Message ID: 2fv2rcF2ma5mU1@uni-berlin.de
Under my father's will, I was given a large allowance, so I never had to work. My mother advised me to get a prenuptial agreement, which stated that my husband could never benefit from my money either while married or after a divorce. Our finances were always kept separate. It was hard watching him struggle financially, when he had to work two jobs or couldn't afford to accompany me on vacation but I never offered to help in case I invalidated the prenup, and he never asked.
He now has a successful business, built on his own. When my mother died recently, I found she'd lived off the capital, including paying my allowance. My income is now very reduced. If my husband won't alter the prenup, I'll have to get a job to pay my share but I have no experience or training and am approaching middle age.
Also, if we ever divorce, my lawyer says I wouldn't get child support for long, as our children are almost adults. Do I have a moral right to demand my husband agree to alter the prenup as circumstances have changed? How do I approach him?
-- TABLES TURNED
DEAR TABLES TURNED:
Approach with apologies, and be grateful if he even listens.
Since you know when to see lawyers when you want to, I find it amazing he stayed, and labored away without help, when you could have easily gifted him some support or inquired about altering the agreement yourself. You didn't even inquire of your mother where and how the money kept coming, you just enjoyed it without him.
OK, let's excuse you by saying you were incredibly naive and it was your mother who benefitted most. I recommend you explain this to hubby and now ask him to go together for legal advice, for both your sakes. According to family law specialist Lorne Wolfson, "Prenuptial agreements are an evolving area of the law." Some courts are allowing for a release from these agreements if the circumstances are seen to be extremely unfair to one party due to changed circumstances. But others are upholding the prenups.
Getting a job and working on your relationship sound like worthwhile options to me.
Things have changed and she now finds prenup disagreeable
May 6, 2004
BY ELLIE TESHER
If you have a single scrap of self respect - which since you wrote this letter in the first place I doubt - you don't.
Your situation only reinforces my belief that parents who give their children everything cut them off at the knees. Your parents certainly did.
Accept the realization that your ride on the gravy train has ended, and now you are on your own hook after a lifetime of sitting on your ass. You refused to share of your largesse on the flimsiest of excuses (it obviously wasn't *that hard* to watch him struggle, because you did it, and what would it have taken to foot the bill for a vacation?) and you are now of the belief that "what's mine is mine and what's yours is mine, too".
Face it. You set yourself up for this mess, and now you have to get yourself out. Get some training, get a job and join the real world.
Childfree Abby
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