Hi y'all wanting some advice, my divorce started off pretty high Conflict primarily due to my STBXW going the silver bullet method and throwing almost every possible accusation at me. After I disproved everything she said at the temp orders hearing on April 28th, things relatively settled down. We both have lawyers, and the process has been slow but getting better I guess? We have a child together, 9, and she has moved 140 miles away (still in Texas), and it's pretty much a set thing that I will be an every other weekend Dad given that her job will give her more time with our son than mine could, and she will be pulling in more than double my yearly salary.

She had a mental switch up a few weeks back and is amicable now and just wanting the divorce to be over with, she keeps the Tinyhome we had (she had already moved it out there) and in exchange she basically covers the legal costs and agrees to lower child support/more flexibility with seeing my son/her transporting my son to and from their new living spot.

She's wanting us to dismiss both of our lawyers and just streamline the process together, we already have the divorce and custody agreements printed out and we have extensively gone over everything together, and both of our lawyers have been...incompetent to say the least. Her lawyer didn't submit most of the paperwork for the temp orders hearing and my lawyer has been really really bad about communication, like 2 and a half weeks of radio silence with me calling and emailing several times a week trying ti get basic answers, and both of the lawyers never actually drew up or gave us the temporary orders like they were supposed to or have the judge sign off on them, and when they finally did draw up the paperwork it wss sloppy and quite a few things weren't even correct on it.

So here's where I need advice, should we go ahead and dismiss our lawyers? We've got a follow up hearing on July 13th, and then presumably the final divorce hearing sometime later in July/early August. Everything has basically been mediated out between ourselves. My lawyer is covered by my insurance benefits so it has been no out of pocket cost for me, but her lawyer was paid for out of pocket by her/her mom.

My main worry is, if we go through the process of dismissal, and then something comes up during the final hearings and I get more screwed than I already have been. I would just keep my incompetent lawyer, since I'm not paying for him, but I think that would put her back on the defensive and make her reluctant to cooperate if we both dont dismiss our lawyers.

  1. What should I do?

  2. Have you ever dismissed a lawyer and went pro se? If so, how did that affect your case?