Disclaimer: All facts gleaned from the filings stated hereafter are only as truthful as the petitioner. The tone of this article expresses a style of writing historically employed by America’s greatest writers and, as such, is for opinion purposes only. No intentional harm is due. Do not read if the topic of divorce (even your own) causes you emotional distress. Continue at your own risk.

January arrives as a ledger of intentions, its pages blank and hopeful, as if time itself were willing to forget what came before. Yet records do not forget. In St. Louis County, Missouri, January 13, 2026 became the date that Wilma White placed her marriage into the archive of official endings, filing a petition for dissolution that reads less like a plea than a report from the field.

Wilma White and Walter White were married on or about February 16, 2007, their union registered in St. Louis County. By April 2025, the household had fractured, the separation already underway long before the court was asked to notice. Two children frame the family’s outline: one adult child born prior to the marriage, and one minor child, age ten, born during it and residing with Wilma for the six months preceding the filing. The petition emphasizes continuity of care, noting that no other custody proceedings exist and requesting the court adopt Wilma’s proposed parenting plan.

The document sketches an imbalance familiar to courts but rarely neutral. Wilma is self-employed and asserts she lacks sufficient income to support herself and the minor child or to fund the litigation. Walter is described as gainfully employed, able-bodied, and earning a substantial wage, capable of contributing to child support, maintenance, and legal costs. The marriage, the petition states plainly, is irretrievably broken, beyond preservation.

Filed through attorney Robert E. Faerber, the petition asks the court to dissolve the marriage; award custody and order child support under the proposed parenting plan; grant Wilma a reasonable monthly maintenance award payable by Walter; require Walter to pay Wilma’s attorney’s fees and court costs; divide marital property and marital debt in just proportions; set aside each party’s separate property and separate debts; and grant any other relief the court deems just and proper.

January promised a beginning. The court record delivers an accounting instead.

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