Support a Family in Crisis: Legal Aid Needed

Update trial date set for January 30th. So I will need to obtain a lawyer by the end of December.

This is taking a lot of courage to post. I'm swallowing my pride for my children. Life has never been easy for me, but I've always managed to wake up, put two feet on the ground, and make the best of it. In 2010, I thought I met my soulmate. We married 6 short weeks after meeting. He already had a daughter, and we decided to grow our family immediately. I gave birth to our son in 2011, and then my youngest brother was placed with us, and we later adopted him. We also added another child to our household who is possibly my sister. We accepted full guardianship of her and raised her till she was 18. During the last 14 years, my main job was to raise the kids and take care of the household needs. We bought a house 2 years ago this past June when our rent-to-buy fell through.

Then this past July, the kids' lives and mine were turned upside down when, out of the blue, my husband decided he didn't want to be married. We didn't argue, and there were no warning signs. Although there was DV, emotional/mental abuse, and severe financial abuse throughout the 14 years, I never saw this coming. He decided not to communicate any of his reasoning behind his decision. So, I became a detective. I found affairs, hidden money, an addiction to porn, and severe predator behaviors. I will not go into details on here, but it is scary.

The divorce process is in full effect. He refuses to follow the court orders for paying for the loans we have on our house, the CMP bill, and paying for my car. The car is in his name, and he knows I'd never be able to pay the payment. He has not been paying any of the bills, and now my car is behind several months and will be repossessed shortly. He also isn't submitting paperwork as he is supposed to. He refused for 4 months to pay any support towards his son. In mediation, he refused to agree on anything and kept asking for a trial.

I went through my whole savings paying for the mortgage, his tax bill owed, the bank account being negative because of the refusal to pay his share of bills, our child's needs, household needs, and fixing my car when it broke.

We go to trial in January, and I'm extremely worried. I've called every lawyer around trying to be able to hire one to help me through this. Unfortunately, the retainers and hourly payments are nothing I can afford. He made 4 times what I make. He is trying to make it so the house is sold. Joseph has thrived so much since moving into the house. Great grades, friends, school isn't such a struggle, and he is into sports. He also has an emotional support dog that has helped us all so much. I desperately want to be able to keep the house for him. It's in his best interest.

He also is fighting for 50/50 primary residence and rights. Our son does NOT want this. He also knows nothing about our child's needs, medication, school, IEP, diagnosis, or even his doctors' names. He was in the house but never involved in any of the kids' or even my life or meeting any of our needs. In 14 years, he has never taken the kids to appointments, ER, school stuff, or me to OB appointments, to be induced, my surgeries, my doctors' appointments, funerals of family members. He was never available.

He didn't even attend his own mother's funeral.

I need a lawyer to help get the kids and myself what we deserve. We didn't ask for any of this. I need to make sure my son's wishes to stay in his home and to not have to see his dad if he doesn't want to. I'm swallowing my pride for my children and reaching out for help.

All funds will go towards hiring a lawyer for the trial to make sure my kids and I live the rest of our life in safety.

Please send prayers for us and, if possible, donate. I know everyone is struggling with inflation, and now we are into the holiday season.