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A Complex Inheritance
The Ex-Wife Who Won’t Share — And Shouldn’t Have To
Imagine, if you will, being married to someone for nearly twenty years, then getting a divorce. It’s not all that uncommon, actually, and there is even a term for it: “a silver divorce.” Isn’t that quaint? (no, no it’s not)
The reality is that lots of couples spend half a lifetime together and then decide to call it. But just because they’ve been in a long, long relationship doesn’t mean that there won’t be another relationship in time. These days, fifty- and sixty-somethings who are divorced are absolutely dating. And that’s great — who would want for anyone to spend their life alone unless they choose to? Having lived with one spouse, likely raising a family and all that goes with it, presents its own challenges in the “post-divorce” landscape, though.
There are myriad emotional and financial obstacles to even getting divorced, and then the terrain is dotted with landmines we’ve often never even considered.
Take, for example, the middle-aged man who, somewhat stereotypically, divorces and begins dating a much younger woman. If he had kids, now grown or nearly so, with his wife, there can be some pretty hard feelings if the new arm candy has much younger kids of her own, or even worse — wants a baby. Grown children in their college years and beyond often struggle quite harshly…
