When a marriage breaks down, the prospect of taking legal action that formalizes the end of the relationship can be a source of apprehension and stress.\u00a0 At our Texas divorce law firm, we often hear from clients that are unclear on the distinctions between the various legal actions to address the rights of married parties when a relationship ends, such as divorce, legal separation (called \u201cseparate maintenance\u201d in Texas) and annulment.\u00a0 Some clients use these terms interchangeably or in ways that make it clear that they do not understand the distinctions between these alternatives.\u00a0 Texas divorce attorney Alex Tyra explains how divorce, legal separation and annulment differ.<\/p>\n
Dissolution of Marriage (Divorce)<\/strong><\/p>\n Divorce (formally called \u201cdissolution of marriage\u201d) is the most common legal action to terminate a marriage.\u00a0 A divorce action terminates marital status based most typically on the \u201cincompatibility\u201d of the parties, which means that the marriage has completely broken down and cannot be restored with counseling or other forms of intervention.\u00a0 While the divorce process will completely dissolve the marital relationship, it also acknowledges that a valid marriage between the parties previously existed.\u00a0 A divorce action may address a wide range of relevant issues that include property division, alimony (spouse support), child custody\/visitation, child support and other issues.<\/p>\n Legal Separation (Separate Maintenance)<\/strong><\/p>\n Separate maintenance is a variation of the process that is referred to as \u201clegal separation\u201d in other states.\u00a0 While legal separation can address essentially all of the issues in a divorce action like asset and debt distribution, spousal maintenance, parenting plans, child support and others, it differs from a divorce because the marital status of the parties is not altered.\u00a0 This type of action is not filed frequently.\u00a0 If a couple wishes to keep their marital status intact for religious or reconciliation reasons, however, this may still provide an option.\u00a0 If one of the parties files for divorce, the court will proceed on the dissolution of marriage claim rather than the separate maintenance claim.<\/p>\n When a party seeks a Kansas annulment, the party is essentially asking the court to formally acknowledge that the marriage was \u201cvoid\u201d from its inception or \u201cvoidable\u201d based on some fact that one or both parties did not know entering into the marriage that would have materially affected the moving party\u2019s decision to marry.\u00a0 An example of a void marriage would include a marriage where one of the parties never obtained a final judgment of dissolution of marriage in a prior divorce or the parties were too closely related by blood to be lawfully married.\u00a0 An example of a voidable marriage might include a spouse finding out that his or her spouse only entered into the marriage to obtain immigration benefits.\u00a0 While some people believe that annulment may only be granted if the marriage is extremely brief, this form of relief can be sought if the statutory criteria are met regardless of the length of the marriage.<\/p>\n Texas divorce attorney Alex Tyra offers a free consultation during which he can advise you about the various options including dissolution of marriage, annulment or legal separation.\u00a0 We invite you to contact us in our Longview office at 903-753-7499 or visit our website and submit a case contact form.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When a marriage breaks down, the prospect of taking legal action that formalizes the end of the relationship can be a source of apprehension and stress.\u00a0 At our Texas divorce law firm, we often hear from clients that are unclear on the distinctions between the various legal actions to address the rights of married parties […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-texas-divorce-cases","tag-longview-divorce-lawyer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":125,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions\/125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tyralawoffice.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Annulment<\/h1>\n