Dallas Divorce Law Blog

Those going through a divorce are increasingly using evidence on their cellphones to help their cases.

A selection of divorce lawyers recently took a survey, and results showed that 92 percent believe the devices are being used more to capture and display evidence through text messages and voicemails. The lawyers said text messages have been the main thing that has increased during cases. This testimony helps prove couples are keeping things sent from one another, if not just to hold each other accountable at any time.

If you're on the verge of a divorce, you may feel especially unhappy this Valentine's Day. It can be hard to watch people in love feeding sweet chocolates to each other while your own relationship continues to sour.

But rest assured you're not alone: Divorce filings rise by about 40 percent during this time of year, according to Avvo, a website that rates and ranks lawyers. Many couples already at odds with each other have stuck out their relationship through the holidays for the sake of their children and other family members, but soon decide they can take no more. Others have made it their New Year's resolution to finally get out of their marriage. And some use Valentine's Day as a final test of their spouse.

It used to be that if you made it through the first 20 or 30 years of your marriage, you and your spouse stuck it out to the end no matter how much you soured toward each other or grew apart. Divorcing over 50 was a major personal and financial upheaval that didn't seem worth the trouble once you and your other unhappily married friends really started to think about it.

But women in particular are bucking that trend these days by asking for a divorce at an unprecedented rate: One in every four divorces is now a baby boomer couple, up from one in 10 in 1990. According to an AARP survey, 66 percent of these divorces are instigated by women.

It's often been said that if parents knew in advance how much their bundle of joy would cost in bundles of cash over 18 years, they'd think twice about having kids at all. Fortunately, most parents aren't deterred by that. But a family law case has prompted one court to literally put a price on a child's life.

A man who discovered the daughter he raised isn't his own has been given license to sue the biological father for the cost of raising her for 15 years. According to the Connecticut Supreme Court, that cost is $190,000 -- quite a hefty child support bill.

One of the biggest challenges of divorce is learning how to be a good co-parent. You and your spouse may have fought to the bitter end about everything under the sun, but if there's one thing you need to agree on, it's how to successfully raise your children under two households.

Believe it or not, divorce can actually be beneficial for children if it leads to less conflict and happier parents. But it involves work on your part, starting with cooperation. Think of your ex not as your adversary, but as your co-partner in the business of making your children happy and well-adjusted. Just as good business partners do, putting the needs of your business before your individual interests is crucial.

Decades ago, it was assumed that when a couple with children divorced, the mother would automatically be granted full custody. Fathers would be required to pay child support, of course, but except under unusual circumstances, they rarely saw their children outside of rotating weekends and holidays.

Things are very different today, with more single dads than ever. Although the reasons vary -- they may be divorced, widowed or never married their children's mother -- Texas and the rest of the nation has seen a substantial increase in the number of unmarried fathers. According to the latest census data, of the 1.8 million single fathers in the U.S., 46 percent are divorced, 30 percent have never been married, 19 percent are separated and 6 percent are widowed. Four out of every 100 households have single dads with children under the age of 18. That's one more household out of every 100 than was reported in the previous census.

Traditionally, the house that a couple shares has been a point of major contention when they decide to divorce. But in light of the housing bust in recent years, this classic property division argument has shifted somewhat. Instead of arguing over who gets to keep the house, divorcing spouses are talking about who should be sacked with paying the mortgage.

If the mortgage is underwater -- in other words, exceeding the value of the property -- it becomes a hot potato neither spouse wants to handle. If you don't plan to sell the house, it's usually best for the spouse keeping it to refinance. That way, you can take the other spouse's name off the title, allowing you to fully cut ties with someone you no longer want to be attached to. The danger of not doing this is that your mortgage lender can hold you jointly and individually responsible for the payments. If a payment is late or missed, it could affect both of your credit scores, no matter what the two of you arranged.

Answering the call to make divorce easier and cheaper, the Texas Supreme Court has developed new forms that couples can fill out themselves to get the process going. But the forms may be so oversimplified that they could cause problems down the road.

Texas is one of 13 states in which couples can't simply fill out a form to file for divorce, which can sometimes act as a barrier for financially struggling husbands and wives who don't want to be together anymore. Although Texans have been representing themselves in divorce cases for years, very often the forms they use, usually purchased from legal help websites, aren't accepted in county courts. Last year the state Supreme Court formed a task force devoted to making the divorce process cheaper and easier for couples who can't afford attorney fees. The Uniform Forms Task Force created forms that would be accepted in any Texas court.