Stjepan also gained employment as an assistant to the director of the local community health center in order to provide an income for his wife and daughters.

He refused to immigrate abroad, as many other Croatian Spring supporters at the time had done to avoid further misfortune at the hands of the Yugoslav regime, and instead chose to agree to a trial and was sentenced to a two-year jail term.

Milka was able to gain employment at a kindergarten at the mjesna zajednica (a form of local self-government in the former Yugoslavia) of Studentski dom, but she almost lost her job when it was found out that her husband was in prison for activities relating to the Croatian Spring and ultimately retained her job due to the efforts of her colleagues, who shielded her from being branded as holding responsibility for her husband's activities.

[1] After her husband's election as President of Croatia in 2000 she kept a low profile and seldom accompanied him on official trips and state visits abroad.

Several affairs also surfaced later on involving the couple's daughters, Saša and Dunja, as well as their grandchildren Sara Šimunović and Tomo Mesić Obranović.