obviously, but in a lot of them.

It's great that she filed! I think any time that the PD can feel like they are in control, or even getting one over on you, is a good thing (assuming they're doing what you want). I think you're correct that she will feel less threatened this way. I would still prepare yourself for a long slog.

My advice for you: Try to spend as little energy on it as possible. This is easier said than done. Hopefully you won't have to be super involved in this. I met DH at the tail end of a very long drawn out court process. Obviously I wasn't very involved as the brand new girlfriend. It was great (for me, not him). Then he went back to court and I was super involved - he was pushing for things that had real impact on me, like parenting time and child support changes and limitations on how much she can harass us. It was so stressful, I gained and lost weight, I hated it, but I helped him figure out the strategy and I do think two heads were better than one on that. He ended up prevailing in a very big way, and the kids' lives are much better for it, so it's hard to really regret the work I put into it. But it really was one of the most stressful times of my life and I hope to never get that involved again in anything for court stuff between the two of them. He later had to take her back to court AGAIN and while I helped a little bit with documentation, I wasn't very invested and I tried hard not to get involved. Again, highly recommend this, it was much better for my mental health.

Like I said it's easier said than done. Court can be all-consuming at times. You've been together long enough that you probably do have opinions on what he should be pushing for and whatnot. Take good care of yourself, it's likely to be a marathon not a sprint, but you have the benefit of being able to step out of it while your SO has to live it. He will get through it, and so will you, and hopefully your relationship will be stronger. It will suck, but it will be OK!

Now, all that being said, I totally failed at this and have gotten heavily involved in court strategy. So I do have some suggestions for your SO that might be helpful as he moves through the process. It might make things go a little more quickly or a little more smoothly.

1. Be clear in your own head about what is your absolute bottom line on all things that are likely to be in dispute. What is the minimum parenting time you will accept, realistically. Split of assets, how the house is valued, child support (your state probably has guidelines on child support, so there may or may not be wiggle room there). All that stuff. Then figure out where you would like to end up - what do you think is truly fair to both of you? Then the final category: your nice-to-haves, that in your ideal world would be included in the plan. What is your pie-in-the-sky dream for the divorce decree? Keep it mostly realistic. In all these categories think about things like provisions of the parenting plan - do you want to have a binding agreement that the kids will go to a certain school, be raised in a certain faith, have drop offs and picks ups happen at a certain place, do you want to restrict access to new significant others (although that ship has probably sailed). Who is in charge of insurance?

2. So, you know what you want and you will accept. Figure out from your lawyer (if you don't have a lawyer, get one, this is not the area to save money) what a judge is most likely to order if the case goes to trial. So you know if your asks are at all reasonable or not. For example if a judge is likely to order LESS than your minimum - then either you need to lower your minimum, or you need to be prepared to negotiate something else in exchange for it. If a judge is very likely to give you your pie in the sky asks - there's no need to ask for anything less for that, however, you might negotiate it down in exchange for something you want more.

3. Then, figure out what is motivating your ex. In DH's case this is 1. money and 2. fear of public embarrassment, for example in the form of her information becoming public as part of a divorce record or in the form of not having custody of the kids and other people finding out why.

4. At some point, you will make her an offer and like I said earlier this is likely to become the basis of the final agreement, even if it doesn't come for several months or years. My recommendation, depending on the situation is: File in court and ask for your pie in the sky. Include at least several things that you would like to have but don't really care about, and bonus points if they are something you don't care about that she will REALLY care about. This will make her worried that she will lose those things and it will give her something to negotiate out and feel like she has a "win." Then send her the settlement agreement that is category 2 - what you think is fair.

5. At some point you will probably have to go to mediation. You most likely won't get anything good out of it, but it's nice to know your bottom line. Sometimes the negotiations in mediation end up being the basis of the order, even if you don't get it agreed to right there.

6. No matter how close or far you seem to a deal, keep pushing the court case forward. Don't push back a deadline because you are thisclose to an agreement. DH did this several times and she kept moving the goal posts. Finally, when he refused to keep delaying the hearing, she settled for exactly what they'd agreed to months earlier. And be prepared to go to court - no matter how reasonable you are, and how many concessions you offer, she might just not be willing to engage meaningfully. You might lose in court, but in so many ways that's better than being jerked around forever with no end in sight.

This was a novel but I hope you can take away some useful tidbits. Hopefully your process goes smoother than ours did, this is sort of a worst-case scenario. I want to reiterate - it is a slog to get through, but life gets so much better after court! Yours and his. Take care of yourself, try not to get too stressed, come here and vent anytime. There are lots of points in court where you just wait around for someone else (the other side, the judge) to do something, and try to use those to recharge. At some point this will just be a blip in the rearview mirror of your life. Good luck!

[oak_tree]

Penny Lane, thank you!
Everything you said makes so much sense to me and sounds like excellent advice. I got SO to read it just now and he said "I should log in just to thank her for that"    
He has a lawyer, in fact, they are NC except through their lawyers. I'm so grateful for that, though she exerts her power over the kids at every turn (DSD "lends" her 85% of the rent every month, and she logs into DSS's homework to watch him work when he's with us) 
The ball is in SO's court (heh, no pun intended    ) . DSS is here this weekend, so it'll have to wait until next week.
I'll do my best to spend my energy on outdoor (distanced) exercise  

And yeah, about the condoms...I'm trying to teach myself not to try to figure out her logic    

[Penny Lane]

I'm glad it was helpful! I forgot to add a couple things and hopefully they'll be helpful too.

DH's ex likes to throw in a curveball at the end every single time. Like everything's agreed to, they just need to sign off ... and she wants more than 50% parenting time that they'd already agreed to (and a corresponding increase in child support). Or, in one case, she wants pictures of how we clean our house. I think these asks are an attempt to exert control. But that's why it's important to know your minimum and to be prepared to go to court, even if it seems like you're on the verge of settling. Because you don't want to give in on parenting time below your minimum just because you aren't ready for the next scheduled court date. (He did send her pictures of how we clean her house - I don't know what she got out of that, or what she thought she was going to see). She often does fold on those curveballs, though, if he's ready to walk away from the deal.

The leverage he has over her might not be anything court related. If she's filing now there might be a reason that she wants it done quickly. One thing that's come up more than once on these boards is that a PD ex gets a new girlfriend or boyfriend, and all of a sudden they're motivated to get the divorce finalized. (Sometime because they've told the new significant other that they're already divorced). That kind of external pressure is just as good or better than the in-court pressure of, say, not wanting to submit discovery of their finances! If they seem motivated to settle, jump on that.

One other thing on finances: Try to avoid any agreement that requires her to act. For example, DH's ex was supposed to roll over half of an account she had, and she was supposed to take on half of the debt that was on a credit card in his name. That process was a NIGHTMARE. It took years, she didn't do either of those things until well after he and I had been dating. She just simply would not sign the forms, and he couldn't do it without her help even with the court order in hand. He finally got her to do both by asking her parents to help him out. But not before she'd pulled some money from that account that was supposed to be joint/split in half. If possible, set up financial agreements so that he can unilaterally enact the provisions. Like, DH bought her out of the house. In retrospect maybe he could have agreed to take on more of the debt in exchange for her getting less cash, and she'd keep the full amount in the shared account. Or maybe he could've at least brought the paperwork to the final divorce meeting and had her sign it right there. Actually, this probably goes for any agreement at all, finances or no - it's practically impossible to get her to do pretty much anything even if she's required by the court order.

[Poison Ivy]

I echo this comment from Penny Lane: "Try to avoid any agreement that requires her to act." I had two overarching goals for my divorce agreement: Divide assets as close to 50/50 as possible (required in my state); and divide them in a way that would put as much of the work on me and as little on my ex as possible. The latter was a goal not because I am a wonderful person who wants to do everything; I'm not. It was a goal because I knew that I get things done much more quickly and easily than does my ex. Obviously, there were a few things he had to do and a few documents he had to sign, but there would have been more, and the divorce would have taken longer, if I hadn't prioritized "make the process easy for ex."