and why is everyone telling him to get a good lawyer?
Doesn't anyone believe in settling your own divorce or getting a mediation lawyer. It's so much cheaper. That's what my husband and I always agreed to do. At the last minute though, he changed his mind and got all adversarial on me.
You answered your own question. You and your husband had agreed to be amicable but then he 'got all adversarial'.
Obviously, NVL's wife is a die-hard dub. She's going all adversarial on him. Yea, he messed up, but the marriage was already doomed. Now she's gonna play the victim while everyone (in dub land) will look at him as the bad guy. Too many emotions on each side. Let an outsider, who knows what they're doing, deal with the legal aspects. Let them be cold and calculating. If the JW spouse wants to play hardball, then let your lawyer deal with it.
I saw this almost exact scenerio play out in my family. The 'guilty' party (in that they had admitted being unfaithful in the marriage) felt enough guilt to allow the 'injured' JW spouse to have too much leverage. It took them awhile to come to their senses and see that they were being played. Once they figured that out, and allowed their lawyer to do their thing, they came out with a pretty good settlement.
C'mon, dear ones - our job is to be here for NVL as he goes through what might be a tough times ahead. To comfort him and support him, yes. But "comfort and support" does NOT mean enticing him to LIE... to his wife, on his wife, or to his children. That is NOT our job. And I cannot believe some are even suggesting that. Wait, no, yes, I can. I truly hate that I can... but I can.
I agree in part with what you say. NVL is at the point where he is ready to quit pretending and needs to be honest about what he things, what he believes. If he is ready to do that and damn the torpedoes, I applaud him. In fact, if I was in his shoes, that's what I'd do. If the marriage is that rocky, then it may be time to start over...and what better way to start over than walking away from all things JW, including wife and other cult indoctrinated family? Lying to his wife, just to stay in her good graces isn't going to work. If she can't accept that he is not going to be a fellow zealous follower of the cult, then it's pretty much over. What worked for me to this point will not work for him. From what I've read, I don't think he's going to be able to slowly deprogram her.
But...to defend some of those that said to lie - at least to the elders; let's not forget that we've been lied to our entire time as JWs - for some of us that means our entire lives. I have no reservations about lying to the leaders and their appointed lackeys of this cult, if it will save me from some hardship that results from their sanctions against me. If I were in NVL's shoes, but really really wanted to keep my family intact, and if lying to a group of elders would get them off my back, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Fuck those assholes. I'll play their little game...and I'll play it better'n them.
The problem with that is that it won't fix the marriage. And if the spouse is uber-dub, it may be nothing more than a fart in the wind, lying to elders only to face hell on earth from her day in and day out over every little thing JW related.
This is where NVL, or anyone else in a similar position, has to decide what is best for him. We can't and we won't. What we have done is show support for him...and given different ideas on how to handle it. Some of those suggestions included be deceitful. Personally at this stage, I wouldn't go that route, but I'm not NVL but it is one route open to him to consider. No matter what he decides, I think everyone here will still comfort and support him.
