My Story: Introduction
I Ran Away From My Narcissistic Husband
And had to live in a domestic violence shelter for almost a year
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Two days after fleeing my angry, alcoholic husband I landed in a Domestic Violence shelter with my children. We hid there for two months until he found us on April Fool’s Day and used the court system to take them from me. The judge didn’t give me anything and left me to live in the shelter until after the divorce was final. After over 20 years as a homemaker and homeschooling mother, everything I had ever known was taken from me. That was just the beginning of the injustice served by the justice system.
I didn’t know I was a victim of domestic violence when I sought shelter from the storm.
Every day of that first week of temporary full custody was spent driving over an hour each way to visit my children while my abusive husband supervised our visits. Two of our teen children had been named my supervisors but my abuser believed he should oversee us, a stark reminder of our marriage and why I had fled. Even though fleeing escalating violence had been suggested by the police the court punished me by appointing my own children to keep me from running with them to safety again.
After he ordered me to reconcile with him and I refused he became angrier and angrier at his failed attempts to bring me back under his control. When faced with my refusal to discuss our relationship he broke out in screams and ordered me from his home. Before my car was placed in drive his hands were on my opened window desperately trying to keep me from leaving and demanding to be let in. A threat to call the police secured my freedom with a parting gift from him of his middle finger displayed for our quiet middle-class neighborhood to see.
Never stepping foot in my home again, visits became a once-a-week event with church, a picnic lunch, and some kind of fun for the children and me. Our unbreakable bond began to weaken and my mother's heart began to break. Loss became a very real part of everyday existence for all.
It took me a month of questions and research to come out of denial about my abusive marriage.
Before the shoring up of my boundaries and the end of all verbal communication he mentioned he hated to think of me living in “that place”. Did he really hate that I lived there or that the world could see how his actions had placed me there? After all, what do most people think when they find out a woman has fled to a DV shelter? They wonder who put her there and how. Imagination takes over and they know that woman lived a hell of an existence to choose homelessness over home.
Living in the DV shelter brought our secret out into the open even though he denied he was ever abusive. Can a woman get by on lies about abuse for months on end? At some point her story will fall apart. Those who work at the shelter see abused women year after year and know when there’s a snake in the grass and they are quickly chased on their way.
Abusers will take everything away from their target so they have no choice but to stay or come back. No alternative home was provided for me. The only option was homelessness. Discarded after years of being called a wonderful wife and mother. Years of being kept in a beautiful cage and told never to work outside the home. No credit cards in my name, no savings account to fall back on. Everything was under his control.
Part of coming out of denial was to admit what he had done to me, to myself and others.
Our older children believed his story of my brainwashing by Al-Anon and ensuing insanity and that he had never treated me badly. Even when the truth that he had had an affair(one of many) for the last year of our marriage came out they still chose to support their father. You see, he would have rejected them as he rejected me if they had dared to stand up to him and they knew it.
His childish ego was wounded when I left and he tried to punish me by keeping me from our children, moving all of the money from our accounts, and being angry and threatening during my visits. He began to alienate our teens from me and is still on that path to this day. One has threatened suicide and he refuses to bring the other to me for my parenting time.
He doesn’t care how much damage he does to our children and blames me for their pain. Even though he divorced me he has told our children I divorced him. Someday they will see the stark truth in black and white written on court documents.
The newest play from his abuser’s playbook was to move over an hour away and try to divide our minor children between our homes. Brothers and sisters should be raised together, their family bond protected as sacred. Not in his mind. He has told the children he will keep the teens and has already sent the younger ones away with boxes of their things he did not want in his new home, his girlfriend’s new home.
Wouldn’t it be ironic if his still married and now pregnant girlfriend’s baby is unquestionably not his child?
The insanity has grown worse and our children cannot be freed from it. They have their journey to live just like the rest of us. Living my life well is the best way to help them. My last recourse is dropping lots of money to try to find some justice through the court system.
Parenting plans are written to protect the children of divorce but what happens when a parent refuses to follow the plan?
Abusers will always abuse. It doesn’t have to be physical. They use control through finances, “their” children, the legal system, insulting words in whatever form of communication you will allow, anything they can find to keep you from living free. Your best defense is to detach emotionally and grow in strength. No reaction to their attacks is the strongest message you can send. They are bullies plain and simple.
Silence is one of the strongest messages you can send to a narcissistic person.
Women leave their children to escape the grips of men who never give up trying to control their lives. Facing the gut-wrenching temptation to just disappear and live in peace was a weekly experience as I drove home after yet another confrontation with him. Running away is easier than fighting a losing battle and watching as your children are taken from you or turned against you.
Children turned into weapons to be used against their own parent is the cruelest form of abuse.
The stories of mothers who have lost their children to documented abusers are devastating to hear. Even fathers who have sexually abused their own children are given full custody. These men create a living hell for their victims.
It will take years to heal from my abusive, controlling marriage. Some days crippling despair punches me in the stomach with the fear that it will never be over. That healing will never progress enough for real love to find me.
Sharing this journey to hell and back is worth it if it helps even one person draw strength from my weakness.
There is light from darkness. Every day brings more hope as life improves and strength is gained. Traveling further from my failed marriage brings new determination to never go back for another round of the battle.
Yes, there are thoughts of going back. Why? Because surviving the familiar is easier than blazing a new trail. Having a “whole” family seems healthier than two households for children to go between. Being away from my children for even a day is agonizingly painful and seeing the tears in their eyes wounds my heart.
Some days there are memories of the loving things he did for me. All those little things done to keep control and present the facade of a loving relationship to the rest of the world. This is why 20 plus years had to pass before his mask fell and the truth was revealed.
It takes most women 7 attempts to leave hell for good.
My mind tells me the truth. To return is death. Slavery to darkness and evil for all. The only hope for freedom is for my children to choose light. With every footstep taken to lead them to the light, I pray they will follow me to a new life.
May this cycle be broken for my sons and daughters. May it be broken for your children.
Your true strength has not been destroyed and you will find it when you need it again. Please reach out for the help that is waiting for you.
National Domestic Violence Hotline
1–800–799–7233
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