How to separate from your partner: legal advice

The way you break the news of separation has an effect on what happens next, writes legal expert Pippa Colman

Pippa Colman & Associates Law Practice founding director Pippa Colman.

Clint Eastwood of Hollywood fame separated from Sondra Locke by changing the locks on their home and moving her possessions into storage when she was at work.

It took seven years of court to finalise their property settlement.

A certain second wife, upset by her husband’s unceremonious dumping of her, contacted the first wife and dished the dirt on how her husband had hidden away money in his first property settlement.

The first wife took action to set aside her property settlement and came back for a second bite of the cherry, plus costs!

A faithful and loving wife came home one night to find her home in darkness and her husband and four children missing.

After the neighbours and police searched she found a letter from her husband’s solicitors under her windscreen wipers informing her of separation and her husband was keeping the children.

The Family Court returned the children to her within a week.

The subsequent litigation destroyed the family finances.

And finally, when a couple was about to embark on an exciting journey to a new life, they spent their last night at an airport hotel.

When she went to the car to retrieve her case, she returned to find her husband gone, and in his place, a note from him informing her of separation and a plane ticket to her home country. Yes, he paid dearly for his cruelty.

The moral of the above sad, but true stories is that those who are unable to break the news of separation in a civil way, and have a conversation about what went wrong, and what should happen next, face the consequences; not just a disbelieving and often broken hearted wife or husband, but a spouse whose grief quickly turns to resentment and a wish for revenge via property settlement, spouse maintenance, spirited litigation or all three.

So what is the right way to separate?

After years of hearing sad stories, we believe that there is no substitute for a face-to-face discussion.

If you don’t know what to say or don’t want to do it alone, then involve a counsellor.

A letter or text is no substitute.

Be direct by all means, but be kind, or you will pay the price.

Pippa Colman is the founding director of Pippa Colman & Associates Law Practice.

Originally published as How to separate from your partner: legal advice