Threatening divorce

[deeky54]

Hi - can anyone give any general advice on the following? I think I need to give some preamble first so you can get the background to our situation.

I live as carer and general houseperson with my 74 yr mother and stepfather.

My mother has been diagnosed with Parkinson's for about 3 years, and this has impeded her quality of life quite a lot.

My stepfather has been diagnosed with Alzheimers for about 2.5 years, and is still in denial about it, and looks like continuing to be so.

He is still very lucid, but has been deemed far enough along to be prescribed Aricept. His main symptoms are being very forgetful, he confabulates (in the strict psychiatric sense), and has paranoid tendencies. He has been stopped from driving.

He has an anxious personality, and is prone to getting very angry if crossed or disagreed with - so mum and me try to avoid conflict, but this is not always possible. He cannot conduct a logical reasoned argument when stressed, and goes to his office to write it down. He is not a man who can be reasoned with, and always thinks he is right, and will strive to be right in an argument.

He has decided that I am the root cause of his difficulties, and regularly writes pages of invective about me, usually full of the same confabulations. These are left lying around, either because he forgets about them or possibly so that me and/or mum will see them.

Mum is thoroughly fed up of this and his other irrational behaviours, and I think pretty fed up with herself and her own state of health, and so all in all, marital relations are often strained. He was widowed, and perceives his first marriage as idyllic, and so perceives his current marital state as pretty poor.

To come eventually to the point - he has been saying on and off for some time now that he wants a divorce. Mum generally responds by saying don't talk daft, I'm not going anywhere, this is just a stressful time, we have three strong-minded people living here, there is bound to be conflict from time to time, etc etc.

We do know that he has been complaining to his health professionals in this vein, and his CPN has advised him to think very carefully before pursuing the divorce route. He could not satisfactorily look after himself if left alone, and would be quite a worry to Social Services. I would not be happy leaving him, and would not want to commute to look after him at one property and mum at another. He would be very lonely I think. He has a fear of being "put in a home", but by himself he would be in a home much sooner than if he remains here with me and mum for company and to look after him.

Mum and I wonder how he would be received if he took himself off (by taxi I presume - we live 7 miles from the nearest town) to a solicitor with a view to setting divorce proceedings in motion. At first presentation he can appear reasonable, but a solicitor would soon begin to suspect his state of mind after talking or meeting with him for a while.

He has no grounds for divorce beyond incompatability. I suspect he would repeat (again) the usual untrue confabulated allegations about me, but then he wouldn't be divorcing me.

What courses of action are open to a solicitor with an Alzheimers client? They surely just can't send him packing, and he deserves a hearing. On the other hand, he is unable to make a rational decision on such an important issue, and the stuff he says would not be true.

Difficult though life can sometimes be, mum and me think that the best thing we can do for everyone for the time being is to all stay put and get on as best we can.

Has anyone experience in this difficult area?

D

 

[jenniferpa]

Welcome to Talking Point.

You know, it's not often I say this D) but I have no idea. I would think there wasn't such a thing as a global standard as each case would have to be dealt with on a case by case basis. I don't know what the current state of play is re divorce in the UK currently - I'm assuming that his only option would be living apart for 2 years but I may well be wrong about that as well.

We do have one member who is a solicitor so she may see this thread and be willing to offer some insight into how a reputable solicitor would deal with this. However, there are shysters in every profession and I'm sure there are some who would be willing to take his money to at least start proceeding even if they didn't get very far.

Is there an EPA/LPA in place? It wouldn't absolutely stop this sort of thing but it would be further evidence (if you needed it) that he wasn't competent to proceed.

I'm sorry you're the "bad guy" in this scenario: it's not uncommon but it doesn't make it any easier.

 

[sue38]

Hi Deeky

I am the solicitor Jennifer is referring to!

My dad has dementia, and sounds pretty similar to your stepfather - willful and not able to listen to reason.

If he were to take himself off to see a solicitor (would he be capable of making an appointment and keeping it?) he would have to give a lot of details about the marriage. I am assuming you are in England or Wales? He would have to give his full name and address, your mum's full name, date of marriage, place of marriage, produce the marriage certificate and give details of the grounds for the divorce. There is in fact only only one ground (irretrievable breakdown of the marriage) but this has to be based on 1 of 5 facts:- adultery; that your mum (not you) has behaved in such a way that he cannot reasonably be expected to live with her - commonly referred to as 'unreasonable behaviour'; 2 years separation with the consent of the other party; 2 years desertion; or 5 years separation.

Unreasonable behaviour covers a multitude of sins -from the most extreme to the seemingly trivial (e.g. she stays up brushing her hair with the light on whilst I'm trying to get to sleep...).

He would also have to give details as to finances- value of the house, whose name it's in, details of savings and income and so forth.

Unless he qualifies for 'legal help' (a form of legal aid for which you have to have a very low income) he would also have to pay the court fee of £300, just to start the divorce proceedings.

I think most solicitors would realise pretty quickly that your stepfather was not mentally capable of taking divorce proceedings.

If he came to see me I would listen sympathetically and try to persuade him to think things through carefully, warning him that your mum would be likely to get 50% and be able to stay in the house if she has more physical disabililty than him. I suspect he would find the whole thing very daunting and I probably wouldn't see him again.

Professional ethics would prevent me from contacting you or your mum.

I hope this helps.

 

[deeky54]

Thank you Jennifer for your earlier reply, and Sue for taking the time to reply.

My stepfather might manage the appointment and the marriage certificate, but after that - savings, house value, income etc, he doesn't know where the deeds are, and I have to deal with his tax for him after he got in a muddle and forgot to declare his state pension.

So he'd need my help to deal with that, if only to tell a third party where to start looking, and it would really be stretching my loyalties!

From what you say, it sounds like it wouldn't come to anything, but we can do without the aggro, and it would only create more domestic tension.

Thanks for your help on that.

On a general point rather than personal, surely there is some recourse for dementia sufferers who have a case for divorce - perhaps their spouses are beating them up, or are alcoholics or some such.

 

[sue38]

On a general point rather than personal, surely there is some recourse for dementia sufferers who have a case for divorce - perhaps their spouses are beating them up, or are alcoholics or some such.

If they came in alone with nobody to back them up, yes it would be diffcult. If a client made allegations of violence I would probably contact Social Services. It is possible for someone to take proceedings on their behalf, but rare in a divorce case.

 

[robertjohnmills]

When the Divorce word is raised

Hi D,
This may be relevent or not, but this is my experience with this:
My partner uses the "Divorce" threat when he bcomes angry and frustrtated. This is caused by his loss of independence and the resentment to being cared for.
Initially I was very shocked but I began to realsie that what he said was not what was he actually wanted. When it arises now I deflect it by suggesting if HE wants that we seek relationship counselling first, and suggesting I'll make an appointment if HE wants. To date this has always calmed things down and we've talked through the problems to discover whats really bugging him. Our Psychologist was a great help to me in understanding behaviours in Mark's Dementia and motivating to a more positive outlook. I hope your situation improves.

 

[KenC]

This story does ring bells with me as many years ago my father was asking for a divorse at one stage and no one really knew what he was talking about.

He was supposed to have lady friends, but he never left the house. My mother was very upset about all of this as were the other members of the family, however we could not find out what it was all about.

Just recently we believe that after looking into his health records that my mother had kept in a diary, he may well have had dementia, and this part was all a form of make believe, and sometimes we see similar things when a person has hallucination's, but this one went out of control and there was no one for support.
It seems that this could have been the cause of all this upset and yet he was never formaly diagnosed.

Although mother knew dad did not have lady friends, this caused a lot of stress, because dad would never accept the truth, and I do wonder whether he suspected that he was ill with this illness and it was his way of trying to hide it.

I had never thought of it in this way, until I was diagnosed with dementia, and spent time discussing problems with diagnosis with a good friend who is also a consultant.

Having had hallucinations I can understand some of these things, but to go down the road of asking for a divorse, was too much.

However I have to say that when a person gets this illness there judgement is less than perfect at times, and it is very possible that a person with the illness, may have stopped trusting their carer for some silly reason, which a normal person would never consider. I know we have problems at times, its just the nature of this terrible illness, and this proves just how much a carer can get hurt.

I do hope that you can resolve all this before things get out of hand.

Best Wishes

Ken