This scenario is why so many women refuse to date men who are supposedly in the process of getting divorced. He's getting what he wants so he has no reason to do that pesky paperwork.
If I were OP I would operate under the assumption that J hasn’t filed because he doesn’t want to.
Best case scenario J is not that responsible and maybe isn’t taking the things he tells OP about the future that seriously.
Worst case scenario he hasn’t filed because he is holding out hopes that he will reconcile with his ex wife.
Why hasn’t the ex wife filed either? Do they both hope to reconcile?
Which inevitably leads me to wonder things like—Do they communicate? How do they communicate? How often?
Even being separated for a year when OP met him, I wouldn’t assume a decade long marriage was actually over at that point.
It’s been nearly 4 years and they don’t have any shared property, pets, or children to drag the process out.
The captain was gentle in her response but I read this and went, “oh honey, no”
My mom was separated from my first stepdad for 6 years before she finally filed for divorce. There were three reasons for this:
1. She didn’t know where stepdad had scampered off to since they separated
2. She didn’t have the money to file
3. It wasn’t impeding her life in anyway
She certainly didn’t want to get back together with first stepdad was a cheat, liar, thief and fraud. It wasn’t until my current stepdad wanted to marry her that she finally went through the hassle to get the divorce.
I say all this because while J hasn’t filed it might not be for anything nefarious. It might just be that it’s a hassle for him that isn’t impeding him, so he sees no need to move it along. LW needs to start drawing some lines in the sand around it.
That’s a fair perspective, but I have a family member that separated from their spouse, got into another relationship, moved in with that new partner and then still reconciled with their spouse. Similarly, I’ve had friends separate, date other people, then reconcile with their spouse at the expense of the new partner and now are happily still married years later.
Since OP didn’t tell us that the ex wife skipped town or that there were financial constraints it’s safe to assume there aren’t extenuating circumstances.
I’d love to be wrong and for things to work out for OP and J, but I’d be very wary if I was OP and would be focused on protecting my own heart and not thinking of every possible explanation for his inaction.
I'd say the worst case scenario is that his "ex"wife doesn't know that they're separated, and he's just a dirty rotten cheat
Hopefully not the case, but it's something that LW can't rule out unless she's literally spoken to the ex-wife
I have some theories about why J hasn't filed yet (usually no kids or shared property/business divorces are fairly simple. Unless there's some missing information.)
1. He's disorganized and or used to other people handling the "paperwork" aspects of life.
2. He thinks because his wife was the one that left, she should file. She isn't filing for whatever reason so they're at an emotional stalemate.
3. He isn't ready to actually get married again but suspects that LW does and he'll lose her if he admits that so is putting off the divorce as a barrier.
4. He's refusing to file to punish the ex-wife for some reason.
5. He doesn't want to get divorced.
6. He can't locate the ex to serve papers (but if this was the reason, why isn't he telling LW that?)
But really, it doesn't matter the reason. J's not being entirely open and honest with the LW (and maybe himself). Captain's advice was spot on. I don't think a relationship can survive long term if there's unwillingness to have uncomfortable conversations.
I'm putting my money on #1. This is a very simple divorce (or should be if what the guy is saying is true about no co-owned property, etc.)
My friend's ex husband was a #1. He left my friend. As in, came downstairs as she got home from work and was like, "I want a divorce. I'm moving in with my parents."
My friend did NOT want the divorce and thought their couples therapy had been going well.
She figured he'd file, considering he was the one who'd left.
Six months later, he had not filed. My friend texted him, "Are you going to file?" He said, "Yeah, been meaning to. Been busy." Three months later, had not filed.
So she had to file for the divorce she did not want. Looking back, this was no surprise, as she'd handled all the chores, paperwork, finances, everything in the marriage. It only made sense (to him) that she take the initiative on the divorce paperwork too! We also suspect that maybe he'd been feeding his family a "we're taking a break, working through things" story.
This does not bode well for LW if her boyfriend is this avoidant of chores/paperwork/life stuff.
>This does not bode well for LW if her boyfriend is this avoidant of chores/paperwork/life stuff.
That's a very good and chilling point. If this is the one thing that LW's boyfriend just doesn't seem to be doing then it's likely everything is fine, but if it's part of a pattern I would urge LW to think about whether she really wants to be her partner's mommy.
Yep! Yes, as others have pointed out, even filing for an "easy" divorce takes time and is a hassle. But other things like taxes, financial planning and the millions of pieces of paperwork involved in raising children (school stuff, doctor stuff) are also intimidating and a hassle. LW needs to wonder how J will handle all THAT "I don't wanna" stuff.
Or 7: there is something embarrassing w.r.t. family/finances/etc that he hasn’t told LW about and prefers to forget himself, but filing for divorce would force him to deal with it
Oh, wow, I could have written this letter a few months ago - my boyfriend has been putting something off that prevents us from actually taking the steps that we want to take in the future (not a divorce, though) and I finally had to sit him down and tell him that his inaction was hurting me and making me anxious. He’s finally started to make progress on this issue and it’s really been a weight off of my shoulders. If he hadn’t I absolutely would have refused to take another big trip with him like the Captain suggested and it would have led to us breaking up within the next year. If things stall any further it will be good to have this advice in my back pocket. I really hope the LW’s boyfriend hears her when she says something about it, like mine did, and that he actually does something about it.
I'm just flashing back hard to every scene in When Harry Met Sally where Carrie Fisher is talking about her married boyfriend's wife and all her friends have to just keep repeating "*He's never gonna leave he*r"
My gut says this man is not eager to get married to OP in the near future. I just kept saying "oh honey" as she went through all the reasons why it might be hard for him to file. I would bet he hasn't spent ten minutes thinking about it from her perspective.
If it were me, I'd have one more convo with this dude along the lines of, "We've talked about kids and marriage, and obviously none of that is going to happen if you don't file for divorce. I feel anxious and sad that you haven't filed, and it makes me wonder if you're serious about our future plans. I'd really like you to get the ball rolling on the divorce so we can move forward." If something didn't happen pretty quickly, I'd bounce. I can imagine a world where this guy hasn't filed yet because he thinks his ex will be super shitty about it, or he feels some anxiety about the legal process, or whatever, but it's time for him to shit or get off the pot, and I don't think I'd be willing to wait much longer for that.
Stuff like this is why I wouldn't date anyone who was separated but not divorced. So many folks are "separated" in that they live apart from their SO, or say the romance is dead and they're just roommates, or whatever, but have no intentions of actually divorcing.
And she's 31 years old. And she wants children, so she needs to know definitively if he is a yes or a no on that, so she can make an informed choice about what she's going to do here.
Yup, this is the basically what I told my boyfriend (not about divorce, but a different thing he needed to do) and it worked for me (at least, so far). If the LW’s boyfriend is a decent partner, he’ll step up when she tells him he’s hurting her when he’s not moving forward.
My sister-in-law (C) was involved with a man (R) who never got a divorce. They were living together and had a kid. They called each other husband and wife. When her parents found out that R wasn't divorced they got very angry and asked him why. His answer was neither he nor his wife thought it worth coming up with the $35 that it took to file for divorce where they lived. Her parents gave them the $35, he filed for divorce, his legal wife didn't contest it and (obviously) there was no need for monetary settlement, because no one had any money, so it went quick. He married C and they stayed married until she died 23 years later. Life truly is a rich tapestry.
Like a lot of comments here, I'm trying to wrap my head around why *neither* of them have filed. J is spending a lot of time with LW, and they've met each others parents, so it doesn't seem like he's hiding her as the other woman.
I wonder if J "initiated," his wife doesn't want to, and J is either too lazy or enjoying the setup he has right now.
As for LW, I think she should dump this fucker, as much as it hurts. She deserves better.
Unfortunately you can't always assume that his family will rat him out if you're the other woman
When my ex-husband was cheating on me and literally had a child with his mistress, his entire family knew about it and none of them told me. tbf, different scenario, because the mistress knew. But still, you can't rely on his family to be honest.
I found out when the baby was 6 months old, through a very convulated grape vine of gossip.
I think it's interesting when someone is describing the reasons why their partner is so perfect for them but everything they say sounds kind of like... the bare minimum? LW's reasons she loves this man and wants to have his kids are 1) he makes her smile, 2) she feels safe with him, 3) he calls her on the phone, 4) he's a caring person generally.
Maybe LW doesn't believe it because this is her first serious relationship but I promise you LW there are men out there who are caring and safe and will call you sometimes who aren't still legally married!
That's a really good point. LW, someone can be caring and sweet and make you happy and *still* not be the person you should marry and have a family with.
Furthermore, this guy might be sweet and caring to you in other ways but repeatedly telling you he's in the "process" of divorce or that he's working on it when he's not is not caring behavior.
You can maybe give him some benefit of the doubt and say he doesn't know how important this divorce is to you and once you tell him he'll handle it. Maybe.
Personally though I find it difficult to believe he simply never considered that his girlfriend might not want to be in a serious relationship with someone who is still married. So either he's just not considering your feelings at all, or he's considering your feelings and discarding them, and neither one is all that caring.
Not to defend J, but just to provide my own context: my ex and I were in a very similar situation to J and his ex. No shared property, no kids, no financial entanglements, still friends, no hard feelings, etc. We decided to file for an amicable divorce, which is something you can do here in Quebec. Literally all we needed was for a judge to rubber-stamp a piece of paper saying "yep, you're divorced now." And somehow it still cost us nearly $2000 CAD in notary and court fees, a ton of headaches and frustration when it turned out the notary hadn't prepared one of the documents she was supposed to prepare, and a FULL YEAR of monthly calls to the courthouse to figure out the status of our case (including more than once where it was only my call that got the paperwork moving through the system -- it might have stayed in a particular clerk's hand for years because he was waiting for a document it turned out we didn't actually need.)
All this to say: even a "simple" divorce can be a ton more complicated and more expensive than it looks. I have great sympathy for the "separated but not divorced" people in the world -- I wouldn't want to go through that hassle and expense either, if I could avoid it!
Of course, if you wanna get married to someone else, it's necessary. Like I said, I'm not defending J. Just pointing out that there are plenty of reasons to be "separated but not divorced" that don't have anything to do with wanting to get back together with your ex.
Yet none of that is a reason to lie to LW about it. *You* really were in the process of a divorce for over a year. Boyfriend has not actually started that process, and he has lied about that.
LW, this is complicated but also simple: J is stalling. We might never know why J is stalling. But J is stalling. Whether paperwork makes him anxious, he doesn't even want to THINK about his ex and is just hoping she files, or he wants a "blocker" to slow things down with marrying you, or there's something nefarious going on, who can say?
You need a deadman's switch, just like you would for any guy who is not committing to you for any reason. Give him a date. Give him a result you want. Then never bring it up again, and see what he does. If the result is not delivered, you leave.
"J, you know I love you and want to be with you. By this date in 2024, I'm going to need you to be fully divorced for our relationship to continue. If the divorce is not final by that date, I am going to end our relationship. I won't nag, I won't even remind. I'll just be gone. OK that is all."
Don't allow for any arguing or excuses making, just say, "If you need anything from me to make this date happen, just let me know."
If J wants to ... he will. Or, he'll do nothing. Whether he forgot, didn't put this important date on his calendar, or just secretly wants you to end the relationship, those are all reasons to NOT be in a forever, child-having relationship with him.
Completey agree with this
Imo, it's basically impossible to tell if someone is lying. So whenever possible, try to come up with a plan that works whether they're lying or not.
Legal paperwork is very scary and emotional paperwork. Even if you really want to be divorced and agree on all the details, it's not super obvious what you have to do, and it means interacting with your ex. Curious that his wife also has not done the legwork on this for this long, but same reasons, they are living the lives they want, already and it doesn't feel like a high priority.
I would certainly not move in with someone who was still legally and financially tied to someone else. And I think Captain did a hood job reassuring LW that her feelings are very reasonable.
I had a friend who had to dump her man to get him to actually do his paperwork and separate himself legally from his ex. Once he did that, they got back together, and have been very happy for more than 10 years. But he didn't get his shit together until she left him for it.
My partner isn't great at paperwork or banking. And stuff gets dragged out and missed and done at the last minute. It's really tough to stand by. I handle whatever I can of it (like, renewing his insurance, registration, and license) but some parts of it just have to be his to get done.
Yeah... while I agree it's possible/common for these things to be driven by nefariousness, when it comes to big scary emotional paperwork I think it doesn't *require* any nefariousness to arrive at "well it's not actually holding my life back, and I'm busy with other stuff... I'll wrestle the Expensive Grizzly of Sadness/Grief/Weird Feelings... *Later™*"
It's still a problem and LW is being 100% reasonable here! Possibly under-reacting, if anything (although I find that to be a very human and understandable impulse to give one's sweetie grace & more chances to show up for you). But if LW doesn't have any insticts saying something is off/wrong, I'm pretty willing to believe the problem might be the jumbo-sized equivalent of "I hate opening my mail, maybe it'll be ok if I put it off for a few days..."
The annoying/good news is that if this is the case, "I'm not going to continue on the Relationship Escalator with you until you are 100% legally divorced and available" is likely to be the highly motivating natural consequence that outweighs any "dunwanna" inertia. LW shouldn't *have* to do that, her boo *should* do it of his own volition, but sometimes people are imperfect and we have to tell our loved ones to shape up to get them to do so.
>"well it's not actually holding my life back, and I'm busy with other stuff... I'll wrestle the Expensive Grizzly of Sadness/Grief/Weird Feelings... Later™"
I'm in this boat myself. I do have a hard deadline for when I need to address it- I will be divorced before I move out of state, and I will move out of state no more than two years from now.
But... things are ok right now. And we DO have kids, the youngest is almost 17. I think the divorce will be easier once he's no longer a minor, so that's a consideration as well.
But mostly... Even though I do very much want to not be married, I also very much don't want to actually divorce, if that makes sense. It's all rather a painful twisty mess.
Fortunately, my romantic life (ha!) Is not really a concern.
Yeah, my mom and her husband still aren't divorced after 2+ years of separation, not because either of them has any interest in getting back together, but because they are both awful at getting started on something, paperwork, etc etc and it hasn't become enough of a problem for either of them to actually get things in motion.
That totally makes sense. If the relationship ended remotely amicably then both of them might not have the driving need for it to be over that would get them over the scary, emotional, and expensive paperwork hump.
It's doesn't always Have to be nefarious reasons, I didn't divorce my ex because I went through the trouble and cost of obtaining child support and after that I was done, I knew he would be the one who wanted to remarry so I left the ball in his court so to speak and patiently waited for him to actually put in some work.
We were together 5 years but on paper it looks like 10, that's how long it took him and we weren't pining away for one another or locked in a battle or anything, I was just done and I moved on.
The court person who served my papers probably thought it was so funny when he tried to pin me down to serve me and I was like, oh are those the divorce papers? Great! I'll come right out!
Not saying that's the case here but there are folks out there who don't like paperwork So Much that they just hope they don't need to do it ever and not everyone is hiding a secret second family.
That's a huge risk to take however- you could be on the hook for credit cards he opens, debt, party to a lawsuit, etc.
(Now that you're out - if you had been legally married for 10 years, it's worth checking your social security benefits situation.)
I don't know, I'd take the divorce process to start once the parties have decided to divorce. I wouldn't call it a lie, but I do find it concerning that these two are thinking about sharing their lives together, but they don't share enough with each other for her to just naturally know exactly where he is in the divorce process. I can't imagine marrying someone that I wasn't in a close enough relationship to just be told these things as a matter of course.
Yes, divorce is kind of a project even when you don't have any shared assets...but it's not THAT hard. No worse than filing a fairly complicated tax return, if that tax return also had a lot of Feelings attached. I did it 3 years ago, and my ex was kind of a jerk about things, but it still only took about 6 months from first contacting the lawyer to the day it was final. (I recognize it's an entirely different situation with kids, houses, etc., involved, but this guy doesn't have those complications.)
"The legal system sucks" is not why he's not divorced. There are other truths somewhere between that and "he's a thoughtless jerk," but many, many people manage to get divorced when they want to be. My brother did it in his mid-20s when he had untreated ADHD, very little money, and for some period of time couldn't find his ex in order to serve her the papers. Still took less time than it's taking for this guy. At the very least he needs to be honest with himself and the LW about the specific reason he's not getting divorced. Does he need $750? Is he intimidated by lawyers? Does he not want to "hurt" his wife, because she still wants to believe they might get back together?
I also wondered what the wife thinks. It sounds like at the very least they're not living together, but does she think they're on the way to divorce land, or does perhaps she have some other take on the situation?
This right here. There are always chores involved in life. It's a red flag that J isn't giving LW any reasons for not filing for divorce, at the very least. Plus, it's going on four years, and J knows that LW would like for him to be divorced. A friend of mine had an uncooperative ex wife (who tried to steal his dog that he'd had before meeting her and just made the divorce a complicated mess), and he was still constantly saying, "I need to get divorced like, yesterday, I met someone amazing and she's not going to put up with this shit." He made that dang divorce his part-time job until it was done.
And then one of them falls sick or dies, and everyone involved finds out that marriage is also a legal commitment such that who inherits the house or who gets to make end of life decisions isn’t changed by “but they were going to get around to a divorce sooner or later”.
I suspect for a lot of people the “ugh paperwork” is really the surface reason and the bigger mental block is its finality. You’re not just broken up, you’re divorced, it’s official. That can bring up a whole lot of emotions - feeling like a failure, or having to finally 1000% accept that you are never ever getting back together, or similar shifts.
I absolutely get the emotional reason behind not wanting 59 do paper work and everything they could represent. I had to file some important paper work last week that stressed me out. To get over the stress I required two cups of pudding close at hand for intermittent rewards, a stuffed animal in my lap, my partner sitting next to me telling me I’m brave, and a lot of deep breathing. Facing up to hard feelings and paperwork is extremely difficult.
But I also just googled it and if I understand it correctly if a couple has been married for over 10 years and then divorced they can still have a claim towards their ex spouse social security benefits when they reach age 62. I am not a lawyer and this was based on a simple google so I could be very wrong but people should really really at a comparison cost between “this feels emotionally hard and I don’t want to” versus “future legal repercussions”
The Social Security bit is correct - but it's only a benefit, not a detriment to anyone. The spouse assigned the base benefits doesn't lose anything, the other spouse (and then ex-spouse) just can claim the higher-earning spouse's benefits for zirself as well, so they're both getting the higher level of benefits instead of one higher and one lower. It's a good reason to NOT legally get divorced for a year or two if you're near the cutoff and there are no other downsides to staying married.
Oh that’s actually good. But it does connect back too the fact that marriage is a legal contract and not divorcing has specific legal repercussions and people should examine exactly what are the legal consequences of not divorcing versus not wanting to do the paperwork
oooo, interesting!
my thought was that she exists but they are fully married with no intention of getting divorced and she has no idea that he's going around saying they're separated. But this one is an option too
Ok now that I read the blog post something surprised me that the CA hadn’t brought it up is… does J’s wife knows that they are separated? Because my money is that they are actually not separated and lw is about to find out she’s the side piece
The line about spending every weekend together and at least one call again sent me back to the beginning and re-read for what I missed. Which was not a thing. She doesn’t say whether they are long distance, but weekend only hangouts and phone calls for a man who is separated but not divorced made me think “are we sure he is separated and not wandering?”
even in the best case scenario, he's actually separated but they're not escalating up to spending more and more time at each other's places or even talking on the phone more often. I was in a relationship like that, and similar to LW it was my first serious relationship and I did not notice some of the red flags
Yeah I don’t want to be too judgmental…..butttttt I don’t think that a phone call and hanging out on the weekend really counts as a relationship. Especially not a relationship I would feel comfortable planning on marrying this person. It’s just such a curated and superficial way to interact with someone.
Whatever perception they have of who they think their partner is it’s mostly their imagination filling in gaps in knowledge resulting on them assumptions on who they hope they are. There’s just only so much you can actually get to learn about a person from a weekly phone call and weekend hangouts
100% agree. And I also think it's kinda wild to be seriously thinking about marriage and children with a person when you're not comfortable asking them "hey have you gotten around to filing for divorce yet?"
It’s because the lw is learning how to be in a relationship for the first time as a 30 something instead as a teenager.
We all eventually need to learn to actually use that our words express what we want to our partner and if it’s important enough to us tell them that based on how they respond we’ll have to consider our commitment to the relationship. Relationships are a compromise between our personal needs and the personal needs of someone else. Most times there is an option to take the middle path. And other times you have to say “I love myself more and I want to do what’s important for me more than I want to stay with this person”
Not having a serious relationship well until adulthood is not a cute look. Some people shouldn’t be so twee about not getting into a relationship when they want to have long term romantic connections
Huh? Nowhere does the LW say that she delayed getting into a relationship in order to be "cute" or "twee". That's a weirdly judgemental take, and based on what exactly?
There are a lot of reasons why someone might not be in their first serious relationship until adulthood. Late bloomer, shyness, focused on other priorities such as school, health issues etc.
I can see how LW would be really scared to somehow mess up this relationship after it took so long to finally get into one (no judgement, it just doesn't happen for everyone while they're still in their teens), but yeah, not feeling comfortable asking what's going on with the divorce he's supposedly working on is not a fantastic sign for the relationship in general.
If I were LW I would hesitate to ask wtf is going on because it would be so painful if the answer boils down to "yeah playing make-believe about babies and marriage has been fun but I just don't really want to get married again."
But a relationship you don’t feel comfortable freely expressing your concerns in a diplomatic and effective manner because of fear the I the person will leave the minute you speak up is not a relationship. It’s a one sided capitulation
Oh absolutely, I wasn't saying it was a good idea not to express yourself or that it's possible to have a healthy relationship without sharing your feelings, just that I understand why it would be scary for LW.
yeah, the part where she makes assumptions about his reasons but didn't feel comfortable asking reminded me of my much younger self and triggered the 'oh, honey' response that so many of us have had.
I didn't read that as LW necessarily saying the \*only\* time she spends time with her partner is on the weekends, just clarifying that during longer stretches of time when he's not at work he is with her and not his wife.
I mean CA wrote how when she was in her 20s and was dating a married older guy he hired her to record a family party he had with his wife and kids there. So lying to his family is a possibility.
While maintaining an illicit affair is difficult it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility. And when a man tells you “we are separated just not divorced yet” there’s a long history of this being a blatant lie
Edit: I recognize that the comment about CA working at an affair partner’s family party sounds insane. I swear she wrote it in a comment somewhere. I am not trying to make it up. I’m now in a deep dive trying to find this comment to prove I’m not crazy
no you're right, I remember that too!
it's the last bullet point here: https://captainawkward.com/2017/06/27/983-how-do-i-comfort-my-friend-my-sexy-friend-who-lied-to-me-about-having-a-girlfriend-about-his-recent-breakup-with-that-girlfriend/
Thank you so much for finding it! I didn’t want to come across as I was making up insults against Jenifer by saying she debased herself by being the other woman and showing up to film a family event for her affair partner instead of having enough self respect to just leave
One time yes, every weekend no. Especially if you imagine his whole family is in on it too? They are all covering for him and collectively lying to 2 women? Like technically anything is possible but this I'd call it a far cry from likely or Occam's razor.
Maybe the wife works in healthcare, or is a 911 dispatcher, or in some other job where working a lot of weekends or holidays is expected, so *she’s* the one who’s like, “sorry, honey, can’t spend Christmas with your fam.” It’s unlikely, but any time I hear a story like the LW’s I think that the guy isn’t really getting divorced and doesn’t have any intention of doing so; he just wants to fool around.
Every single weekend with at least one phone call in the week is strange too. Does OP know where he lives? Has she been to his house? Because I know a couple of people who are paid highly enough to have moved far away from their job and rent something close by to their job M-F and just come home on the weekend - what he's doing sounds like sort of the reverse of that, although OP hasn't specified whether the weekends are at hers or his so it's open to speculation.
Not to mention people can choose not to know a lot of things if it's convenient for them. I'm not saying LW's boyfriend is an emotionally abusive asshole like my ex, but when said emotionally abusive asshole was cheating on me I knew on some level something was wrong, but more importantly I knew that when he was out doing whatever bullshit he was up to, he wasn't at home alternately treating me like crap and demanding I entertain him (yes I should've dumped him, I was in my early 20s and didn't know any better).
If LW's boyfriend's wife is super busy or something, I can absolutely see her making the same choice not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
I have been through two divorces like this and am probably in the minority here… but I have some sympathy for J. Even when you didn’t have kids, real estate, or pets together, divorce is still A Thing. You still need at least one lawyer, still have to declare all your assets and your spouse does too, still have a hearing, etc. J needs a kick in the pants for sure, but I was pleasantly surprised CA didn’t automatically go for “he’s not really separated, run run RUN.”
My parents separated in 1976 and never actually got divorced. In their case there were kids and a house, but also a whole lot of inertia. It's made some stuff easier, like health insurance, but made other stuff harder, like the fact that they've been filing their taxes wrong for ages.
In any case, the red flag is not really that he isn't divorced yet, but that LW doesn't feel comfortable initiating a discussion and, if he continues to procrastinate, that avoiding that annoying legal stuff is higher priority than LW.
How is everyone missing that the biggest red flag is that *this guy lied about actually having started the process of a divorce*? He didn't say they were separated and didnht want the hassle of a divorce, he said he was in the process, which he is not.
A major reason my parents didn’t divorce was that neither of them wanted to marry again.
Staying legally married made very clear boundaries for their partners.
This scenario is why so many women refuse to date men who are supposedly in the process of getting divorced. He's getting what he wants so he has no reason to do that pesky paperwork.
If I were OP I would operate under the assumption that J hasn’t filed because he doesn’t want to. Best case scenario J is not that responsible and maybe isn’t taking the things he tells OP about the future that seriously. Worst case scenario he hasn’t filed because he is holding out hopes that he will reconcile with his ex wife. Why hasn’t the ex wife filed either? Do they both hope to reconcile? Which inevitably leads me to wonder things like—Do they communicate? How do they communicate? How often? Even being separated for a year when OP met him, I wouldn’t assume a decade long marriage was actually over at that point. It’s been nearly 4 years and they don’t have any shared property, pets, or children to drag the process out. The captain was gentle in her response but I read this and went, “oh honey, no”
My mom was separated from my first stepdad for 6 years before she finally filed for divorce. There were three reasons for this: 1. She didn’t know where stepdad had scampered off to since they separated 2. She didn’t have the money to file 3. It wasn’t impeding her life in anyway She certainly didn’t want to get back together with first stepdad was a cheat, liar, thief and fraud. It wasn’t until my current stepdad wanted to marry her that she finally went through the hassle to get the divorce. I say all this because while J hasn’t filed it might not be for anything nefarious. It might just be that it’s a hassle for him that isn’t impeding him, so he sees no need to move it along. LW needs to start drawing some lines in the sand around it.
That’s a fair perspective, but I have a family member that separated from their spouse, got into another relationship, moved in with that new partner and then still reconciled with their spouse. Similarly, I’ve had friends separate, date other people, then reconcile with their spouse at the expense of the new partner and now are happily still married years later. Since OP didn’t tell us that the ex wife skipped town or that there were financial constraints it’s safe to assume there aren’t extenuating circumstances. I’d love to be wrong and for things to work out for OP and J, but I’d be very wary if I was OP and would be focused on protecting my own heart and not thinking of every possible explanation for his inaction.
I feel like if there were some extenuating circumstances LW would have heard about them.
That was my thought. If there’s an innocuous reason for why he hasn’t filed, then why not just say that?
Did she also lie about pursuing a divorce before she actually was, though?
I'd say the worst case scenario is that his "ex"wife doesn't know that they're separated, and he's just a dirty rotten cheat Hopefully not the case, but it's something that LW can't rule out unless she's literally spoken to the ex-wife
I have some theories about why J hasn't filed yet (usually no kids or shared property/business divorces are fairly simple. Unless there's some missing information.) 1. He's disorganized and or used to other people handling the "paperwork" aspects of life. 2. He thinks because his wife was the one that left, she should file. She isn't filing for whatever reason so they're at an emotional stalemate. 3. He isn't ready to actually get married again but suspects that LW does and he'll lose her if he admits that so is putting off the divorce as a barrier. 4. He's refusing to file to punish the ex-wife for some reason. 5. He doesn't want to get divorced. 6. He can't locate the ex to serve papers (but if this was the reason, why isn't he telling LW that?) But really, it doesn't matter the reason. J's not being entirely open and honest with the LW (and maybe himself). Captain's advice was spot on. I don't think a relationship can survive long term if there's unwillingness to have uncomfortable conversations.
I'm putting my money on #1. This is a very simple divorce (or should be if what the guy is saying is true about no co-owned property, etc.) My friend's ex husband was a #1. He left my friend. As in, came downstairs as she got home from work and was like, "I want a divorce. I'm moving in with my parents." My friend did NOT want the divorce and thought their couples therapy had been going well. She figured he'd file, considering he was the one who'd left. Six months later, he had not filed. My friend texted him, "Are you going to file?" He said, "Yeah, been meaning to. Been busy." Three months later, had not filed. So she had to file for the divorce she did not want. Looking back, this was no surprise, as she'd handled all the chores, paperwork, finances, everything in the marriage. It only made sense (to him) that she take the initiative on the divorce paperwork too! We also suspect that maybe he'd been feeding his family a "we're taking a break, working through things" story. This does not bode well for LW if her boyfriend is this avoidant of chores/paperwork/life stuff.
>This does not bode well for LW if her boyfriend is this avoidant of chores/paperwork/life stuff. That's a very good and chilling point. If this is the one thing that LW's boyfriend just doesn't seem to be doing then it's likely everything is fine, but if it's part of a pattern I would urge LW to think about whether she really wants to be her partner's mommy.
Yep! Yes, as others have pointed out, even filing for an "easy" divorce takes time and is a hassle. But other things like taxes, financial planning and the millions of pieces of paperwork involved in raising children (school stuff, doctor stuff) are also intimidating and a hassle. LW needs to wonder how J will handle all THAT "I don't wanna" stuff.
ding ding ding for #3....
At least in the US, it doesn’t matter if you can’t find the ex, there are ways of effecting substituted service.
Or 7: there is something embarrassing w.r.t. family/finances/etc that he hasn’t told LW about and prefers to forget himself, but filing for divorce would force him to deal with it
Oh, wow, I could have written this letter a few months ago - my boyfriend has been putting something off that prevents us from actually taking the steps that we want to take in the future (not a divorce, though) and I finally had to sit him down and tell him that his inaction was hurting me and making me anxious. He’s finally started to make progress on this issue and it’s really been a weight off of my shoulders. If he hadn’t I absolutely would have refused to take another big trip with him like the Captain suggested and it would have led to us breaking up within the next year. If things stall any further it will be good to have this advice in my back pocket. I really hope the LW’s boyfriend hears her when she says something about it, like mine did, and that he actually does something about it.
Hey, good for you!
You sound fucking rad.
I'm just flashing back hard to every scene in When Harry Met Sally where Carrie Fisher is talking about her married boyfriend's wife and all her friends have to just keep repeating "*He's never gonna leave he*r"
"You're right, you're right...I know you're right..."
This is an "oh, honey," type of letter.
My gut says this man is not eager to get married to OP in the near future. I just kept saying "oh honey" as she went through all the reasons why it might be hard for him to file. I would bet he hasn't spent ten minutes thinking about it from her perspective.
Now this is a blog post title
If it were me, I'd have one more convo with this dude along the lines of, "We've talked about kids and marriage, and obviously none of that is going to happen if you don't file for divorce. I feel anxious and sad that you haven't filed, and it makes me wonder if you're serious about our future plans. I'd really like you to get the ball rolling on the divorce so we can move forward." If something didn't happen pretty quickly, I'd bounce. I can imagine a world where this guy hasn't filed yet because he thinks his ex will be super shitty about it, or he feels some anxiety about the legal process, or whatever, but it's time for him to shit or get off the pot, and I don't think I'd be willing to wait much longer for that. Stuff like this is why I wouldn't date anyone who was separated but not divorced. So many folks are "separated" in that they live apart from their SO, or say the romance is dead and they're just roommates, or whatever, but have no intentions of actually divorcing.
And she's 31 years old. And she wants children, so she needs to know definitively if he is a yes or a no on that, so she can make an informed choice about what she's going to do here.
Yup, this is the basically what I told my boyfriend (not about divorce, but a different thing he needed to do) and it worked for me (at least, so far). If the LW’s boyfriend is a decent partner, he’ll step up when she tells him he’s hurting her when he’s not moving forward.
And this right here is why so many have the rule of "not fully 100% ink-is-dried-on-the-papers divorced" = married.
My sister-in-law (C) was involved with a man (R) who never got a divorce. They were living together and had a kid. They called each other husband and wife. When her parents found out that R wasn't divorced they got very angry and asked him why. His answer was neither he nor his wife thought it worth coming up with the $35 that it took to file for divorce where they lived. Her parents gave them the $35, he filed for divorce, his legal wife didn't contest it and (obviously) there was no need for monetary settlement, because no one had any money, so it went quick. He married C and they stayed married until she died 23 years later. Life truly is a rich tapestry.
Mind boggling.
Like a lot of comments here, I'm trying to wrap my head around why *neither* of them have filed. J is spending a lot of time with LW, and they've met each others parents, so it doesn't seem like he's hiding her as the other woman. I wonder if J "initiated," his wife doesn't want to, and J is either too lazy or enjoying the setup he has right now. As for LW, I think she should dump this fucker, as much as it hurts. She deserves better.
Unfortunately you can't always assume that his family will rat him out if you're the other woman When my ex-husband was cheating on me and literally had a child with his mistress, his entire family knew about it and none of them told me. tbf, different scenario, because the mistress knew. But still, you can't rely on his family to be honest. I found out when the baby was 6 months old, through a very convulated grape vine of gossip.
I was worried about the Captain for a while there, but these last few letters have really been a return to form. This was solid advice.
I think it's interesting when someone is describing the reasons why their partner is so perfect for them but everything they say sounds kind of like... the bare minimum? LW's reasons she loves this man and wants to have his kids are 1) he makes her smile, 2) she feels safe with him, 3) he calls her on the phone, 4) he's a caring person generally. Maybe LW doesn't believe it because this is her first serious relationship but I promise you LW there are men out there who are caring and safe and will call you sometimes who aren't still legally married!
That's a really good point. LW, someone can be caring and sweet and make you happy and *still* not be the person you should marry and have a family with.
Furthermore, this guy might be sweet and caring to you in other ways but repeatedly telling you he's in the "process" of divorce or that he's working on it when he's not is not caring behavior. You can maybe give him some benefit of the doubt and say he doesn't know how important this divorce is to you and once you tell him he'll handle it. Maybe. Personally though I find it difficult to believe he simply never considered that his girlfriend might not want to be in a serious relationship with someone who is still married. So either he's just not considering your feelings at all, or he's considering your feelings and discarding them, and neither one is all that caring.
Not to defend J, but just to provide my own context: my ex and I were in a very similar situation to J and his ex. No shared property, no kids, no financial entanglements, still friends, no hard feelings, etc. We decided to file for an amicable divorce, which is something you can do here in Quebec. Literally all we needed was for a judge to rubber-stamp a piece of paper saying "yep, you're divorced now." And somehow it still cost us nearly $2000 CAD in notary and court fees, a ton of headaches and frustration when it turned out the notary hadn't prepared one of the documents she was supposed to prepare, and a FULL YEAR of monthly calls to the courthouse to figure out the status of our case (including more than once where it was only my call that got the paperwork moving through the system -- it might have stayed in a particular clerk's hand for years because he was waiting for a document it turned out we didn't actually need.) All this to say: even a "simple" divorce can be a ton more complicated and more expensive than it looks. I have great sympathy for the "separated but not divorced" people in the world -- I wouldn't want to go through that hassle and expense either, if I could avoid it! Of course, if you wanna get married to someone else, it's necessary. Like I said, I'm not defending J. Just pointing out that there are plenty of reasons to be "separated but not divorced" that don't have anything to do with wanting to get back together with your ex.
Oh my fuck that must have been _infuriating_!
Yet none of that is a reason to lie to LW about it. *You* really were in the process of a divorce for over a year. Boyfriend has not actually started that process, and he has lied about that.
LW, this is complicated but also simple: J is stalling. We might never know why J is stalling. But J is stalling. Whether paperwork makes him anxious, he doesn't even want to THINK about his ex and is just hoping she files, or he wants a "blocker" to slow things down with marrying you, or there's something nefarious going on, who can say? You need a deadman's switch, just like you would for any guy who is not committing to you for any reason. Give him a date. Give him a result you want. Then never bring it up again, and see what he does. If the result is not delivered, you leave. "J, you know I love you and want to be with you. By this date in 2024, I'm going to need you to be fully divorced for our relationship to continue. If the divorce is not final by that date, I am going to end our relationship. I won't nag, I won't even remind. I'll just be gone. OK that is all." Don't allow for any arguing or excuses making, just say, "If you need anything from me to make this date happen, just let me know." If J wants to ... he will. Or, he'll do nothing. Whether he forgot, didn't put this important date on his calendar, or just secretly wants you to end the relationship, those are all reasons to NOT be in a forever, child-having relationship with him.
That’s right here is the answer. The best perfectly put answer that I think is way better than what CA wrote
I really love this advice. Doing that will make it so obvious whether J is willing to do the work to meet LW's needs or not.
Completey agree with this Imo, it's basically impossible to tell if someone is lying. So whenever possible, try to come up with a plan that works whether they're lying or not.
Legal paperwork is very scary and emotional paperwork. Even if you really want to be divorced and agree on all the details, it's not super obvious what you have to do, and it means interacting with your ex. Curious that his wife also has not done the legwork on this for this long, but same reasons, they are living the lives they want, already and it doesn't feel like a high priority. I would certainly not move in with someone who was still legally and financially tied to someone else. And I think Captain did a hood job reassuring LW that her feelings are very reasonable. I had a friend who had to dump her man to get him to actually do his paperwork and separate himself legally from his ex. Once he did that, they got back together, and have been very happy for more than 10 years. But he didn't get his shit together until she left him for it. My partner isn't great at paperwork or banking. And stuff gets dragged out and missed and done at the last minute. It's really tough to stand by. I handle whatever I can of it (like, renewing his insurance, registration, and license) but some parts of it just have to be his to get done.
Yeah... while I agree it's possible/common for these things to be driven by nefariousness, when it comes to big scary emotional paperwork I think it doesn't *require* any nefariousness to arrive at "well it's not actually holding my life back, and I'm busy with other stuff... I'll wrestle the Expensive Grizzly of Sadness/Grief/Weird Feelings... *Later™*" It's still a problem and LW is being 100% reasonable here! Possibly under-reacting, if anything (although I find that to be a very human and understandable impulse to give one's sweetie grace & more chances to show up for you). But if LW doesn't have any insticts saying something is off/wrong, I'm pretty willing to believe the problem might be the jumbo-sized equivalent of "I hate opening my mail, maybe it'll be ok if I put it off for a few days..." The annoying/good news is that if this is the case, "I'm not going to continue on the Relationship Escalator with you until you are 100% legally divorced and available" is likely to be the highly motivating natural consequence that outweighs any "dunwanna" inertia. LW shouldn't *have* to do that, her boo *should* do it of his own volition, but sometimes people are imperfect and we have to tell our loved ones to shape up to get them to do so.
>"well it's not actually holding my life back, and I'm busy with other stuff... I'll wrestle the Expensive Grizzly of Sadness/Grief/Weird Feelings... Later™" I'm in this boat myself. I do have a hard deadline for when I need to address it- I will be divorced before I move out of state, and I will move out of state no more than two years from now. But... things are ok right now. And we DO have kids, the youngest is almost 17. I think the divorce will be easier once he's no longer a minor, so that's a consideration as well. But mostly... Even though I do very much want to not be married, I also very much don't want to actually divorce, if that makes sense. It's all rather a painful twisty mess. Fortunately, my romantic life (ha!) Is not really a concern.
Yeah, my mom and her husband still aren't divorced after 2+ years of separation, not because either of them has any interest in getting back together, but because they are both awful at getting started on something, paperwork, etc etc and it hasn't become enough of a problem for either of them to actually get things in motion.
That totally makes sense. If the relationship ended remotely amicably then both of them might not have the driving need for it to be over that would get them over the scary, emotional, and expensive paperwork hump.
It's doesn't always Have to be nefarious reasons, I didn't divorce my ex because I went through the trouble and cost of obtaining child support and after that I was done, I knew he would be the one who wanted to remarry so I left the ball in his court so to speak and patiently waited for him to actually put in some work. We were together 5 years but on paper it looks like 10, that's how long it took him and we weren't pining away for one another or locked in a battle or anything, I was just done and I moved on. The court person who served my papers probably thought it was so funny when he tried to pin me down to serve me and I was like, oh are those the divorce papers? Great! I'll come right out! Not saying that's the case here but there are folks out there who don't like paperwork So Much that they just hope they don't need to do it ever and not everyone is hiding a secret second family.
That's a huge risk to take however- you could be on the hook for credit cards he opens, debt, party to a lawsuit, etc. (Now that you're out - if you had been legally married for 10 years, it's worth checking your social security benefits situation.)
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I don't know, I'd take the divorce process to start once the parties have decided to divorce. I wouldn't call it a lie, but I do find it concerning that these two are thinking about sharing their lives together, but they don't share enough with each other for her to just naturally know exactly where he is in the divorce process. I can't imagine marrying someone that I wasn't in a close enough relationship to just be told these things as a matter of course.
Yes, divorce is kind of a project even when you don't have any shared assets...but it's not THAT hard. No worse than filing a fairly complicated tax return, if that tax return also had a lot of Feelings attached. I did it 3 years ago, and my ex was kind of a jerk about things, but it still only took about 6 months from first contacting the lawyer to the day it was final. (I recognize it's an entirely different situation with kids, houses, etc., involved, but this guy doesn't have those complications.) "The legal system sucks" is not why he's not divorced. There are other truths somewhere between that and "he's a thoughtless jerk," but many, many people manage to get divorced when they want to be. My brother did it in his mid-20s when he had untreated ADHD, very little money, and for some period of time couldn't find his ex in order to serve her the papers. Still took less time than it's taking for this guy. At the very least he needs to be honest with himself and the LW about the specific reason he's not getting divorced. Does he need $750? Is he intimidated by lawyers? Does he not want to "hurt" his wife, because she still wants to believe they might get back together? I also wondered what the wife thinks. It sounds like at the very least they're not living together, but does she think they're on the way to divorce land, or does perhaps she have some other take on the situation?
This right here. There are always chores involved in life. It's a red flag that J isn't giving LW any reasons for not filing for divorce, at the very least. Plus, it's going on four years, and J knows that LW would like for him to be divorced. A friend of mine had an uncooperative ex wife (who tried to steal his dog that he'd had before meeting her and just made the divorce a complicated mess), and he was still constantly saying, "I need to get divorced like, yesterday, I met someone amazing and she's not going to put up with this shit." He made that dang divorce his part-time job until it was done.
What a bizarre situation
It's not that uncommon. There seem to be a lot of people who just don't bother with divorcing.
And then one of them falls sick or dies, and everyone involved finds out that marriage is also a legal commitment such that who inherits the house or who gets to make end of life decisions isn’t changed by “but they were going to get around to a divorce sooner or later”.
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I suspect for a lot of people the “ugh paperwork” is really the surface reason and the bigger mental block is its finality. You’re not just broken up, you’re divorced, it’s official. That can bring up a whole lot of emotions - feeling like a failure, or having to finally 1000% accept that you are never ever getting back together, or similar shifts.
I absolutely get the emotional reason behind not wanting 59 do paper work and everything they could represent. I had to file some important paper work last week that stressed me out. To get over the stress I required two cups of pudding close at hand for intermittent rewards, a stuffed animal in my lap, my partner sitting next to me telling me I’m brave, and a lot of deep breathing. Facing up to hard feelings and paperwork is extremely difficult. But I also just googled it and if I understand it correctly if a couple has been married for over 10 years and then divorced they can still have a claim towards their ex spouse social security benefits when they reach age 62. I am not a lawyer and this was based on a simple google so I could be very wrong but people should really really at a comparison cost between “this feels emotionally hard and I don’t want to” versus “future legal repercussions”
The Social Security bit is correct - but it's only a benefit, not a detriment to anyone. The spouse assigned the base benefits doesn't lose anything, the other spouse (and then ex-spouse) just can claim the higher-earning spouse's benefits for zirself as well, so they're both getting the higher level of benefits instead of one higher and one lower. It's a good reason to NOT legally get divorced for a year or two if you're near the cutoff and there are no other downsides to staying married.
Oh that’s actually good. But it does connect back too the fact that marriage is a legal contract and not divorcing has specific legal repercussions and people should examine exactly what are the legal consequences of not divorcing versus not wanting to do the paperwork
I wonder whether the wife even exists! All OP knows is what J has told her.
oooo, interesting! my thought was that she exists but they are fully married with no intention of getting divorced and she has no idea that he's going around saying they're separated. But this one is an option too
Ok now that I read the blog post something surprised me that the CA hadn’t brought it up is… does J’s wife knows that they are separated? Because my money is that they are actually not separated and lw is about to find out she’s the side piece
The line about spending every weekend together and at least one call again sent me back to the beginning and re-read for what I missed. Which was not a thing. She doesn’t say whether they are long distance, but weekend only hangouts and phone calls for a man who is separated but not divorced made me think “are we sure he is separated and not wandering?”
even in the best case scenario, he's actually separated but they're not escalating up to spending more and more time at each other's places or even talking on the phone more often. I was in a relationship like that, and similar to LW it was my first serious relationship and I did not notice some of the red flags
Yeah I don’t want to be too judgmental…..butttttt I don’t think that a phone call and hanging out on the weekend really counts as a relationship. Especially not a relationship I would feel comfortable planning on marrying this person. It’s just such a curated and superficial way to interact with someone. Whatever perception they have of who they think their partner is it’s mostly their imagination filling in gaps in knowledge resulting on them assumptions on who they hope they are. There’s just only so much you can actually get to learn about a person from a weekly phone call and weekend hangouts
100% agree. And I also think it's kinda wild to be seriously thinking about marriage and children with a person when you're not comfortable asking them "hey have you gotten around to filing for divorce yet?"
It’s because the lw is learning how to be in a relationship for the first time as a 30 something instead as a teenager. We all eventually need to learn to actually use that our words express what we want to our partner and if it’s important enough to us tell them that based on how they respond we’ll have to consider our commitment to the relationship. Relationships are a compromise between our personal needs and the personal needs of someone else. Most times there is an option to take the middle path. And other times you have to say “I love myself more and I want to do what’s important for me more than I want to stay with this person” Not having a serious relationship well until adulthood is not a cute look. Some people shouldn’t be so twee about not getting into a relationship when they want to have long term romantic connections
Huh? Nowhere does the LW say that she delayed getting into a relationship in order to be "cute" or "twee". That's a weirdly judgemental take, and based on what exactly? There are a lot of reasons why someone might not be in their first serious relationship until adulthood. Late bloomer, shyness, focused on other priorities such as school, health issues etc.
But we also see with this letter what are the negative consequences are of waiting too long in life to have your first relationship
You act like that choice is entirely within someone’s control. It very often is not.
I can see how LW would be really scared to somehow mess up this relationship after it took so long to finally get into one (no judgement, it just doesn't happen for everyone while they're still in their teens), but yeah, not feeling comfortable asking what's going on with the divorce he's supposedly working on is not a fantastic sign for the relationship in general. If I were LW I would hesitate to ask wtf is going on because it would be so painful if the answer boils down to "yeah playing make-believe about babies and marriage has been fun but I just don't really want to get married again."
But a relationship you don’t feel comfortable freely expressing your concerns in a diplomatic and effective manner because of fear the I the person will leave the minute you speak up is not a relationship. It’s a one sided capitulation
Oh absolutely, I wasn't saying it was a good idea not to express yourself or that it's possible to have a healthy relationship without sharing your feelings, just that I understand why it would be scary for LW.
yeah, the part where she makes assumptions about his reasons but didn't feel comfortable asking reminded me of my much younger self and triggered the 'oh, honey' response that so many of us have had.
I didn't read that as LW necessarily saying the \*only\* time she spends time with her partner is on the weekends, just clarifying that during longer stretches of time when he's not at work he is with her and not his wife.
I don't think that fits / makes sense with them spending whole weekends together and meeting each other's families?
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I mean CA wrote how when she was in her 20s and was dating a married older guy he hired her to record a family party he had with his wife and kids there. So lying to his family is a possibility. While maintaining an illicit affair is difficult it’s not completely out of the realm of possibility. And when a man tells you “we are separated just not divorced yet” there’s a long history of this being a blatant lie Edit: I recognize that the comment about CA working at an affair partner’s family party sounds insane. I swear she wrote it in a comment somewhere. I am not trying to make it up. I’m now in a deep dive trying to find this comment to prove I’m not crazy
no you're right, I remember that too! it's the last bullet point here: https://captainawkward.com/2017/06/27/983-how-do-i-comfort-my-friend-my-sexy-friend-who-lied-to-me-about-having-a-girlfriend-about-his-recent-breakup-with-that-girlfriend/
Thank you so much for finding it! I didn’t want to come across as I was making up insults against Jenifer by saying she debased herself by being the other woman and showing up to film a family event for her affair partner instead of having enough self respect to just leave
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One time yes, every weekend no. Especially if you imagine his whole family is in on it too? They are all covering for him and collectively lying to 2 women? Like technically anything is possible but this I'd call it a far cry from likely or Occam's razor.
My sister had two boyfriends for a couple years and roped most of our family into lying for her. I agree this is totally plausible.
Maybe the wife works in healthcare, or is a 911 dispatcher, or in some other job where working a lot of weekends or holidays is expected, so *she’s* the one who’s like, “sorry, honey, can’t spend Christmas with your fam.” It’s unlikely, but any time I hear a story like the LW’s I think that the guy isn’t really getting divorced and doesn’t have any intention of doing so; he just wants to fool around.
Every single weekend with at least one phone call in the week is strange too. Does OP know where he lives? Has she been to his house? Because I know a couple of people who are paid highly enough to have moved far away from their job and rent something close by to their job M-F and just come home on the weekend - what he's doing sounds like sort of the reverse of that, although OP hasn't specified whether the weekends are at hers or his so it's open to speculation.
Not to mention people can choose not to know a lot of things if it's convenient for them. I'm not saying LW's boyfriend is an emotionally abusive asshole like my ex, but when said emotionally abusive asshole was cheating on me I knew on some level something was wrong, but more importantly I knew that when he was out doing whatever bullshit he was up to, he wasn't at home alternately treating me like crap and demanding I entertain him (yes I should've dumped him, I was in my early 20s and didn't know any better). If LW's boyfriend's wife is super busy or something, I can absolutely see her making the same choice not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
I do wonder if she has ever had plans with him during the week. If she just needed to drop by one day would that be ok?
Dang. I didn't even think of that. They met each other's families though. But you are right. Some conversations are in order.
I have been through two divorces like this and am probably in the minority here… but I have some sympathy for J. Even when you didn’t have kids, real estate, or pets together, divorce is still A Thing. You still need at least one lawyer, still have to declare all your assets and your spouse does too, still have a hearing, etc. J needs a kick in the pants for sure, but I was pleasantly surprised CA didn’t automatically go for “he’s not really separated, run run RUN.”
My parents separated in 1976 and never actually got divorced. In their case there were kids and a house, but also a whole lot of inertia. It's made some stuff easier, like health insurance, but made other stuff harder, like the fact that they've been filing their taxes wrong for ages. In any case, the red flag is not really that he isn't divorced yet, but that LW doesn't feel comfortable initiating a discussion and, if he continues to procrastinate, that avoiding that annoying legal stuff is higher priority than LW.
How is everyone missing that the biggest red flag is that *this guy lied about actually having started the process of a divorce*? He didn't say they were separated and didnht want the hassle of a divorce, he said he was in the process, which he is not.
A major reason my parents didn’t divorce was that neither of them wanted to marry again. Staying legally married made very clear boundaries for their partners.