When you and your partner decide to get divorced, there are quite a few decisions to make. One of which is if you move out or remain living together. What you do is up to you. Your partner has no right to make you move out.
I decided to remain living with my ex-wife during the divorce process. The two main reasons for this were:
- Renting is expensive – If I was to move out from the family home I would need to rent a 3-bed house, for me and my two kids, who would live with me 50% of the time during the divorce.
In my local area, I would be paying at least £1700 per month in rent! Which was just unaffordable with all the divorce costs.
- Kept the pressure on – If I moved out, my ex-wife would be living mortgage free, and I would be out of the picture. For her, this would have been ideal, and she would have little incentive to move the divorce forward.
Living with someone during divorce is pretty tricky, but there are a number of things that I found you can do to make things considerably easier.
I found in the early days of the divorce process, we actually got on OK’ish. I think this was partly because it was quite a major decision and both of us were in mild shock that we were actually going to get a divorce. However, as time went on, a month or two later, things rapidly deteriorated.
Avoid Each Other
I recommend avoiding each other even if you are getting on. The more time you spend together, the more time you have to get into arguments and fights.
Avoiding each other can best be achieved by scheduling your daily life so you do not cross paths. For example, agree on times that you will have meals; one does earlier, and one does later.
Do not sleep together in the same room. Fortunately for me, I had a spare bedroom, which I moved into. My bedroom doubled as my living room (basically had a TV in it), which allowed my ex-wife and I to schedule days that we could each use the sitting room without it causing too much of an inconvenience.
If you don’t have a spare room, do what you can to create separate sleeping areas. This might mean converting another room (e.g., a sitting room) into a temporary bedroom.
Only Speak When Necessary
After a while, I found that literally every conversation with my ex-wife was becoming an argument. The conversation would start okay, but within minutes, things would turn south, and a full-blown argument would erupt.
Only speak to your partner when absolutely necessary. It may initially feel weird to ignore your partner to avoid conversation, but it will eventually become the norm and not feel that weird. If you must speak to your partner, keep it really simple, with ‘yes’ and’ no’ type responses.
Don’t be tempted to make small talk. It’s unnecessary, and I found it often leads to a fight.
Communicate Using Text or Email
Using written communication is great because not only does it mean you don’t have to speak to your partner, but you also have a record of what was said.
For more in-depth stuff, I used email (my ex-wife loved getting those emails) and for everyday practical-type things that required a more immediate response, we used WhatsApp or text messages.
Walk Away
My ex-wife often said the most stupid things that often made my blood boil. I really wanted to tell her how f*cking stupid she was, and in the early days, I did.
However, I soon learned that it was a complete waste of time. So when your partner says something that really grates, just walk away. You’ll probably get a barrage of abuse as you walk away, but it is the best thing to do.
Let It Go
My ex-wife hated the fact that I didn’t move out and went through a phase of doing stuff that she knew would annoy me in the hopes that I would eventually go. Some of the stuff she did was really quite odd and I genuinely thought she was having a mental breakdown.
When she did one of her dumb ass things, I asked myself, does it really matter? If not, then I just rolled with it, not responding or retaliating in any way. Not only did this make it much easier for me, as I wasn’t getting stressed, but my ex-wife began to realise that what she was doing would not make me move out.
Booze Is Not Your Friend
Do not turn to the bottle! It might help in the short term, but I can guarantee it will ultimately make a bad situation much worse.
Booze f*cks with your emotions and all logical reasoning goes out the window. Unfortunately for me, my wife started drinking in a big way and it made life so much harder for me, her and the kids.
If your partner does hit the booze during your divorce, don’t get involved with their drinking problem, It will just exacerbate things
Personal Space
I think it is important to agree on some boundaries with your partner. My ex-wife and I agreed that our bedrooms were our personal space, and neither of us was allowed in the other’s room.
Seeing Other People
How you feel about this will depend on your feelings towards your partner. Personally, I had no feelings whatsoever for my ex-wife. I was thrilled when she started to see other men while we were still living together. It meant that she was around a lot less, and I had the house to myself a lot more.
We agreed that no men she saw would come to the family home. I know she didn’t honour this agreement. Why would she? She’s a fu*king tw*t. At least they never went to the house when I was there, and I hope none went when the kids were at home.
If you do still have some feelings for your soon-to-be ex-partner, then them seeing other people will probably feel pretty horrible. I guess see it as part of the separation process. It’s bound to happen sooner or later anyway.
I didn’t see any other women while I still lived with my ex-wife during the divorce. I went out on a few dates, which were (mostly) a bit of fun. I was not looking for anything serious for the following reasons:
- I had enough on my plate with the divorce and didn’t want any distractions that a relationship with someone new would introduce.
- I’m quite sure my ex-wife had no feelings for me, but she was very emotional during the divorce. I was concerned that if I were seeing someone else, it would cause her to be more emotional (if that was possible) and make life even harder.
Keep Busy
Try to keep yourself busy, find a new hobby, go to the gym, or do anything that gets you out of the house and away from your partner.
Exercise
This tip should probably be higher up on the list, as it worked wonders for me. I joined my local health club. Initially, it was just something to do that was away from the house. But the more I went, the more I enjoyed it.
If I ever felt stressed or angry, I’d go to the gym, and all the stress and anger would vanish. The gym also had many other benefits, including keeping healthy, meeting new people and women in tight-fitting Lycra 🙂
Think About The kids
If you have kids, do not use them as a weapon against your partner. It is totally unfair to the kids and your partner.
Divorce is between you and your partner. It should impact the kids as little as possible.
Money and Bills
This is an area that you really need to agree on with your partner. Otherwise, it will cause a lot of conflicts, as I found out. As the breadwinner, I had always paid all the bills (they were all in my name). But, as we were getting divorced, I didn’t see why I should pay for my to-be ex-wife.
Initially, I suggested that the bills be split based on our income. So, if I earned twice as much as my ex-wife, I would pay for two thirds, and she would pay one third. Unfortunately, I never got an agreement on splitting the bills; it was constantly an area of conflict.
Don’t Be A Dick
On many occasions, I found it very tempting to do things that I knew would annoy my ex-wife, especially if she had intentionally done something to upset me. The problem is it just escalates things and ultimately achieves nothing.
Conclusion: Living Together During Divorce
Living together during a divorce is not fun. But, it might be necessary for a number of different reasons. In my situation, living with my ex-wife during our divorce was the right choice. It saved me nearly two years’ rent (about £40,000!), it meant I saw my kids every day and I’m fairly sure if we had lived separately the divorce would have dragged on for even longer.
