FIRING ATTORNEY MIGHT BE A MISTAKE

Question: I have been married for 15 years to a "high profile" person in a relatively small community. We have two children. This is my first marriage, his third. He is 12 years older than I am. After putting up with his abuse, drinking, and womanizing for the years, I finally got up the nerve to hire a lawyer to get me out of the relationship. But my husband intimidated me until, against my lawyer's advice, I dropped the suit, took my husband back, fired my lawyer, and allowed my husband to deal with my lawyer to get back my retainer -- which my husband kept. Although my husband promised to go to counseling, after the case was dropped, he refused. I began counseling to maintain my sanity because things did not change. Now, six months later, my husband has sued me for separation, claiming I am emotionally unstable and asking for custody of the children. My lawyer won't represent me again, saying I have lost the edge I had and that he did not appreciate the way he was treated. Others in the local legal community seem to stay away from me like I have the plague. Is there anything I can do?

Answer: Even when a person is sure that he or she wants to end the marriage and brings a lawsuit, there is often lingering doubt. And many who have been divorced continue to wonder, years later, if they did the right thing. But a long history of drinking, abuse, and adultery by a "three-time loser" is not a forecast for a viable marriage. While preserving the marriage is important, your first obligation is to protect yourself and your children.

Using his past experience, your husband threw out the bait and you took it: "Fire your lawyer and I promise to do better. I promise to go to counseling. Let's not give it all to the lawyers." But you didn't have to. Rather than fire your lawyer, you could have asked the court to put things on hold for 60 days to allow you and your husband to seek counseling. If it worked, then you could have dropped your suit; if it did not, then you could have proceeded. Or you could have tried to negotiate a post-nuptial agreement to protect you just in case things did not work out.

You were lucky to find an advocate willing to take on your "high profile" husband. As you are now finding out, firing your lawyer in the way you did and for reasons other than his not doing the job was shortsighted. You are now being seen by the legal community as a "problem client" who is riding a losing horse. In today's world, lawyers do not want to accept what they believe may be problem clients. We suggest that you try to begin the attorney selection process again, perhaps in another town.

Jan Collins is an award-winning writer and editor. Jan Warner is a matrimonial, elder, and tax attorney. Both are based in Columbia, South Carolina. Flying Solo is distributed to newspapers throughout the United States by Knight-Ridder Tribune News Service and can be found on the Internet at http://www.flyingsolo.com.

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