I left my abuser. Or so I thought. He knew that he could say and do whatever he wanted to me because, well, he had money. He had been in the Military. He was God fearing and most importantly he was a man and what was I? Just an unemployed woman who did his dishes and had his children. When my 7 year old son refused to move to another state with him and wanted to be with me, I tried to fight. I called Legal Aid, told of his abuse, and they said “sorry, we can’t help you because he didn’t hit you”. As if abuse doesn’t run deeper than that.
I was afraid with Noone to advocate for me. The day he tried to leave, he called the police on me, telling them I was crazy and “was on drugs”. A man’s lie trumps a woman’s reality, I guess, because the cop, also a woman, believed him immediately and verbally berated me until I was so broken down that he was able to take my two boys (my 3 year old was too young to understand what was happening)
In spite of a court order granting visitation, he wouldn’t let the kids see or talk to me. When I finally was able to scrape together enough money for an attorney it had been 7 years.
My boys and I are still being terrorized by him even though I finally regained custody of 1 and am working on saving my younger boy.
He has had zero consequences so far…
