Your Divorce Checklist and Planner
The practical side of a separation is a few dozen small tasks that arrive with no order and no reminders. This holds them in one place, grouped by roughly when they come up, so you can tick things off and see what is left rather than carrying the list in your head.
Overall
0 of 89 steps. Paperwork handled, not how you are doing.
Tasks
- 0
- Finished
- 0
- Part done
- 29
- Not started
Of 29. Several of them will not apply to you.
Has a clock behind it
Your plan
Saved on this device as you go. Nothing is sent anywhere. If you share this device with the person you are separating from, erase it when you finish.
If you do one thing
Listed the options that actually exist
Work out where you are sleeping for the next month · The First Weeks · 0% done
Nothing has to happen today. This is here for the days when you want a starting point rather than a list.
What you are working on
Your words, your list
Nothing here yet. No suggested number of items and no dates unless you want them in the text. A class on a Tuesday counts as much as a legal deadline.
What this planner is not
It is not a program, and finishing it is not the point. Nothing here counts days or measures how you are doing, because the administrative side of a separation and the human side of it move at completely different speeds, and a planner that pretended otherwise would be lying to you on a bad week.
The bars count paperwork. Someone can have every box ticked and still be in the worst month of their life, and someone can have almost nothing ticked and be perfectly all right. Both of those are normal and neither is what the numbers are measuring.
Why it is grouped this way
The five groups are the stages this site is organized around, because that is how these tasks actually arrive: everything at once in the first weeks, then the slow untangling of joint things, then a house arranged for one person, then the slower rebuilding, then the loose ends that surface a year later when nobody is looking for them.
One stage is deliberately missing. There is nothing here about whether to get back together, because that is a decision rather than a task, and turning it into a checklist item would put a thumb on it. It is covered on its own terms in Trying Again.
The items with real deadlines
Most of this can wait. A few things cannot, and those are flagged in the sidebar as you work:
- Health coverage, where losing a plan opens a limited enrollment window.
- The order that divides retirement accounts, which has a statutory clock once it is disputed.
- Beneficiary designations, which no decree changes for you and which nobody sends a reminder about.
Frequently asked questions
Is anything I tick or type here stored on a server?
No. It is saved in your own browser on this device, there is no account, and nothing is transmitted. We cannot see any of it. Clearing your browser data clears it, and the erase button in the sidebar removes it immediately.
What if I share a device with my ex?
Then treat this like anything else saved in a shared browser, because someone with access to the device can open it. Use the erase button when you finish, or keep the list somewhere they cannot reach. Where there is any fear involved, safety comes before organization: the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233, or text START to 88788.
How long should a divorce checklist take to finish?
There is no schedule and this planner does not set one. A few items are urgent because a deadline sits behind them, such as an insurance enrollment window. Most are not urgent at all, and several will not apply to you.
What if most of it does not apply to me?
That is common and it is not a problem. There are no children on some of these lists, no house on others, and no pension on many. Tick what applies, ignore the rest, and use the last card for the things only you would think to write down.
Can I get this as a printable list?
Use the Copy as text button in the sidebar, which puts the whole thing on your clipboard as plain text with the ticks preserved. Paste it into a note, a document, or an email to yourself.