My Story: Chapter Nine

Visiting My Own Children

Court-ordered abuse

Photo by Jan Baborák on Unsplash

The day after the abuser received temporary full custody of our children I made the hour drive to see them. The judge had ordered me to get the abuser up to speed on homeschooling our children. I would have to sit in what had been our home and tell him how to teach our children so I could live away from them in the shelter. Surreal.

I arrived and he asked to speak with me in the master bedroom. I stood in the doorway afraid of what he would do to me if I joined him in that room. The room where he had been so cruel to me on so many occasions. He asked if we could reconcile. I stared at him in disbelief. I told him he was divorcing me and I had made peace with his decision. He informed me that he had only gotten custody of the children to make me come home.

Speechless I began to pack my things while he sat, arms crossed, his face full of sadness. I knew the moment he said he had taken our children to make me come home that it was 100% over. What a cruel, wretched man!

Later while I went through the children’s school materials and told him what each child was working on I looked up to see him watching me as if he was trying to figure out how to get me back where he wanted me. I quickly finished the job and went outside to play with the children to distract myself from the creepy feeling he had given me.

Soon it was time to leave. I was sad to leave my children but so relieved to get away from the home that had been my prison and the man who had kept me locked up there.

I was still heartbroken about the end of our marriage but the man I had been married to disgusted me so much I never wanted to speak to him or be around him again.

The shelter became a place of respite and peace even on the craziest days and I always breathed a sigh of relief when my new town came into view. I had a safe place where I could be myself without any judgment from others. In fact, the people there loved me for who I was.

My youngest girl had a difficult time being away from me. One day she asked me to put her car seat in my car and take her with me. Another day she clung to my dress and tried to keep me from leaving. As heartwrenching as each of those incidents was I knew I had to stay strong and stay on my course to freedom so I would be able to take care of her properly in the future.

I practiced the Al-Anon principle of detachment to help me through this time. I couldn’t take on anyone else’s pain and survive what I was going through. I had to take care of myself first.

When I went to visit the children my abuser was there almost every time. He planned a picnic lunch for all of us and asked that we discuss our future while the children played. He offered to give me a back rub in our bedroom, told me to go take a nap in our bed, bumped into my hip and behind as I was sitting down to dinner. Every attempt he made to touch me disgusted me. He now repelled me in every way possible.

He tried to start arguments with me. One day he screamed at me to get out of his house and then held onto my car so I couldn’t leave. I could see his anger getting more out of control as he lost his hold over me. He looked miserable and unhappy whenever I saw him.

He could have had me still if he had agreed to get help when I asked him to leave. Instead, he chose a path of self-destruction. I chose a path of survival and healing.

I used my phone to make a recording every time I was around my abuser in case I would need evidence of his behavior. None of it would matter, even when I recorded him yelling at me in front of our children my own voice calm and appeasing. It made me sick to realize how well I had been trained to stay quiet and submissive even as I was yelled at, blocked into a room, and ordered around.

With the escalating violence, I was advised to pick the children up and spend my time with them away from their home. It was difficult because our town didn’t offer much to do and I didn’t have any money to spend on movies, fast food, or the other things available to us. We spent a lot of time swimming, going to the park, and hanging out at the local stores.

I was trying to see the children as much as I could before I needed to start job training. Our time together would be cut short sooner than I anticipated with a shocking call to the shelter just a few weeks after the abuser took my children from me.

If you are looking for the previous chapters in my story here is a link with the whole list.