stressed mom- take a deep breath.
You are not divorced yet, so any informal arrangement you have right now about mortgage, spousal, child support is just that- an informal agreement. Nothing is official until a judge says it’s official. So calm down.
First things first- do not do ANYTHING precipitous right now. Tens of thousands of women every year make financial decisions when their marriages go bust and many of those decisions are terrible ones. I know at least a dozen women who basically impoverished themselves due to panic and lack of planning. Don’t let that be you.
You need to do Four things:
1- get a handle on your financial picture. Assemble all your recurring bills (mortgage, property taxes, utilities, health insurance) and your tax returns going back to as many years as you can find. If you aren’t very savvy financially, your lawyer may be able to recommend someone cheaper than a lawyer (a paralegal?) who can go through your tax return and make a list of your assets. Knowing what you own is going to be important.
2- Call your bank- today- and get a printout of the payments made on your mortgage, and either go to city hall or wherever records are kept for property in your town to get a copy of the title/deed to your home. Ask the clerk to help you figure out if the mortgage you know about is the only loan or lien against your home. You may think you own an asset worth X… but if your husband has an equity line of credit on the house, you may own much less than you think.
3- Either retain the lawyer you’ve met with, or get a friend/family member to recommend another lawyer. But you need a lawyer. You have a minor child whose interests need protecting and the best way to do that is through the legal system. Your husband may have a 401K at work or other retirement assets you don’t know about; if you and your kids are now getting health insurance from his job, you need to figure out how you’re going to get health insurance going forward, etc. These are issues worth MUCH more than the 5K in housing you are worried about right now. Once you are off your husband’s insurance, even a small surgery or injury could set you back 50K or 75K. So try not to belabor the small stuff- you’ve got much bigger things to deal with.
4- Go online to your son’s account at college and take a look at what’s been paid, what is owed. I will bet you dinner that your husband did NOT pay the entire year ahead of time… or if he did, there are still fees owed so your son can finish out the year. But take a screenshot of your son’s account.
Once you calm down you will realize that having your son commute such a distance is not a feasible plan right now. And that protecting your 14 year old child’s future is an important priority for you.
And you need to adjust your thinking about going to back to work. Of course you can be a mother to a 14 year old who has a job- like millions of other women. Your goal right now is to emerge from the divorce in the best position you can, knowing that you are going to end up back in the work force at some point.
But these four things need to be tackled asap.