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Coping with Divorce: Five Strategies Suggested by Experts
If you are considering ending your marriage, you probably have a thousand different concerns. Will I be too lonely living by myself? How will the divorce affect my children? How will I tell my friends and family? Unfortunately, there is no way of getting through a divorce pain-free, but there are some steps you can take to help you cope with the emotional burden of ending a marriage.
Strategy 1: Do Not Take It Personally
It is reasonable to assume that if your marriage was unhealthy, the divorce will not be the most cooperative or collaborative process either. Often, couples getting divorced continue to struggle with the same issues they struggled with when they were married. If your spouse attempts to sabotage efforts to end the divorce efficiently and amicably, do not take it personally. Someone acting out in childish or hurtful ways toward you does not reflect on your character; it reflects on theirs.
Key Estate Planning Documents That Are Often Overlooked
When one thinks of estate planning, the main legal tool that most often comes to mind is the last will and testament. Of course, having a will in place is tremendously important. Not only does a will give you the peace of mind that your possessions and property will end up in the right hands after your death, it also helps your loved ones wrap up your estate much more quickly and efficiently than would otherwise be possible. Even though wills are vital, they are not the only estate planning documents we should be concerned about. As you plan for your future, make sure not to overlook these other important legal and financial implements.
Advance Health Care Directive
An advance health care directive is a plan that is made ahead of time in regard to a person’s health care. Illinois law allows citizens to create four different types of advance directives: a medical power of attorney; a living will; mental health treatment preference declaration; and a Do-Not-Resuscitate (DNR)/Practitioner Orders For Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST). Depending on your circumstances, you may wish to use more than one of these types of documents to plan for your future.
The Basics of a Stepparent Adoption
If your spouse has a child from a previous relationship, you know how sensitive and complex issues related to parenting can be. While you may not be the child’s biological parent, it is understandable that you would wish to offer a positive, reliable adult influence for the child—not to mention an authority figure with whom the child is comfortable sharing concerns and problems. With time and effort, you are likely to find a sense of family starting to develop. In some situations, the bond becomes so strong that the stepparent is willing to take on the legal responsibilities of parenthood through the adoption process.
Is the Adoption Appropriate?
When you are thinking about a potential stepparent adoption, you must be aware that the decision to adopt affects the child as much or more than it affects you. You might ready, willing, and able to accept the duties of a legal parent, but that is not enough to make the adoption the right choice. If the child has a healthy, productive relationship with a second parent—other than your spouse—there is little reason to try to cut that parent out of the picture, and a stepparent adoption would probably not serve the best interests of the child. If, however, there is effectively no second parent or the other parent has shown to be uninterested in being a parent, your adoption might serve the child well.
What You Should Know About Living Trusts
When you are beginning to prepare an estate plan, it is important to remember that you are not just planning for the time after your death. An estate plan is necessary for more than just the rich—though that designation can be quite misleading. An estate plan is an outline set up by anyone—including those in lower- and middle-class income sectors—that determines what will happen to one’s assets and property. For those who may tend toward the higher end of the socioeconomic spectrum, it may be in your best interest to establish a living trust, which is a tool that can be used to manage your assets while you are still alive. Among other benefits, living trusts can useful in protecting certain assets and maintaining eligibility for government financial aid programs such as Medicare and Medicaid.
Two Types of Living Trusts
There are two main types of living trusts: irrevocable and revocable. The vast majority of living trusts are revocable, meaning that they can be amended or revoked at any time by the creator. When you create a living trust, the assets you select are transferred to the trust and ownership is in the trust’s name rather than in the name of an individual. Your designated trustee then administers the trust, meaning that the trustee makes decisions for the leveraging, sale, or gift of any assets in the trust. Most people name themselves the trustee of their own living trusts, meaning that there is essentially no difference in the way that one administers his or her own assets—only that they are now technically owned under the umbrella of the trust.
Talking with Your Children About a Remarriage
As a divorced parent, you have probably had to work through a number of difficult discussions with your child. You may have been the one to break the news of your divorce to him or her and, in the time since, you may have answered dozens—if not hundreds—of questions about the future. Now, as you consider getting remarried, you will need to address difficult topics with your child once again.
Every Family Is Different
Your approach to talking with your child about remarriage will depend on a number of factors, including how long it has been since your divorce, the role of the other parent in the child’s life, and your child’s age and maturity. The relationship between your child and your new partner is also a major consideration. For example, if your child was very young at the time of your divorce and has come to see your new partner as a member of the family already, the conversation may much easier in many regards. By contrast, if you only recently got divorced and your child is extremely close with your ex-spouse, your child may not be prepared to accept a new stepparent so willingly just yet.
Undue Influence by a Beneficiary Can Invalidate a Will
The time after the death of a loved one is almost always difficult, even if the death was preceded by a lengthy illness or years of health problems. When you are dealing with the grief and other emotions associated with loss, it can be especially troubling to learn that your loved one’s will was recently changed to benefit a particular beneficiary in a way that seems suspicious. If you have a reason to believe that the beneficiary—or anyone else—tricked or forced your loved one into amending his or her will, you may have the grounds to contest the will based on undue influence.
The Importance of Voluntary Testaments
Every person has the right to decide how his or her assets will be distributed on the person’s death. It is very important, however, for those decisions to be voluntary. A person who has been deceived or coerced into making certain choices about his or her property is not making them voluntarily. He or she is being manipulated.
Is It Possible for Me to Have Sole Custody of My Child After a Divorce?
If you are a parent who is in the midst of a divorce, you probably have many questions about the future. “Where will I live?” “Will I be able to make enough money?” “What will happen to my kids?” As you probably know, the laws regarding child custody have undergone substantial changes in the last few years. The changes were designed to reduce competitiveness and friction between divorcing or unmarried parents and to encourage cooperative parenting. But what if your former partner is uninterested in taking responsibility for your child? Or, what if it scares you to leave your children with him or her? Fortunately, it is still possible for you to seek an amended version of what used to be called “sole custody” of your child.
New Names for Legal Custody and Physical Custody
At the beginning of 2016, sweeping reforms to the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act (IMDMA) took effect. The updates largely eliminated the term “child custody” and replaced it with the more nebulous phrase “allocation of parental responsibilities.” Under the amended law, parental responsibilities are divided into two primary areas. “Significant decision-making authority” replaced the previous concept of legal custody, and “parenting time” replaced the old idea of physical custody. Sole and joint custody were two different types of legal custody arrangements as they were established to clarify which parent or parents had the responsibility to make important decisions about the child’s life.
How a Special Needs Trust Can Protect a Disabled Loved One
When you consider what life will be like for your loved ones when you are not around to care for them, you may have serious concerns about family members who rely on you for the most care. You may have a child, a sibling, or even a cousin with a disability or other special needs. These needs may leave the person unable to adequately look after themselves. If you have been caring for a person with special needs, your death could lead to serious challenges for him or her, and your best option may be to create a special needs trust in the name of your loved one.
A Powerful Tool
Also known as a supplemental needs trust, a special needs trust is an instrument that places assets under the care of trustee to be utilized to help provide for a person with special needs. The most unique aspect of a special needs trust is that the funds contained in the trust are not considered to be “available assets” for the disabled individual, which means they cannot impact the person’s eligibility for Medicaid, Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and other income-based government programs.
Finding Hidden Assets After Your Divorce Is Finalized
When you are navigating the process of divorce, you and your spouse must be open and honest about your individual finances and those you share as a couple. Without both parties being forthcoming, you will not ever be able to divide your marital property as prescribed by Illinois law. Even the court will not be able to make such decisions without all of the necessary information.
Unfortunately, is not uncommon for one spouse to hide property and revenue streams in an effort to keep them away from the asset division process. While it may be possible to track down these assets before a judgment is entered, sometimes the property will remain hidden until the divorce has been finalized. If you have recently gotten divorced and you just found out that your ex was being deceptive during the process, you can still take action to remedy the situation.
Getting Your Divorce Reopened
The first step in addressing the issue of hidden assets after a divorce is to enlist the help of a qualified divorce lawyer. Your attorney can help you with filing a petition for relief from the judgment of divorce in its current form. Essentially, your petition will state that the judgment should be set aside and the case should be reopened in light of the newly discovered assets. It is much easier to have your case reopened within the first 30 days of the entry of the judgment, but the law allows your case to be reopened at any time if there is a sufficient reason to do so.
Important Estate Planning Tasks for Newlyweds
People can get uncomfortable when discussing the role finances play in how successful or fulfilling a marriage will be. However, the simple fact is that money is consistently found to be the number one cause of stress in marriages. Studies have even shown that couples arguing over finances is the top predictor of divorce. Marriage is a financial partnership as much as it is a romantic partnership. If you are tying the knot this summer or have recently wed, read on to learn the steps newlyweds should take to protect their financial future.
Update Beneficiary Designations
Getting married can be quite the challenging and chaotic undertaking. Between choosing the venue, inviting guests, hosting the reception, and finding places for all those wedding gifts, some newlywed couples forget that there are certain financial steps they should take as well. Many unmarried individuals have their parents chosen as beneficiaries on things like life insurance policies and retirement accounts. When those individuals get married, they will need to change the beneficiary to their new spouse—presuming they wish to do so, of course. If the beneficiary designation is not modified and a tragic accident occurs, the surviving spouse will not receive any of that life insurance policy's payout. After getting married, each spouse should review financial accounts such as 401ks, brokerage accounts, IRAs, and bank accounts and update beneficiary designations as needed.
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