Bullet Formatting changes, and text box columns changes when I open with Word 2010

Hi all you wonderful MS-Word challengers! I need some help with docs who change format when I open them with MS-Word.

So I am using LibreOffice at home, and MS Office 2010 at work. I don’t want to use Word. It is controlling and makes my life difficult on purpose whereas LibreOffice is designed with my needs (and not corporate needs) in mind.

I had spent a lot of time editing the bullets (spacing, levels, and indentation) and creating text box collunms (I couldn’t figure out how to do this with a page break like in Word).

The document is a .doc file (Word 97/2003).

When I open it in MS Word 2010, all this formatting has to be redone because the bullets have changed and moved around. Its no longer clear which is level 1, 2 or 3. The columns in my text boxes are also gone and it is replaced with a normal text box.

Honestly I think that MS-Word and LO both have too many formatting tools and its hard to ensure consistent formatting. Its easier to ensure consistent formatting by copying format-free text from notepad. . . I wish there was a better way!

I want to make this work… so maybe there are other techniques I should be using to format bullets and sections with columns. Any suggestions?

Maybe I should try different formats?

Any help is appreciated… I want to eliminate the need to have Word at all.