Grounds for protective order?

Hi there, are there any lawyers or social workers out here who may know about this? I've looked online and spoken to a few people but no one really has answers. I'm in the US. My abuser is a narcissist. I am living with him and our young daughter. I have an ongoing thread in the wayward side. Yes I am asking for free advice

Any thoughts or advice would be very much appreciated.

1. How long ago did the abuse have to occur? Can it be more than 2 months? A year?
2. A physical incident occurred in 2018. One slap across the face. There's no evidence or reports of this.
3. I've not been physically or sexually abused in the literal way, but coerced to have sex with multiple men by my abuser. He didn't threaten me exactly, but more like intimidated me to comply. A few times he threatened to kick me out, divorce me and keep our daughter from me if I didn't comply. But he never threatened to physically harm me if I didn't obey.
4. Last November, my abuser has pulled a firearm out of our closet, not threatening to use it on me, but he got it out claiming to go hunting, but I knew he was showing this to me to make me think he was going to commit suicide. I talked him out of "going hunting", and later threw it into our pool. There have been a few incidents like this.
5. He has verbally threatened to carry me out of the house and lock me out.
6. In January, something happened that offended him deeply. On the phone he warned me to not come home because he didn't know what would happen (implying he would hurt me or someone else).
7. In February, he got drunk and was slurring, yelling at me, telling me to get the fuck out of his house, and he walked over to me while I was crouched down near the floor, and he put his foot on my chest and pushed me gently enough to not leave a mark or really hurt me, but I fell over. I left the house and slept in my car. He called me at 4:30am asking where I was because I had turned off my location services. I have this particular incident on an audio recording.
8. He stalks me but I don't know if that counts as stalking because we are married and living together. He has 24/7 access and alerts to my phone's whereabouts.
a. Yesterday he followed me to the laundromat and I'm pretty sure it was to make sure I was alone.
b. Last Friday he did that when I was picking up our daughter from school. I was at the school early. He texted me to ask which of us was picking her up and I said I was already there. Then just as school was let out, he pulled up to the school acting all cute and innocent. I'm sure it was not to be cute. It was to make sure I was alone and not cheating on him.
c. One other time around Christmas, I was in a city an hour and a half away getting labs done for my health, and I wanted to go shopping too. I had my daughter with me. When I was almost home, I saw his truck as he raced past me. He beat me home and pretended he was in bed the whole time. His truck engine was clicking and still warm when I got home. I know he followed me. I called him out on it but I didn't say anything about the engine, and he flat out lied and said he had been home all along.

I just don't want to petition for a protective order, have the judge dismiss it and then my abuser gets even worse and there will be hell to pay for going that route. How dare I call him abusive? He will absolutely go nuts. Thanks!

9 comments posted: Sunday, April 3rd, 2022

Best way to tell AP's girlfriend?

I'm sure this has been asked loads of times, so I apologize if redundant.

I want to tell my AP's girlfriend about his infidelity.

Here is the breakdown. I had a very emotional connection with AP that lasted for a few years. I know way too many of his secrets, and I feel I know way too much about his girlfriend. I doubt their situation is rare; she doesn't enjoy sex and he does, he rarely got it from her so he goes looking elsewhere for that, which is how he found me and some girls after me. I was his first "cheat". He never got caught, but I fessed up to my BH. AP always told me that he would not want to cheat once he married her, like he could start fresh and make a real promise to her. I know that's BS. Anyway, that was his idea. And guess what, that was in 2017 and they are still not engaged. I believe they have been together for a decade. He is dragging her ass along. By the way, I never saw him as a potential life partner. So my intentions are not to break them up, even though she will probably not stay with him if she believes me.

I want to tell her because obviously she has a right to know. But also because I still feel a connection with this loser! For some sick reason I don't want to damage the sultry, fun, secret adventure he had with me in his mind (and mine!). I don't even want to see him again, so why do I have to keep this connection intact? The answer is: I don't. I don't need him to have fond memories of me, to be daydreaming about me, or to even desire me ever again. In fact it might be nice if he hated me. I don't hate him but I do have mixed feelings. I'd like to feel disgusted with him at some point.

I know how to get into his secret email because he once shared his password with me. That is where he kept all his secret photos of me and other secret affair paraphernalia. After I ended things, I told him to change his password. I recently found out all he did was add another character to the password. Yes, I went in so I could dig up dirt on him so I had ammo to tell his girlfriend. And guess what. He still has photos of me in there and I can see he has been with at least 3 other girls since me and I bet there's actually even more! I never knew, but he is a serial cheater.

Something else important:
I don't want to use my photos as ammo, I prefer to be anonymous. I don't really need any more drama in my life than there already is, I don't want MORE backlash from this affair. I hope AP doesn't have any other places he stores those photos. I don't want him to know that I'm the one who told his girlfriend, while he still has photos of me, and sends them all to my BH out of revenge. My BH hasn't seen those particular photos and I don't see any reason why he would need to! BH knows what I've done, why make it worse by making him look at images to go with his imagination? But that would mean it would be harder to prove to her that I'm being truthful.

So then shall I delete my stuff from his email (I want to anyway), and in the same day secretly message her to log into his secret email? Or do I just suck it up, and tell her from myself what we did and let her figure out the rest? Either way he will know it was me who blew it for him. Or, I stay anonymous and find some other way to prove it?

I should not leave it alone though, right?

8 comments posted: Tuesday, March 1st, 2022

W post: Now I am finally the one contemplating divorce.

Hello,
I am the WS. This post may seem harsh if you are the BS so please be careful when reading. This gets explicit, and I talk about abuse. We have a really different story and I have dissociated from my feelings and many of these events. I am not currently having any affairs but there have been recent occurrences that I will explain.

So, to sum up our complex situation...my husband and I got together when I was 18 (he was divorced and 27), he essentially manipulated me into having multiple extramarital partners until I had had enough of the control and found myself a "boyfriend" with whom I would really just not hold anything back (I didn't care if I got emotionally attached). I didn't care who he was, but he was going to fulfill what needs I wasn't getting from my husband (but with his knowledge). By the way, I have told him that I didn't want to do all that, so there were times where we would stop talking about it but it wouldn't last long. I did get attached to the boyfriend, my husband made me stop, and I secretly met up with that boyfriend one last time. I kept that from him for 3 months. It's been a living hell since then. I actually wish I kept it to myself. That was in 2018.

Between then and now, there have been countless threats of divorce made by him, he has kicked me out of the house, leading me to sleep in my car for a few nights until I convinced him to let me come home, a ton of yelling and verbal abuse, suicide threats, and blaming and stonewalling coming from him. He slapped me once at the time of discovery but there hasn't been any other physical abuse other than an occasional finger jab in my chest. Our s** life has been nonexistent. Zero. He also has communicated that his self esteem would come back if I found a few women to "boost his ego", which means s**. Any time I tried to talk about my feelings and things that led to my affair, he wanted nothing to do with it and he was just okay with believing it was because he "wasn't man enough". He would also seem to get amnesia whenever I brought up his past s**ual addictions (the ones involving me). There have also been many weekend vacations, dates, family time, football Sundays at home that were actually good times. We have a daughter together and honestly she is probably why we're still hanging on to whatever hope is left.

In January 2020, BS wanted me to find a man to sleep with to "erase" the boyfriend from my mind and body. In fact it was demanded of me, or I'd be a single woman by the next morning. I found someone, did what was demanded of me and continued that "relationship", on and off for about a year. Meanwhile, because I felt manipulated and not cared for again, I rekindled the relationship with the original boyfriend from 2018. I never met with him, but frequently talked. I know, yikes. I also eventually came to enjoy the second guy. This guy (naming him SC) moved away in March 2021. BS always seemed to like this relationship I had. BS and I still didn't engage in s**, but BS expected a nightly BJ.

In May 2021, I got caught via Instagram message from original boyfriend. BS saw it, was hurt, got mad and demanded I hook up with as many guys as I could in one day. I managed 3. One of them really hurt. I felt like a POS and that I deserved it. 2021 sucked.

Moving on to October 2021. My relationship with SC eventually turned into BS wanting me to see him again, and frequently, until I got sick of him and dumped him. I thought maybe BS actually wanted me for himself for once? So I drove to meet SC again back in October 2021 with BS' consent. This actually means that I wanted to see him as well. However, I didn't message BS quickly enough while I was "busy" with SC and we got into a big fight. I didn't see SC again but we continued to talk, with BS knowing.

Fast forward to January 2022. BS wanted "action" from me so he could get over my affair. "Action" meant building his self esteem, finding women to help him s**ually, or me having s** with lots of different guys. One evening we were talking about the affair. He wanted me to help him get over my affair by taking action. I asked BS "I slept with those 3 guys in one day last May, so that did nothing?" He said "Well yeah it did something, but you can't just do it once, you have to keep doing it." I didn't really know that was the assignment, so I found a new guy the next day, and he even came over that night. My BS was there the whole time, but hiding out in the house (the guy didn't know about my husband knowing). Then a few days later I met up with him again, which was prompted by BS. It took another ugly turn when BS didn't get any texts from me for awhile (like 1.5hrs) because I was still with this guy (calling him AG). It rapidly escalated to BS frantically calling me in front of AG. I answered to hear from a screaming, fuming, vulgar husband, demanding I leave now and make sure AG knows that BS "found out". AG looked devastated and frightened. I told him I'd never see him again, and I left. BS said I better not come home because he doesn't know what will happen. So I slept on the floor in our cold vacant rental house that night.

For a week, I couldn't come home, so I slept on the floor for a week at our business, and he wouldn't allow me to see our daughter. He even went on vacation the next week and had his sister keep our daughter with her while he was gone, just to keep her away from me. He didn't tell anyone what was going on, he just acted like it was a fun week for it. And of course I went along with it so our skeletons weren't released from the closet. She ended up getting sick and I did get to go pick her up and stay at our home.

We came to a place where I was allowed back home and talking about things. One night a couple weeks ago we had a breakthrough or so I thought. He listened to me. I spilled my guts about our past, how I feel, my anxiety, and what I have needed from him in our marriage. He actually listened and promised to never yell at me again, and said he doesn't want me to be afraid of him.

Meanwhile, I started seeing a Christian counselor, virtually. I haven't told BS because he has always been afraid of counselors convincing me that he is a bad guy and I should leave him. I'm aware that counselors hear only my side of the story, so any advice is taken seriously but carefully. Just like in here. If BS was telling this story, you'd be hearing it very differently. However, she says she fears for me and my daughter and thinks I have been trafficked. Just so you all know, he absolutely 100% isn't a pedophile. But he is broken. Just like me. She wants me to read Attachments before making any decision to divorce. I'm halfway done with it.

These past 2 weeks have been nice, not getting screamed at or called names. He took great care of me while I was sick last weekend (cooked for me, drew me a bath with candles and music, let me sleep, brought me water, took our kid to school). He has been really nice and not angry. He has still been complaining daily about how I neglect him and his needs. He says every day, multiple times, that I don't care about him. He doesn't know why I can't figure out how to build him up. There is truth in this, I have forged strong walls, I have become withdrawn and independent. I don't feel like being vulnerable and open. I also feel really weird s**ually. So does he, obviously. He feels like he isn't good enough. We haven't had intercourse in so long. But deep down he wants to be romanced and seduced, and I feel uncomfortable and just weird. What the heck am I doing? I am the one who cheated! This is not fair to him. I still don't trust that his change will last. I don't think he loves me, but I think he thinks he does. I care a lot about him, but any loving, special, vulnerable, close, romantic feelings are long gone. Like, many years.

Lately he has also been complaining about the things I did with AG, and how I need to be doing those same things with him, only bigger and better. But before I even saw AG the 2nd time, BS said to do whatever I wanted, but check in with him every now and then (which I failed at doing). SMH.

For those of you who have divorced, what was the ultimate thing that made you go "Yep, there is no hope left, we have to call it"? Was it mutual or one-sided? For me, it seems it's like neither of us will let go of the past, and our traumas are too deep to ever be close again. I feel like we are awkward roommates who are desperately raising a kid together. For those that stayed together, did you get past those feelings that we're having?

I've been diagnosed with severe anxiety and moderate depression by the way. I'm sure my husband would be diagnosed similarly if he started therapy.

There are wayyyyyyy more details to our story, but what I've said is a pretty good summary. Thank you to anyone who read it to the end.

Me: Wayward F
Him: Betrayed M
We are: Still married, since 2012
D-Day: Some day in October 2018
My Attachment Style: Dismissive/Avoidant
BS Attachment Style: Anxious/Ambivalent
My Enneagram: 9
His Enneagram: 8

200 comments posted: Friday, February 25th, 2022