Divorce is never pretty, but it can sometimes be downright ugly. Emotions are high, and each party usually stands to lose something significant in a divorce. These ten dirty divorce tricks are used by a lot of people in a divorce, but they usually don’t result in anything positive for either side.

Serving Papers with the Intent to Embarrass

You’re angry with your spouse, and you want to humiliate him or her. So, you arrange for the divorce papers to be served at work when you know your spouse will be in an important meeting. Or, you have them served at a happy family gathering.

This may feel temporarily satisfactory, but don’t be surprised if your spouse retaliates in an equally publicly humiliating way.

Taking Everything

While your spouse is at work or on a business trip, you clean out the house. Your spouse returns to an empty home. You feel vindicated because after all, your spouse was a horrible person to live with. Unfortunately, this move will likely only provoke an equal or bigger reaction from your spouse.

Be prepared for war if you try to boot your spouse out of the house while he or she is away.

Canceling Credit Cards

You’re finishing up a meal at a restaurant with your friend, and you go to pay the bill with the same card you always use. The waiter soon returns with the dreaded word “Declined.” Your spouse pulled a dirty trick and canceled all your credit cards without your knowledge. Now you’re left with no way to pay.

Not only is this kind of conduct bad form, in Travis County it is prohibited by the Travis County Standing Order, which automatically goes into effect once a divorce petition is filed. Cancelling credit cards or engaging in similarly prohibited conduct in Travis County can result in the offending spouse being sanctioned by the Court.

Clearing Our Your Bank Accounts

The marriage is over, and you’re furious at the many ways your spouse has wronged you. So, you go to the bank and completely clean out all joint bank accounts. Feels good, right? Especially when you think about the look on your spouse’s face when he or she realizes what you’ve done.

However, this could reflect poorly on you when a judge determines you’ve stepped out of bounds. If you’re truly worried your spouse will financially ruin you, don’t clean out the bank accounts. Instead, have your family law attorney walk you through the appropriate steps to protect yourself financially.

To schedule a consultation with experienced divorce lawyer Ben Carrasco, please fill out the form below.

Starving Out the Other Spouse

You’re the partner who supports the family, and you begin to withhold the money and resources needed by the other partner. You refuse to pay the electricity bill, leave nothing for groceries, and won’t cover the kids’ medical expenses. This is done so that your spouse will be placed in a desperate financial situation where he or she might accept an unfair settlement.

Refusing to Cooperate

Refusing to speak to your spouse about anything, especially about arrangements with the kids, makes cooperation impossible and causes stress for your children. Pettiness doesn’t help anything, but it does incite anger on both sides, which leads to sabotage in other ways. If you can’t speak civilly with your spouse, let your family law attorney intervene.

Jeopardizing Employment

When a marriage is ending on the worst terms, sometimes a spouse will just want to hurt their partner, no matter the consequences. This desire can extend to trying to jeopardize a spouse’s employment by providing negative information about a spouse to their boss or coworkers.

The problem with this is it can ultimately hurt the offending spouse, as spousal and child support can be affected by a lack of employment.

Meddling in an Affair

When a marriage ends because of an affair, it makes perfect sense that the jilted partner would want to damage the relationship of the spouse and lover. Calling the spouse of your spouse’s lover to inform him or her of the affair might even seem like the right thing to do.

However, the temporary satisfaction someone receives from this is not worth the potential repercussions. If you think it’s important that the affair also be revealed to the other spouse, let your Austin divorce lawyer handle it. Otherwise, it almost always ends badly.

Skipping Town With the Kids

When your marriage is falling apart, getting away from it all for a while may seem like a good idea, especially if you have kids. Taking your kids out of state may seem like the best way to really stick it to your spouse, but it can backfire and result in you losing primary custody or having your visitation supervised when the behavior is brought before a judge.

Filing False Accusations of Child Abuse

You don’t want your spouse to have custody of the kids, so you do everything you can to discredit him or her including making accusations of child abuse.

However, stretching normal occurrences in an effort to make your spouse look like an abusive monster will backfire on you. If your child is truly in danger, seek professional help immediately.

Need a Great Divorce Attorney?

When you’re going through a divorce, you’ll encounter situations you didn’t even realize could exist. To protect yourself, you want the best divorce attorney on your side. Ben Carrasco is an experienced local divorce attorney in Austin who will help ensure the best possible outcome for you in your divorce case.

Call Ben today at (512) 489-9820 or request a consultation online!

About the Author
Ben Carrasco is a highly skilled family law attorney based in Austin, Texas, known for his extensive expertise in family law and business litigation. While his primary focus is family law, Ben brings a wealth of experience in litigating diverse business disputes, ranging from breach of contract and collections to business torts, fraud, and real estate matters. In his family law practice, Ben navigates all aspects of the field, including divorce, child custody, support, property division, and more, offering clients expert guidance throughout the litigation process. His legal journey began in complex commercial litigation, initially with a global law firm and later with a prominent Austin-based firm. However, driven by a desire to make a direct impact on people's lives and embrace the human element of the law, Ben transitioned to family law, a decision that has proven to be deeply rewarding. A proud Austin native with roots in California, Ben completed his undergraduate studies at the University of California, Berkeley, before earning his law degree at Stanford Law School, where he excelled in legal writing and served as an associate editor of the Stanford Law and Policy Review.