well first it does not need to be a

mutual decision it only takes one spouse

to want to initiate the divorce process

the initiating spouse would file what’s

called the divorce petition which would

give a case number and put it before the

court and in that petition they would

want to illustrate if they’re seeking

spousal support if they want spousal

support terminated if they want the

other side to contribute to their

attorney fees if they want joint or sole

physical and legal custody if they have

children and it won’t create a

substantive hearing but it will get a

case number and then put the proceeding

within the the court system and then the

respondent the person who didn’t file

that initial petition will have 30 days

to respond to the petition

and basically respond to every

everything requested by the petitioner

in the initial uh pleading so they would

say

if they do not want to pay spell support

or if they want spousal support if they

think either party should contribute to

their own attorney fees or they

shouldn’t have to pay the other party’s

fees or what they want for custody when

the court has all of that information

there are certain procedures that go

into place the parties will need to

exchange disclosures on the financial

side of the case which is basically two

forms that set forth all of their income

all of their expenses all of their

assets and all of those debts and those

forms will help the parties have a full

and comprehensive understanding of what

exists and then there are various legal

and factual arguments that can be made

if it

if a certain item of property should be

divided in half if it should belong just

to one spouse if one spouse should get a

certain amount of spousal support or

child support if there are children

involved and but often those disclosures

aren’t sufficient in a very contested or

divorce that involves a lot of assets

property income things of that sort in

which case the discovery process would

involve lawyers or parties if they’re

representing themselves

initiating additional requests for

information and documents that are far

more

extensive than the disclosures would

require and then after

that process eventually on the financial

side

the parties would be in a position to

have enough information including if

they wanted to take depositions and

things of that sort to proceed to trial

or to engage in meaningful settlement

discussions most cases settle often with

the assistance of a mediator or a

private judge

before trial occurs but some cases

unfortunately proceed all the way to

trial generally that could take anywhere

from a year to two or three years or

even more to conclude if the parties

aren’t able to resolve it in settlement

on the custody side of things

it’s not as formal a procedure with

disclosures of things of that nature but

if the parties can’t work out a way to

divide custody of their children amongst

themselves or with the assistance of

lawyers or mediators one party during

the case could file a request for order

of the court seeking a certain custody

plan the other party can respond to that

a judge would decide that preliminarily

not a final custody order but just how

it should be navigated during the case

now often that sets the status quo and

that makes it kind of difficult to

deviate from if things are working out

well but eventually

the parties could have a trial on the

issue of custody one party can argue to

keep it the way it is or make minor

modifications one party can argue to

completely change it and eventually

that matter of custody would be resolved

at a final trial or same process with

settlement if the parties can work it

out beforehand