I met my wife in my early 30s. She was in her mid 20s at the time. I was already well established and had made a significant amount of money working as a quant and investing my savings diligently. She on the other hand had never gone to college and was content working for basically minimum wage.
So when I meet her we click instantly and I fall head over heels for her. We get married and move in together, and soon after have three kids. When we were expecting our first born she had told me she wanted to be a stay at home mom. Obviously I was jealous but I went along with it since it seemed logical.
So she spends the next 20+ years as a stay at home mom taking care of our kids while I work 12 hour days and then some. I’m not demeaning stay at home moms by the way, but in the context of our marriage she had an extremely easy going life style.
A couple years ago I discovered she had been cheating on me with her friend’s husband. Divorced obviously followed.
The only major asset we had in the US was our house, which was a premarital asset. We had a shared bank account, but since I am a finance guy I handled all our investments, and for tax reasons invested it abroad in my home country.
Now if we had just grown apart, or she said she was unhappy, I’d have no problem paying what’s fair. But the fact she cheated on me is what makes me resent paying her a cent.
So in the divorce she is awarded half of our investments made during marriage, >90% of which are abroad in my name, along with alimony for 20 years for 30% of my pay.
So here I am given an opportunity to get out of this entirely by moving back to my home country and never looking back. So I sell our house as fast as possible, move the money abroad, and move back to my home country while stringing her along about why it’s taking so long to liquidate our savings. Once abroad I immediately stop alimony payments.
Now she has no legal recourse (I’ve double checked with lawyers) and is left with her share of the small amount we had in the states.
The reason I’m asking here is that my own children are split on this. My son is on my side 100%, while my daughters are 90% on their mothers side. I figured it would be interesting to see the opinions of people here.
[–]N19864 29 points30 points31 points (1 child) | Copy Link
This guy's comment is the best. It is spot on.
[–]icemanthrowaway123 4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Oh hey that's me
[–]fgrsentinel 11 points12 points13 points (2 children) | Copy Link
I find it interesting how all the YTA responses are basically attacking his belief that being forced to give up half of their shared value (when it's clear his share is way more than half) to someone who couldn't even take one of the longest-standing institutions (marriage) seriously is wrong.
If this happened the other way how many of them would still be saying YTA?
[–]5th_Law_of_Robotics 6 points7 points8 points (0 children) | Copy Link
If it was the other way around everyone would sympathize with her and yell "you go gurl! You don't need no man!"
[–]icemanthrowaway123 1 point2 points3 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Bill Burr's mocking tone of "THATS WHAT THE LAW SAYYSSS" is all I could hear.
[–][deleted] 7 points8 points9 points (2 children) | Copy Link
Refuse to pay? Dont drop the soap.
[–]BeachsideWRX 8 points9 points10 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Read the post. Hes not in the country anymore- no issue
[–]icemanthrowaway123 4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
He fled and apparently is in a country that hasn't agreed to extradite due to alimony arrears. He did it.
[–]confrey 4 points5 points6 points (0 children) | Copy Link
I think the post just got locked.
[–]blowingchina 3 points4 points5 points (0 children) | Copy Link
The YTA posts on there have to be posted by fear grimacing losers.
[–]Gimpy1405 2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Looking on the AITA page it appears your kids are old enough that you would not be supporting them anyway so it comes down to what is fair for you and your ex. Specifically what you think is fair.
In the same way that I am better than my worst moments and less than my best moments, we are complex and it may not be fair or correct to measure us by a moment or a selected piece of time. Choose one piece and I'm an angel. Select another and I'm an abominable shithead. But over a long term, I'm just an average guy. See what I mean? My overarching point is that we are complex and it is not simple or accurate to reduce us to our best or worst hours.
I suspect that likewise your ex is better than her worst behaviour and not as good as her best moment. She let you down in a huge way with the affair, but is that a complete measure of who she is, or even of who she was to you? If all her previous behavior was much the same and hugely harmful to you, then I'd ask you why you are waiting to move and cut her of without a cent. But if the balance is not so starkly awful, then "What is fair?" may not be simple.
If you move - and if she was better at the beginning, a good wife and a good mom before she went off the rails - then that opens up a third possible path. If you are where there are no legal consequences to paying nothing, then I suspect you will have no consequences if you unilaterally "change the agreement" whatever way you deem proper and pay her some other amount that you choose as a more fair appreciation of her early contributions. If that has any merit (and it may not!) then check that establishing a precedent of payments from a distant place does not imperil you legally. Laws are strange and you would want to check that this idea did not come back to haunt you.
No matter what, if you do move, and if you cut off alimony with no legal consequences, you are not reducing your costs to zero. You are enduring the emotional cost of uprooted-ness and the financial and practical costs of re-establishing yourself in a new place. Those are nontrivial. Anyway, I wish you the best in a hard situation.
EDIT: By the way you're NTA.
[–]eofree2be 2 points3 points4 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Advise the son to cut the ties as well. Caring for an old bitter mother sounds like hell. I’d wager she’d waste the sudden windfall anyway.
[–]goodmod[M] [score hidden] stickied comment (1 child) | Copy Link
Although this is a good post, the title does not say enough about its subject. This forces people to click and read before they can decide whether they are interested. It also makes searching impossible.
If everyone did this, the subreddit would become unusable.
So please don't do it in future. Take the time to describe your link, and save the time of hundreds of other people.
When making a title, it's best to assume the reader doesn't know what you're talking about - but don't go overboard with every detail. Then check if there are any words you can cut out without losing any important information.
[–]LizardIsLove 0 points1 point2 points (0 children) | Copy Link
Ok will do!