I will start first by saying that I am not a lawyer. This is not legal advice. These words are advice that, in my opinion, every Father needs to read before the button is pushed in the War, we call divorce.

If you’re here, your one of three groups: thinking about divorce, starting or going through a divorce, or been burned by the fire of divorce already. This little ditty is not my own but it is the collective wisdom of lots of guys in our shoes. These are things that, for the first two groups, mean a lot, since you will face them for the first time. Here is a glimpse of what that person, you married, will do to you now that she has decided to leave and seek greener pastures elsewhere or you decided you could not take it anymore. Now, all of us know, you won’t fully believe that the mother of your children is capable of doing this to you and your children so we won’t leave you waiting . “We told you so!

She convinces you she wants to be a stay at home mom. You possibly don’t understand that this is really an opening move toward divorce. This gives her such an overwhelming superior advantage in the marriage that you may as well wear your chains in public.

This is death when looking at a father’s relationship to your children. You will see them on average 4 days a month. This is what judges in Colorado feel is significant contact for a father. Never let your wife stay home with the kids unless you want to go to counseling to help you with “the grief associated with a lessening of the relationship with your children.”

Your wife will attempt to get you to leave the marital residence. She will have all kinds of nice things to say like “you can visit the kids anytime, I just need some time to decide what to do, you need to get your own apartment or another house anyway’ so let’s start early.” She has been told by the women’s shelter consultants or her attorney to get you to leave the residence to establish without a doubt the fact that she is the primary care giver and use the fact that you abandoned the residence to minimize custody for you. Overnights with the children are the only thing that matter when calculating custody.

Do not ever leave the marital residence without being court ordered to do so.

Your wife will attempt to get you on a domestic violence charge by either provoking a fight or just outright lying. Remember, her word against your word, wins for her every time! The two reasons for her to get you on a DV charge are: 1. She can get free legal aid if there is a DV charge against you and she can get a restraining order that throws you out of the marital house, for the above reasons and 2. Gives her sole custody of the children till the final orders makes the status quo permanent.

Get a digital recorder and keep it on you at all times in her presence. It is legal in Colorado for you to record a person without them being aware and you can use the recording to “prove” either that DV did not happen or she was the aggressor.

In most divorces, women file first. You can be sure that she has talked to veterans in the field, a lawyer, and probably a women’s safe house counselor. She has most likely planned her next 15 or 20 moves in this “game.”

If she or you have not filed first, be aware that there are advantages to filing first but they are slight compared with being able to prove your equal parenting time with the children. NO, providing for them by working for the money doesn’t count for jack in Colorado court except to figure out how much your going to pay her during and after the divorce.

She knows your weaknesses and has been told by the minions of the divorce machine to set you up, bait you to fight or get you to attempt to force her to let you see the kids.

Never lose your temper or touch her in any way. Feminist groups have made this taboo for men to use violence or physical manipulation while applauding or excusing the use of violence by women on men.

She will take off with the children. She will attempt to get them out of State or barring that hide them and/or refuse to let you see them. This is legal if she doesn’t have any injunction in place to prevent her from leaving the State. She can refuse you any visitation as long as she is physically present with the children.

Do not allow her to leave the State even giving a blessing for a trip to see family until final orders are cut. You make the judge rule to allow her to take the children out of State even for a visit. If you allow her to leave the State with the children, you will be admitting even indirectly that people out of State are important to your children. She wants to see her parents? Then they can come to her and the children.

Don’t allow her to leave the county, file immediately to bring the children back to the county they are residents of at the time the paperwork was filed for divorce. Do not allow status quo to be that you allowed the children to become residents of another county before even Temp Orders were cut 6 months out.

Your wife will go through all the financial records and hide them outside the home. She will have complete access to all records and you will have a hard time recreating your financial situation. She and her attorney will then make a case that you are trying to hide income, assets, or even debt that you purposely forgot to mention.

Make copies of every current financial record or create PDFs of them so you have records safe. Or, take the originals off site yourself.

If she leaves the house, she will take all furniture. photos, artwork, appliances and everything to the bare walls while you are at work.

Take what you can not replace somewhere safe. Make a inventory of all things to do the financials with later.

She will stay the maximum time at a local safe house even if she doesn’t have a police record of you ever abusing her. Most likely her attorney has told her that this will go long way to proving to the judge that you are abusive physically or verbally, that she is afraid of you, and /or you intimidate her and she needs the judge to protect her.

Nothing you can do will combat this except never lose you cool.

She will clean out all joint accounts. The lawyer has told her that she most likely will not have to give the money back. She will take it to pay the lawyer and then if you are stuck with her attorney fees, she walks with the cash at a latter date.

Immediately, separate your accounts and take all savings into your name only. Remember, you are the wrong gender to spend it all on anything. You will end up giving her half at final orders so be ready to pay up.