When Todd and Rosaland Gauchat married 21 years ago, they knew their life would be challenging: Todd has cerebral palsy, but was relatively independent and could communicate by writing or typing into a computer that would speak for him.
Todd Gauchat: How are you? My wife and I want to thank you for coming here today. I know I am blessed and have a lovely family.
The Gauchats built a careful financial plan around Rosaland's job and an inherited trust. But then their youngest child was diagnosed with autism and Todd contracted a spinal inflammation that left him paralyzed from the neck down.
Rosaland Gauchat: Todd was good for the rest of his life, I had to work to get the health care through the work, so we were just paying the mortgage and then the paralysis happened and then the trust really kicked in.
Rosaland quit her job to help out. They started going through money fast. They found that medicaid won't pay for Rosaland to provide long term care in the home, that is unless they separated.
Rosaland Gauchat: I said ok this is ridiculous, let's get a divorce. I was the one saying, I want a divorce honey! (laughs)
Lawyers say more couples are having this conversation, thanks in part to recent changes in Medicaid. The Federal Deficit Reduction Act aims to cut Medicaid spending by $4.7 billion by 2010. It does that partly by restricting eligibility based on a couple's financial savings - including retirement accounts.
Columbus lawyer William J. Browning says often he's trying to protect one spouse's retirement from disappearing into the other's end of life care.
William J. Browning: Under the old rules she could have kept more of the assets - more than half of the assets. But under the new rules, she can't. Her impoverishment really occurs after he passes away thats what we're trying to avoid now by doing more divorces.
According to The Ohio Health Policy Institute, 24% of medicaid enrollees are aged, blind or disabled, but they consume 72% of state medicaid spending, and long term care costs are growing. Mary Mynatt is section chief for medicaid eligibility at the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services. She says divorcing for benefits is technically illegal.
Mary Mynatt: If one could prove that someone was divorcing with that intent and only that intent I suppose it would be fraud.
Lawyers and former Medicaid officials say they are also seeing lots of couples deciding to not marry. But its not just retirees facing this dilemma. Single parents of children with disabilities are also choosing to not marry, lawyers say, in order to protect their child's medicaid benefits and the retirement accounts of the new spouse. Janet Lowder is a lawyer at Hickman and Lowder. She says explaining the marriage dilemma to her elderly and disabled clients looking for medicaid help is difficult.
Janet Lowder: So, even if they go into the marriage with a prenup saying what's his is his and mine is mine and there will be no contribution for nursing care when a spouse goes into a nursing home that means nothing to Medicaid and I've got to tell people that.
For Todd and Rosaland Gauchat, divorce was ultimately unfathomable. They say they fought hard to overcome stereotypes that Todd's disability meant he could never marry. Rosaland rests her hand on her husband's arm as she talks about their life together.
Rosaland Gauchat: We're stuck. We're stubborn. We can't move out of this marriage thing. (laughs)
So the Gauchats are spending through their savings and retirement plans. Rosaland says for them, there simply isn't another choice. I'm Mhari Saito, 90.3.