I’m being vague with some details to maintain anonymity and it’s complicated and kinda all over the place. Please hear me out.

It’s an age gap relationship. I’m almost 20 years older. We met the year she got her undergraduate degree as an international student. Being in the US on a student visa she had to maintain her student status to stay here. We fell in love and I didn’t want her to have to leave because of her status. I had read up on age gap relationships and the potential pitfalls but we got married anyway.

Her wealthy father had, long ago, set up some sort of trust fund that she lived on and it paid for everything, school, rent, car, food, entertainment. Her dad passed away in the early pandemic. Her mom passed a handful of years after we met. I had a chance to spend time with both.

Me, I came from a broken home, barely graduated high school but went to a tech school early on and kept myself afloat however modest, despite debt but living in a desirable neighborhood. I had my ups and downs but I was on an upswing when we met. My point is, I didn’t have much.

After we married, she went on to earn two masters degrees, had a child during the first, and has been working two jobs for a handful of years utilizing both. Now she makes more than twice what I make and she is a workaholic. She’s admitted to schooling and working so much to avoid issues at home. She also inherited enough from a grand parent to buy some income generating property after the kid was born.

Years later we had also bought a place to live in the city after her dad passed as she inherited another chunk of cash from him. We were able to gut the place and make it very nice.

From the very start, my goal was to be the stable provider, furnish us with good health insurance and be a present father to our child, all of which I have done. I even pitched in to help her complete a few assignments during her second graduate degree. I was the primary childcare provider while she got her degrees. And even now as she works so much.

Early on, after the baby came, things started to change. I understand it’s not unusual for the parents to grow apart. The passion dies, the stress, the child rearing. We’ve all heard it before.

After two graduate degrees, my wife ‘grew up’, and we continued to grow apart. We had different priorities. I wanted to live and spend quality time while maintaining a comfortable career and she wanted to work nonstop and make even more money like her life depended on it.

A few years after the kid came, the seven year itch struck and we tried an open marriage initiated by her. But the guy at work she was crushing on wasn’t interested. I tried but didn’t meet the right person. That went nowhere. We had a dead bedroom by this point. Maybe having sex a handful of times a year, at best.

Well, fast forward six years after the open marriage experiment, and about a couple years ago, I got diagnosed with cancer. Had to do treatments and have surgery. I lost the functionality of my manhood thinking I would be okay as I already had a wife and child. Even now, pills don’t work.

And about a month after surgery, she tells me she wants to move on, that she’s over it, that she wants to find someone else. Yeah, it was crushing.

With the advice of a trusted mutual friend, she ‘decided’ to try and give it another shot. The friend pointed out that she couldn’t do that to me after major surgery. This went nowhere. I don’t think she really wanted to try again.

Anyway, there are more complications but that’s the gist of it.

Now she wants to avoid the cost of attorneys and just get divorced ourselves. Fill out an application, pay a fee and start with a legal separation to give us time to untangle finances and keep health insurance going. She wants to buy me out of our place with the potential proceeds from the first income generating property. But I’m told by an attorney, half of that income generating property is already mine.

And that’s it. She’s foreign and doesn’t buy into the 50/50 custody thing. She’s said if the child and I wanted to spend time together it’s no problem. Come over for dinner anytime. Things along those lines.

I’ve spoken to a lawyer and after 10 years of marriage it’s considered a longterm marriage. And if she makes that much more than me, I’m entitled to some form of alimony.

So what is at stake is half of the income generating property, half of the equity in our home, and some form of alimony. I don’t think I would be able to maintain the current lifestyle and financial status without it. As it is, most of my income goes to our bills, mortgage and debt.

I also have specific medical expenses, medications, etc.

I’m already less of a man as I can’t get it up. Am I even less if I ask for alimony and half of everything?