Realistically how screwed am I?

Factastical · 2025-10-27T21:46:01+00:00

You may not owe any alimony if she finds a moron to move in with her lying ass. Give it time. Pay child support voluntarily. Once she gets an livein boy toy, it may alleviate half your problem. But your incomes are too close for alimony and even if you owe any, it may be a few hundred a month

l3landgaunt · 2025-10-23T20:20:27+00:00

Check the laws on support. My state is also no fault, but cheating forfeits spousal support. You just have to prove it

Flow1944 · 2025-10-23T20:08:33+00:00

Get yourself a good attorney and prepare for war.

Gattsama · 2025-10-23T06:44:38+00:00

I am post divorce in WA (no kids). First here's a link that has several documents and videos that explain the process in WA (I did not use this group, but their online information is very helpful ).

https://www.genesislawfirm.com/divorce-washington-state

Washington is a no-fault state. So all communal assets and debts will be split 50/50. This part is easy. Just add up all of your communal assets and debts, divide by two. That will be the number that each of you will need to get. You don't actually have to get half of the item, it just has to add up to 50/50. For example, you might keep your entire retirement account in exchange for taking more debt .

Next on the list is the children. You have to work out Child custody and child residency. Custody can be thought of as who owns the children which will pretty much be $50. The issue is residency which is where the kids sleep. Ideally you want 50/50 residency as well. So they're with you half the time and with her half the time .

Child support is calculated based off how much you each make. In theory, if you have 50/50 residency, you each owe each other the same amount of child support. If you make the same money. What actually happened since you make more than her is, you will owe some small amount of child support to her.

Next is spouse support. Washington state does not have firm rules on how much spousal support is paid. The general rule of thumb is for mid-length marriages( 5 to 25 years) if she is eligible( which she might not be) you get one year of support for every 3 to 4 years of marriage. So if you guys were married for 15 years she's looking at 3.75-5 yrs of support. The amount is highly variable however.

You will both be imputed. This is the amount of money that the court says that you can earn, not how much you actually earn. In your case. It's pretty straightforward. You just show your last 3-year w-2s. In her case. You claim that she now needs to start working a 40-hour week, and the courts were pretty much expect that as well. She can't claim that she just wants to work part-time anymore. They'll expect her to work full-time. So you want her imputed at a higher rate than she's been making .

From there, the courts usually try to make things fairly equal. In other words, if she qualifies for spousal support, they would take an amount from you given to her. That makes things about equal for you both earning the same amount of money. However, there are no actual rules for how much money .

In my case, the ex who didn't work at all during the marriage ended up getting approximately 25% of my gross base salary. We were married for 12 years, and she got 42 months = 3.5 years of support.

Read and watch the videos from the link above. They will cover most of your questions. Find an attorney and ideally go to mediation to work out a fair deal.

If you're in King county, there is no family. Court. Cases are heard by the superior court. They do not want to deal with divorce cases. They strongly encourage you to settle through mediation.

Wish you the best of the coming drama. Feel free to DM me if you have any specific questions or just want somebody extra to vent to.

thiscalltoarms · 2025-10-23T00:03:18+00:00

Ok so I believe WA, like NJ where I got divorced, is a state where marital equity is a thing. The goal of the judge will typically be to split your two incomes so that you each have the same. Child support is calculated first, and whatever else it takes to even it out is second.

On term, I’d guess you’re paying for 5-9 years. It may taper over time, and if she gets married or moves in with a partner, you can fight to have the alimony decreased. But usually not child support. The support continues until they’re 18 or emancipated typically.

So here’s a starting point: add your income to hers, and divide by 2. That’s your likely worst case scenario.

Expert-Raccoon6097 · 2025-10-22T19:13:48+00:00

All the calculators for WA state are online. Plug in the info and it will tell you what you will be paying for alimony and child support. Super simple.

Acceptable_Piano4809 · 2025-10-22T18:06:38+00:00

I mean screwed is relative. I didn’t have any children so I feel I shouldn’t have to pay my ex a fucking thing, but if u had kids, I’d want my kids to live with my ex in a decent place and have good food to eat, etc.

I don’t think you’ll really be screwed, but it won’t be cheap. In your case, look at it like you’re paying for the kids and don’t worry about her (except how she is as a mom).

SnooChipmunks8506 · 2025-10-22T17:43:51+00:00

Definitely shop around for a good attorney. You will want to make sure you do the best thing for your kids.

Washington does take affairs into account if she is using marital money in the affair (buying gifts, paying for trips, or hotels, etc), as it relates to child support, alimony, and custody.

The fact that she agreed to work on the marriage, but continued the relationship with the other guy also looks bad when it comes to child support, alimony, and custody.

A qualified attorney will help you negotiate a good standing for your future and the kids’ best interests.

FUMoney · 2025-10-22T16:29:14+00:00

Alimony in WA State.

dfb54749014 · 2025-10-22T16:19:28+00:00

If your kids are on your health insurance, keep them on it. You're already used to this being deducted from your paychecks, so no added hardship there.

Plus that will get figured in when they calculate child support payments. Thus reducing the amount you may have to pay her monthly.

gratefulstudent76 · 2025-10-22T15:16:06+00:00

If she’s cohabiting with the boyfriend I imagine you can argue for that

notconvinced780 · 2025-10-22T14:59:31+00:00

Hi RemarkableDonut2676, I’m not a lawyer. If you follow the steps you need to not too screwed, if you don’t, could be bad. Get a divorce lawyer immediately! Not one who advertises on TV. Interview a couple till you find one you like and trust. This is. Important. I am a guy who with a couple of kids, got divorced a couple years ago. Knowledge imbalances are power. Do not tell her shit! Let her come to whatever conclusions about outcomes on her own, especially regarding the impact of cohabitation on alimony. there is a spousal support calculator by state available online. It will give you a rough idea about alimony for Washington State. You probably should NOT work overtime till after the divorce, and STBXW will probably have income imputed at $19/Hr. X40 hrs/wk. it is a percentage of the difference between your incomes. At your incomes, it likely isn’t much. Duration is also often influenced by length of marriage and difference in income. Child support is based on percent of time you each have custody and difference in each of your salary. It usually ends for each child when they hit 18. I’d recommend that you not agree to extend child support beyond the age of 18, though you can of course continue to support your kids regardless. To that end you should pursue 50/50 custody (which is the default in most states), presuming you guys split custody 50/50 this will both minimize your child support obligations and maximize your ability to maintain your relationship with your children. ***Important note: Child support is not negotiable down in any binding way! Even if she agrees, she can go back to court to have it modified to the statutory calculation and judges routinely grant it as it’s not money for her but rather money to maintain your children. Alimony/Spousal support IS negotiable. Additionally, if she wants to”out”, this can work to your advantage as spousal support can be ended if/when she cohabitates or marries another partner. If she documents anything on social media snap screenshots to support claim that she’s cohabitating with someone else. File immediately and document/discretely photograph her packing her things up to move in with her affair partner/leaving marital home. Take time stamped pics of her car at affair partner’s home each night with license plate visible. Take a couple pics of the outside of the house/apartment building with address visible when you take the initial pics. This will serve as supporting evidence of her state of cohabitation from the date of filing. Hopefully she remains with affair partner long enough to hit the cohabitation threshold. Additionally , you should have a security camera system put in (or nanny cams in any rooms you may be in at the same time as her). This will help mitigate any false claims of spousal or child abuse against you, on her part. Do not let her goad you into acting or speaking aggressively towards her. Do not say anything bad about her to your kids. Try to get this divorce done ASAP. She is in an “affair fog”. This may end quickly if/when the affair does. If you can get the marital settlement agreement terms agreed between the two of you ASAP, that will likely help you a lot. Mediation is NOT designed to get a “fair” settlement. It exists to simply get marital settlement agreements done and executed. Mediators are often biased against husbands, but the impartiality can be greatly reduced by firmly pursuing a resolution you will agree to which is in line with Wa State statute guidelines. As for asset splits, if you’ve maintained assets that you had before marriage, AND YOU HAVE MAINTAINED THEM SEPARATELY, they probably are not marital property. Everything else is, including retirement savings, etc. cancel all joint credit cards. Take ALL the money out of your current joint bank account and close it. Open a new solo account and leave that money in it except for the payment of joint bills. Open another new account for yourself that your paycheck will go into. Serve her with divorce papers today to start the clock in everything. Do not wait for mediation or anything else. Keep it friendly if possible and the actions taken are just the administrative end of getting the divorce. Good Luck!

gratefulstudent76 · 2025-10-22T14:49:44+00:00

I would argue for no alimony. 50/50 custody. Minimal child support. She cheated. She doesn’t deserve financial support

rightwist · 2025-10-22T14:31:19+00:00

50/50 custody is not the best you can ask for yourself.

And everyone I've known, including myself, finds that 6-24 months after this point it's a lot better than they had feared.

I represented myself and my ex's lawyer was quite good to me, curved her psychotic ranting and basically took a tone of reasonable clarification.

There's a table that is exactly the same for 26 states of the USA I think, although those states vary in terms of the other factors, it's the starting point. I believe for two kids it's 21% of your income.

Chin up, brother. This is your all time low point. You're going to get it together, put together a vision of where you want your life to go, and get busy building that life. If you want to, you'll find someone who matches your energy. It does get better.

Several-Eagle4141 · 2025-10-22T14:09:44+00:00

What is the custody arrangement

Title	Realistically how screwed am I?
Author	RemarkableDonut2676
Upvotes	18
Comments	43
Date	October 22, 2025 2:00 PM UTC (9 months ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/Divorce_Men
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/Divorce_Men/comments/1od92mn/realistically_how_screwed_am_i/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/Divorce_Men/realistically-how-screwed-am-i.1564733 https://theredarchive.com/post/1564733

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