That's nothing, look at what hit my home town this week.
https://www.9news.com.au/wild-weather/2018/12/21/07/08/nsw-weather-sydney-hail-storm-in-pictures
Firstly, congratulations!
Secondly, no. The bigger the pay, the bigger the tax taken out so splitting it into two different checks would have you paying less tax on each check and more than likely less tax overall.
Seen it done it. I actually was able to reach out to a friend here on MGS and he was very accommodating in his advice. We also had counselling and it helped a lot. Is everything perfect? No, but we are communicating, no more fighting and work at getting better every day.