Divorcing Later in Life – 5 Issues

Divorcing later in life brings with it special considerations, mostly around your retirement savings. While you might think it is going to be easy because your children are grown, the finances need to be handled by an experienced attorney to ensure your financial future is secure.  

Mediation in a gray divorce is a great idea since many couples have simply grown apart and are not actively fighting. They stayed together for the kids, and usually, get along. For others, marital tension continues to grow over time and they don’t want to spend their golden years in an unhappy marriage. In other cases, one spouse decides to leave. 

Whatever the reasons for the divorce, the issues older couples face when divorcing are a bit different than those of younger couples. 

Finances

There are many financial factors that need to be addressed when older couples divorce. Some couples are fortunate to have amassed significant assets during their years of marriage, while others are on fixed incomes. Either way, divorcing after decades has a significant impact. 

Division of assets: Your assets, both financial and physical, will be divided. If you thought you had enough for a comfortable retirement before you split, you probably don’t now and you have less time than younger couples do to make more money. You will have to look closely at your investments and your employment decisions to make ends meet, especially if you’re already retired. 

Retirement funds: If you have IRAs or 401(k)s, they will need to be shared. In some cases, one fund was intended to take care of both of you. In other cases, each spouse may have had a retirement fund but contributed to them at different levels. The different funds may also have had different rates of return. This can require a financial expert to help divide all the retirement finances fairly.

Alimony or spousal support: In older couples, it is common that one spouse has stayed home for years to care for the family; thus, it is not likely that the at-home spouse will be able to go back to work and make a living wage. Thus, spousal support or alimony is much more common in older couples. Note that such payments end when the receiving spouse remarries. 

Estate planning: You will likely have to change your beneficiaries and possibly the executors of your Will to reflect your new reality. Do this sooner rather than later. 

Social Security: If you have been married for at least 10 years and you are over 62, you have the opportunity to receive spousal benefits from your ex’s Social Security, if the monthly support would be higher than your own. You may take advantage of this even if your ex is remarried, but not if you yourself remarry.

Health and Life Insurance

In most families, especially in couples who have been married for 25+ years, health insurance is through one spouse’s employer. When you get divorced, the other spouse loses health insurance. Therefore, that spouse should insist that the cost of carrying health insurance be factored into the division of assets or alimony. 

Like your Will, your life insurance will need to be adjusted to reflect new beneficiaries. If one spouse never bothered to get life insurance, perhaps a stay-at-home mom, it will be much more expensive to get that coverage now, therefore this cost should also be factored into the settlement. 

If an ex-spouse is receiving spousal support, that spouse should also have a life insurance policy on the payor (with his/her approval) in case something happens to the payor. If you are just a beneficiary on your ex’s life insurance, you could be removed without your knowledge – which would leave you with nothing if your supporting ex-spouse dies. 

Effects on the Kids

Even if your children are adults, expect them to be deeply affected by your divorce. Unless they saw unpleasant relations between you for a long time – and even if they did – they will still feel a loss and possibly a shock. Our parents are our role models and the foundation upon which we build our lives. When that foundation is shaken, our lives are shaken. 

Lifestyle/Relationship Changes

If you’ve been married 25+ years, not only do you share families and in-laws, you probably share friends and favorite places to go. It may be difficult to maintain those relationships in your new reality. You may be able to retain some, but not all. You may also have to go back to work after years of being out of the workforce in order to make ends meet. If you were used to a yearly vacation to a favorite family destination, you may not be able to afford that anymore. 

Emotional Health

Because of all these reasons and more, you will have to take particular care of your emotional health. The longer you’re married, the more your life has been tied to one person, and the more you are likely to have built your identity around your marriage and family life. It will be a challenge to rebuild your personal identity as a single person. After many years as a couple, newly-divorced people can experience a terrible fear of being alone, especially if it wasn’t your idea to divorce. 

Get some help from a support group, a counselor, or a faith community to get you through this transition. You can make it. Many others have and you will, too. Your life is before you. Being thankful for the good that you have had in the past and looking toward the good that this new stage of your life can bring will help you see the future with a sense of adventure and hope.