Updated on April 16, 2025
If you are facing a divorce, you likely want to resolve the matter as quickly as possible. Even the friendliest divorces are emotionally draining and difficult. A divorce is not only the dissolution of a legal contract but is also the end of an important relationship, and the outcome of your divorce will shape your future.
If your divorcing spouse is engaging in delay tactics, it can drag out an already arduous process and leave you at a distinct disadvantage if you do not address them. Fortunately, an experienced Texas divorce attorney will fiercely advocate for your rights and take the steps necessary to keep your case moving forward.
How Delay Tactics Can Be Harmful
The divorce process itself is complicated and lengthy enough without purposefully extending it. The longer your divorce drags on (for no good reason), the more difficulties you are likely to face:
The longer your divorce takes, the more it is likely to cost. (Read more on controlling the cost of your divorce)
Divorce is hard on children, and the longer it takes – and the more contentious it becomes – the more difficult it is likely to be for your children.
A long divorce can affect your job, leading to lost career opportunities and even a decreased earning potential.
As your divorce drags on, you are more likely to accept terms that disadvantage you.
As your divorce is pending, your finances remain intertwined and you are not free to dive headlong into your post-divorce future.
While rushing a divorce is never advised, if your spouse is delaying your divorce for his or her own purposes, it is a problem.
Your Spouse’s Motivations
While you may not understand why your spouse is dragging out your divorce case, having a clearer understanding of the primary motivations behind such practices can give you greater perspective in your own case.
If Your Spouse Is Invested in Manipulating You Emotionally
Your spouse may be trying to punish you emotionally during your divorce, such as by trying to ensure that you are as hurt as he or she is. This punishment often takes the form of divorce delays. Your soon-to-be ex may not even be aware of the motivation, which can make the matter difficult to resolve.
Your spouse may also simply be buying time in an effort to avoid the inevitable. This behavior is especially common when one spouse doesn’t want the divorce but can’t find a more constructive way to cope with the associated grief.
With divorce comes inevitable change, which includes facing the future without one’s current life partner. This outcome can leave some parties so terrified that they’re willing to do just about anything to keep divorce at bay.
If you’re the one seeking a divorce, it can be difficult to live with the fact that you’re causing your spouse to go through a very painful experience, which may delay your divorce further. However, you’re seeking a divorce for a reason, and pulling the bandage off slowly isn’t going to do anyone any favors.
If Your Spouse Is Strategizing Tactically
There may be a specific reason behind your divorcing spouse’s stalling. For example, if he or she is vying for better child custody terms, keeping the divorce in play helps to ensure that the terms won’t be finalized any time soon, which may be part of the plan.
Your soon-to-be ex could also have a business deal in the works that would better serve him or her financially if it was achieved during your marriage, such as if it ties up and obscures marital assets in the process.
Your spouse may also be artificially extending your divorce as a means of breaking you down. He or she may be waiting for you to simply give whatever it is that he or she wants out of pure exhaustion, a desire to cut your financial losses, or both.
If Your Spouse Is Financially Motivated
The longer your divorce takes to be finalized, the more costly it’s likely to be. This is a universal truth that makes purposely slowing the divorce process for financial reasons seem counterintuitive. However, your spouse may be engaging in dirty dealings. For example, your spouse could be engaging in any of the following behaviors:
Waiting for you to give up and accept less advantageous financial terms
Planning to benefit from tax advantages that are related to marital status for another year
Trying to remain on your health insurance plan for as long as possible
Seeking more time to hide or dissipate marital assets, which is especially relevant in divorces involving high assets or business ownership
If Your Spouse Is Simply Vindictive
One of the most challenging attitudes your spouse can adopt in divorce is pure spite. If your spouse is motivated by a desire to make things as hard on you as possible no matter the cost, it can be very difficult to get your case back on track.
In situations like yours, the best path forward tends to be going directly to court and allowing the presiding judge to resolve your divorce terms on your behalf. Attempting to reason with your vindictive spouse isn’t likely to get you anywhere.
Often two or more of these motivations are interwoven with one another. This means that if your divorcing spouse shows no signs of letting up, it’s an emotionally and legally complex situation that is going to require skilled legal guidance and perseverance.
If you find yourself in a divorce with a spouse who is stalling for time, get help from a skilled divorce attorney. Contact our Killeen divorce lawyers today to schedule a FREE consultation.
Delay Tactics: The Telltale Signs
There are many, many ways to delay a divorce, and if your soon-to-be ex wants to get creative, his or her tactics may become more and more outlandish. However, the basic behaviors remain the same.
Ignoring Your Side’s Legal Documents
Your attorney will engage in official communication with your divorcing spouse’s attorney. A common practice used to stall is simply not responding. This lack of response leaves you with nothing but time-consuming options, such as filing a motion to compel a response with the court or seeking a default judgment.
The more the court needs to be involved, the longer your divorce is likely to run and the more costly it’s likely to be. If your spouse isn’t responsive to your legal actions, it’s a pretty good sign that he or she is not above dragging out your case to the fullest extent possible.
Taking Advantage of the Discovery Process
The discovery process is meant to facilitate the free exchange of information between spouses in preparation for court or for more effective negotiations. If your divorcing spouse is requesting massive amounts of information that are overly broad and will serve no purpose other than eating up time, it's likely on purpose.
Your spouse may also take advantage of the discovery process using these tactics:
Providing you with inadequate or incomplete information
Not complying with your requests for information
Challenging the necessity of your requests for disclosure
Abusing the disclosure process in this way can make getting down to the meat of your divorce, which is resolving the involved divorce terms, feel like a distant dream.
Rescheduling Meetings Constantly
Everyone is busy, and once you get a meeting, deposition, or court date on the books, it's usually a relief. If your spouse comes up with excuses for constant reschedules, he or she is managing to inconvenience a lot of people and is tipping the power balance in his or her own favor.
Don’t fall for this ruse. Instead, consult with an experienced Killeen divorce attorney for help navigating this challenge.
Filing Frequent Legal Motions
You, your spouse, or each of you may need to file a legal motion or two in the course of your divorce, but if your spouse shows no signs of letting up and if there isn’t much validity behind the motions he or she is filing, your spouse is probably stalling.
If your soon-to-be ex’s legal filings strike you as irrelevant or unnecessary, it’s very likely because they are. Such practices can bog down the process and make your divorce take far longer.
Not Signing Documents
You have hammered out some terms or come to an agreement that will help guide the process forward, which feels like progress, but if your spouse refuses (or simply never gets around) to signing the documents, you really have not gotten anywhere.
This game of cat and mouse can get your hopes up only to dash them over and over again, and it is a sure sign that your spouse is motivated to delay the process.
Related: Keeping Your Divorce Documents Private in Texas
Firing Lawyers
Everyone understands that changing lawyers midstream in your divorce requires time to get back up to speed. However, if your divorcing spouse makes a sport of it, it is very likely a delay strategy.
When your spouse changes counsel midstream, it slows the process in all of the following ways:
The attorney will need to get up to speed on the case by reviewing the history and file details.
The change can disrupt your case’s flow.
The change can necessitate a shift in your own legal strategy.
Seek the Professional Legal Counsel of an Experienced Killeen Divorce Attorney
Brett Pritchard at the Law Office of Brett H. Pritchard – proudly serving Killeen, Texas – is a well-respected divorce attorney who knows how to cut through your divorcing spouse's delays and skillfully fight for your rights. To learn more, please do not wait to contact us online or call us at (254) 781-4222 today.