Long story short I have been with my partner 5 years. We have a large family and have had one of our own with another on the way.
I am happy but We took on a large debt that was from my partners ex wife/marriage. She walked away with a car, no debt while we are struggling paying this debt each week, plus child support for my partners son on top of his dance fees, school stuff, hair cuts and very expensive wants. Only child. The ex is limiting when we can have him due to the money and it altering the child support. The ex has been a huge ongoing issue. There is no other word to explain other than a gold digger. I have managed to let all this go over the years but we had to move house and our rent increased $100 a week, the loss of my income has now put us at a point where I am looking into debt help to survive. She is just sitting pretty with another man just forking out money for her again, another doing FIFO. I get resentful at my stepson because he gets everything he wants, is so spoilt like his mother. He has no respect for me or our house. He has stolen things from my kids to look cool and only got caught because he posted a video on tik tok. He lied straight to our faces when asked beforehand. I am angry because after 5 years he still gets in the car and ignores me unless my partner tells him to say hello. I have never told him or shown him how I feel. I have always tried to be the mature adult and cope with the step mum thing and be understanding.

I am angry and resentful at my partner for allowing her to continue using him and although we have tried to stop paying all the extra fees she ignores the messages and manipulates him by saying he is a crap father. His response to me is then “I was doing this before you came along”. It just goes around and around in circles and never gets dealt with. We are arguing because of it and we don’t argue.
She manipulates my step son. If he asks to come over she will use “oh just pack your bags and live there then “so he doesn’t come. I cannot see a light at the end of this tunnel for the next 5 years till this debt is gone. I am getting depressed. We had both done our divorces so we could get married and then we discovered last week she hasn’t filed it even though we gave her the money to do it. I am managing a house, 2 teens and an 8 month old , I am 4 months pregnant and we have my two sons part time and my step son every second weekend and I am starting to crack.

HelloBradyunch, it sounds you're in an unfortunate situation and although I'm not qualified to say, I can say that the divorce laws need to be changed and this will only happen as soon as a politician in authority becomes involved themselves.

As she hasn't signed the divorce papers what you can do is file a Petition for Dissolution of Marriage with the courts and can be done without her signature and if you copy and paste this 'can you get married if the ex hasn't signed the divorce paper', then there will be information for you to read.

A judge will file a default hearing on your uncontested divorce and there is only a limited time to contest this divorce and if nothing is done, then this will eventually happen by the court, unfortunately, it's another cost but you will achieve what you're looking for.

Geoff.