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The unique challenges faced by military couples

| May 12, 2017 | Military Divorce

In virtually every Tennessee divorce, the most important issues for consideration boil down to money and children. When it’s a military divorce, the long deployments and constant moving around cause child- and money-related issues to create even higher levels of consternation.

Because of the added stresses of military life, many military marriages end up in divorce. Usually, these divorces happen when children are still quite young. Because divorces tend to happen while children are still children, it means that the military member could be responsible to pay for child support — and also spousal support in a lot of cases.

For most service members facing divorce, the burning questions on their minds — aside from questions about what went wrong in their marriages — relate to how their military pensions and other savings and assets will be divided and whether they will be required to pay spousal and child support and what those financial obligations will be. Spouses of military members will have similar questions on their minds.

Because it can take a considerable amount of time for a military divorce to be granted and finalized, a lot of couples choose to file a motion that agrees to different terms during the time of separation when the divorce is still pending. Such a temporary motion will usually decide issues relating to how the spouses will pay for their food, utilities, auto loans, rent and child care costs.

Every military divorce is different — and military divorces are certainly very different from civilian divorces because unique laws and legal standards will apply. For this reason, spouses of military members and military members alike may wish to seek out a Tennessee divorce lawyer who is both familiar and experienced with handling military service member divorce proceedings.

Source: military.com, “Military Divorce: Dividing Children, Pay and Pensions,” Rebekah Sanderlin, accessed May 12, 2017

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