devoted thirty four years to raising the parties three children and to supporting her husband donald miller in moving up his career and advancing his career which now brings him to the earning capacity of approximately seventy six thousand dollars every year including bonuses as the general manager manager at the county market in close county where the parties live and where they raised  where parties raised their three children i have searched for cases in which there have been maintenance modifications for after thirty four year marriage and i was unable to find any thirty four year marriages where that was the issue the court is saying to a twenty four year case twenty four year marriages but i think this may be one of the record one the one that could go down in the record books as far as the length of a marriage dedicate am and in this case as in many cases you see the dedication of one spouse to the raising the parties children what is interesting here is that the respondent apparently has come back now for the second time to try to modify or terminate maintenance his maintenance  to his wife of thirty for nearly thirty four years and in this case the court the trial court clearly abused its discretion in agreeing to modify downward the court the my client maintenance what she was receiving initially the court entered an order and sent maintenance at thirteen hundred dollars per month and ordered the respondent husband to pay cobra health insurance so my client could receive health insurance and ordered that he pay forty percent of any his bonuses when he asked to when he filed a motion modify two years later the court reduced maintenance in that it modified the maintenance obligation for is the amount of bonuses what the quoted here in this case that is under appeal is that it not only eliminated all of the bonuses or any of the bonuses that my client would receive but in for the reduced maintenance the maintenance obligation from thirteen hundred dollars a month to eight hundred dollars a month the court had clearly abused its discretion when it found that donald had proved the head proved a substantial change in circumstances the court the evidence was it was clear that my client had not only continued to have made insufficient effort efforts i believe were the terms of the words of judge o'brien in trying to find additional work despite the fact that not only had she found a part time and gotten a try time job at pet smart making nine was asked where have you been applying it goes on for pages and pages their c s s cleaning online home depot staples walmart sears j c penney carson's pet smart seller bush rattle king cracker barrel she goes it every every month into the unemployment office she claims that one news which has their office in main office in mention she goes to the employment search engine indeed dot com and updates and grew fresh as her applications on a monthly basis she does her check tested general electric during that six year period a year over the last six years when we have had the worst recession since the great depression she has continued to apply for and look for jobs on top of the odd jobs that she was doing and has been doing the cleaning houses walking dogs anything that she can get through word of mouth she's continued to do that and continue to apply for jobs she she finally was able to obtain this part time she makes one hundred fifteen dollars a week compared to her husband who is making seventy six thousand dollars a year probably about ten times more than my client's making in addition of course donald has is remarried and has income from his spouse on which he can roll by there is no suggestion that he cannot afford to continue paying maintenance or pain even a higher amount of maintenance but the evidence is clear that despite the obligation despite the requirement that in determining the amount of maintenance a trial court should consider the parties income of the time dissolution as well as the potential incomes that my my client no longer can afford health insurance but this man has health insurance through his employment my client has none my  has no dental insurance her debts have increased in just a nine month period from the beginning of two thousand and twelve to september of two thousand and twelve had it increased drastically she has now only more debts but had can't put anything into her well the trial court and i wasn't i wasn't attorney of record in the initial case or in the initial request they had been refined found they did find a bit least a judge rider in the fifth back in two thousand eleven did find that she had made insufficient effort that's first judicata but since that time since june of two thousand and seven when the court made that entered that order the idea or the suggestion that she has not made sufficient effort since then the lie by the record is belied by the numerous cases of page after page beginning of page forty on the secure sixteenth story aug sixteenth transcript of the places that she would go to week after week month after month through fresher application of experience or training she's high school education on the other hand she's not likely to find a job that pays a great deal more than her cold way to from one thirty five per hour she's also not physically limited to part time work that's her capacity there are more now than  earn more now than she now earns is also evident she is to jobs where they are or she was offered more jobs if she could get another offer for a job she would take that and that's in the record as well but despite all of these applications and the he for a high school graduate who is fifty nine years of age and essentially has not worked outside that didn't work outside the home during that thirty four year marriage it's unreasonable for the court to raise that to to co and to suggest then that the whole she should receive his maintenance after this for thirty four year marriage is eight hundred dollars a month when the husband clearly has the ability to earn that and when milly's income has read has been read despite earning  hundred fifty dollars a week at pet smart on average but she can no longer afford it and no longer has health insurance sense donald didn't have to pay quote his cobra after believes three years after the marriage dissolve and donald's abilities to pay maintenance has increased he is the court did note accurately he's doubled his four one k retirement he's doubled the contributions he's doubling the payments on his h so he has that ability goes on vacations goes down to florida spends thousands of dollars a month on restaurants for him and his wife well my client is the testimony in the evidence shows can't even put food in her refrigerator there's nothing more than like a dozen eggs in her refrigerator in time because she doesn't have the funds she waits for time to be able to house clean and get twenty dollars to be able to buy some groceries or put gas in her car yes this is a fortune situation courts based on their record before they have found minimal or no would you say effort or success well i guess both they tend to fit together but i understand that you would argue well i understand that argument and all shiny answer the question is an argument goes on i understand that finding i believe judge o'brien's finding which is just a case where peeling now is an abuse a clear abuse of discretion based on the evidence on the record before the court i'm not going to buy a q they at she didn't make sufficient efforts before because that's a finding by a judge writer that was not appeared i was not counsel record and i so i can't say for that what that record shows but i can say that the red not in this case before this court shows this good mary taylor was making efforts from it clearly from the last time the court entered its ordering summer of two thousand and eleven and was going to applying for a goodwill interviews ask her friends for jobs for friends working at g e and did a testing there she's applied it might wonder if she applies there is indeed that column which is a work site where you are a website where you apply for jobs and then was it was going places around around close county as well in addition to going to get to the unemployment center on a monthly basis  refreshing her applications there there was evidence of she would take her daughter or her granddaughter to syria bush the medical center there and saw that they were unsure place where there wasn't a place i think in close county that she didn't apply and so the finding by the suggestion that she could work or could expect to work thirty hours a week is without any basis in the records there's nothing that suggests that she's ever been offered or could could get a job for thirty hours a week she's grateful for the fifteen to twenty hours a week that she receives and the hundred fifteen dollars a week that she averages for from pet smart but that simply simply not only insufficient to meet the standard of living that she and donald acquired during those thirty four years of marriage when she great when she got married shortly after high school graduation or also living beyond their means the court found that they had live beyond their means during during they're married now they had two houses as well so that but yet they had but that they had a comfortable standard of living and the evidence there is no contrary evidence that suggests that donald can't afford to continue to pay mar the thirteen hundred dollars a month in fact more than that based on his income of the seventy six thousand per month not even taking into consideration his wife's income and and again with these additional do decision by the trial court think she has the the she should be able to come to the church that's all she needs and the fact is she needs much more than that thirteen hundred dollars a month isn't going to get her back to compared to the spouse's previous standard of living and not should not be required to lower the standard of living established in marriage as long as the payer spends in this case mr taylor has sufficient assets to meet his needs and needs of the former spouse said that there isn't that isn't a substantial change in circumstances or even if it were that the court said that donald taylor did not prove that in this case in which it is on a notes afternoon likeness wyman i am a newcomer to the situation also and in fact to answer one of your questions the original judgement was in fact entered by judge writer and the second order from two thousand and eleven was one that was entered by her also of interest to note is that with regard to each of those orders the in paragraph a which is one of the ordering graphs in the two thousand and seven judgement just right or specifically makes reference that quote said payments regarding the maintenance and the bonus documentation said pain and shock continue until further order of the court and with regard to the order of december eleven once again by the honorable judge writer she says quote the monthly obligation remains until mr taylor retires and the pension benefits mr taylor was awarded take effect or until further order of the court permanent or either judge will judge right or leaves open the opportunity here for a modification when she says in both the two thousand and seven judgment in the two thousand and eleven order then these things take these things stay in place until further order of the thousand and eleven order is the fact that she continue to not try to secure some sort of employment that would make her self supporting i said well it's a change in circumstances from the fact that the order from two thousand and eleven basically puts the parties in the position to where that evidence was based on the fact that she continued to not do that is an additional change in circumstances because she's told she has to do this she has to do something to become self supporting and in fact gentle bryan in his order from twenty thirteen indicated that many of the pieces of evidence with regard to employment were the same thing she submitted back in twenty eleven except that it's pretty clear that there is absolutely no resign but on anybody's part she sells or maybe she can be self supporting name plus more hours or vet or job but not that she's going to become self support well i would quarrel with you as far as that goes just simply because we don't know the she ever work anywhere near your art for thirty four years i understand that the fact of the matter is the answer is we don't know simply because of the lack of effort and we get back to the timing of these after donald filed his petition in may of twenty thirteen the answer is we don't know that's the thing because of the lack of effort and that is a change in circumstance with this being a rehabilitative mean a situation whe the standard on the review obviously is that with regard to the various things that have been presented to you is an abuse of discretion and the fact of the matter is also the judge will draw and his orders from a december of two thousand and thirteen our position obviously is that he took painstaking effort to go through the evidence he said here to apply their dance with regard to the law in place and to come up with his decision this is not a one paragraph order that he just threw out without any to fit definition at all as to what it is that the showed what the law is we do not believe that there has been an abuse of discretion on any of the points that have been raised by mary in her brief  fact draw conclusions from the evidence regularly one second is we have to fall back on the fact that there has not been that concerted effort to try to achieve not to achieve but to try to achieve self sufficiency so those two points there i don't believe it was inappropriate for the trial judge to make that ruling or make that assumption based on the evidence that was presented because we did have her being able to admit that she had full time employment if it was presented or she would take it at pet smart but when she got a part time job a pet smart the testimony was that all efforts to secure anything outside of pet smart's part time employment terminated she admitted to that so the fact that the judge o'brien made that assumption based on the evidence is is i think the first one to make a guess the trier of fact cleaning dog walk ing when friends have houses that they're renting out and they need to be cleaned between renters she continues to do that what her testimony was a trial was dead she's not going to quit pet smart and try and get another job if pets marty is able to give her more hour she takes all hour she can get but pet smart doesn't hire people for more than part time except managers and she doesn't have the education or qualifications to become a manager again the suggestion that she unable or unwilling to look for additional work or said she's working i believe that the evidence when when she was clearly asked  beginning of december that she was continuing to do so additionally this if she didn't stop looking for work the idea was this the suggestion the argument by opposing counsel they had she didn't start looking for really looking for jobs and told on onsite interviews she did the testing at g e that she was able to get in and do a testing and get an application from one of her neighbors who worked there that she was going in monthly to the to the unemployment office applying to lenders all of those were in two th two thousand and early two thousand and twelve lonely for donald made file his because she continued after he found his petition and there's additional the testimony is there's certainly additional places it that she continued to go back security i believe donald has to retire first and then she would become eligible i believe as early as sixty two but you take this reduced amount if you go before sixty two and i don't know if they've raised it to sixty seven before you get full amounts or sixty five  she's not eligible now and depending on when down decides to retire that will depend that will decide when she would be eligible for her reduced question on social security is there there is and i'm sorry i didn't have that partner that was the florio one k that was at c one thirty eight but the c one thirty three is the from the from the pension plan no she is not able to get that yet i believe she doesn't receive that until he would retire decides this point finally sure the other rain issue there was a petitions for contempt in which donald had failed to go ahead blacked out documentation after petitions for contempt were filed he then provided the funds that were due but we defile those petition for contempt finally the court granted only a portion of the attorney's fees incurred in two hundred eighty eight thousand six hundred thirty five dollars in attorney's fees were they done to contribute only three thousand six hundred thirty five when he was paying no no money and attorney's fees trial court and so we would ask that the court order for payment on that we've asked the court be that the trial court's decision on maintenance be reversed and remanded with the requirement for restoring the four amount of maintenance plus health insurance