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Dissolving your marriage can be an unpleasant business. It involves a great deal of strain and emotion. The life you once had is gone, and you must now lay the groundwork for a new life that has yet to be created. If you are a service member or a spouse of one, you will have to deal with factors that only intensify the stress. Deployment, temporary duty assignments, and the wide range and complexity of benefits to be divided are all things that you will need to contend with.
Your only aim is to get through the divorce with your sanity intact, your future secure, and your children, if you have any, taken care of. This is best done by retaining the services of a military divorce lawyer. In a military divorce, the complicating factors consist mostly of jurisdictional issues and the types of assets and benefits that can be divided when one person in the party is in the service.
Jurisdiction
In general, you and your spouse have three options when it comes to where you can file for divorce. You can file in:
1. The state where the spouse filing resides
2. The state where the service member is stationed
3. The state where the service member claims legal residency
The state in which you decide to divorce will determine the grounds for the divorce, the distribution of assets, child custody, and every other matter that must be settled.
How the Drexler Law Group Can Help
If you have decided to get your divorce in the state of Colorado, the Drexler Law Group can help you. The lawyers of the firm have a great deal of experience handling military divorce cases. We can represent you if you are a service member or the spouse of a service member.
We understand the special needs and particular hardships of the latter especially. If you are a spouse who wants to file for divorce, but your husband is deployed overseas and does not have easy access to a computer or a phone, it can put you in a terrible situation. At the Drexler Law Group, we create an atmosphere in which you can vent, tell your story, and relay your sense of frustration and anger.
You don’t have to feel isolated, stranded, and alone. When you come into our office, we will ask you to give us the facts from your perspective. Multiple overseas deployments can lead to a certain estrangement between husband and wife. Infidelity on deployment is an unfortunate phenomenon, but it is not one that you need to resign yourself to.
If you have grounds for divorce, if you have been subject to mental or physical cruelty, been abandoned by your spouse, or know for a fact that they have cheated on you, the lawyers at Drexler Law will help you begin the process of dissolving your marriage. None of what you tell us will be revealed to others. We can also help you with child care and other support services. If communicating with your spouse is difficult owing to where they are, we will make other arrangements. We can move through various command channels to ensure that your spouse is able to read and sign the documents that are necessary to move the divorce proceedings forward.
The Reality of Benefit and Asset Division
You and your spouse receive many benefits. Depending on the length of time you’ve been married, you may be entitled to receive some or all of them after the divorce. For sure, they will be considered as part of his estate and thus given a value when child support and alimony is determined by the judge. These are some of the things that will be factored in:
Survivor benefit plan (SBP)
VA disability
Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance (SGLI)
Retired Pay (retirement pension)
Thrift savings plan (TSP)
Basic Allowance for Housing (BAH)
Basic Allowance for Subsistence (BAS)
Hazardous Duty Incentive Pay (HDIP)
Tax implications of assignment pay
Income treatment of benefits
It must also be noted that in addition to pension benefits, you will have access to full medical, commissary, and exchange privileges after your military divorce in the following cases:
You have been married for 20 years or more;
The service member has performed at least 20 years of creditable service toward retirement pay
There has been at least a 20-year overlap of marriage and military service.
When it comes to any disability benefits received by your spouse, the Supreme Court has made it harder for states to have much discretion. Nevertheless, your family law attorney will employ their knowledge of the facts and their command of the law to get you everything you are entitled to.
Divorce is hard. You have every right to your frustration and anger. But you must also look after your material interests.
Call Drexler Law today at (719) 259-0050 to speak with an experienced divorce attorney who can help you fight for everything you have earned over the years.
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