Worried for my safety - 07/16/11 04:59 PM
I am new to this site but I'm not sure where else to turn. I am currently separated and thought all was going well with the separation until recently. My hope was that we would be able to remain friends, keep an amicable relationship and not end up hating each other. It seemed that this was possible until just recently when suddenly he changed his behavior. This is not the first time we have had issues, we almost separated 8 years ago, but I decided to stay and try to work thru things....8 years later, the same issues are still here, unresolved.
Background as to issues....I don't know that I should say "separated" as we were never legally married. He insisted on a wedding with no marriage license. His reasoning was "I don't want the government to be part of our marriage." And, I loved him so much that I agreed to this condition. After we were married, the only thing we shared was a bed. We did not share finances or property, we did not file our taxes together. This was all part of "not allowing the government in our marriage".
The economy did a number on his business, so he sold it and was unemployed for 4 years. During that time I continued to work and maintain insurance on our family. During this time I realized he was becoming depressed. And then one day a friend of mine sent me links to 2 threads on a website forum. The links were to 2 different threads on the same website. The first thread was "My Hot Wife" and there were several posts by him that included my pictures and how he thought he had a "hot wife". That was all flattering....until I opened the link to the 2nd thread....."Hot Babes"....thinking I'd find more pix of myself that he had posted. That is not what I found. Instead I found nude pix of other women, pictures that had been taken from porn sites. In the posts with these pictures were comments like, "I sure would like to spend the weekend in there" and "I'd love to give her a hard time for the weekend. Wonder if she could handle it?" I was crushed. And what was even worse than knowing he'd posted these pix and messages, was knowing that many of our friends had seen it and knew who he was even though he had a login that was not his real name.....he had ON THE SAME DAY posted pictures of ME in the "My Hot Wife" thread!!! Did he not think people would know who he was?
I waited a while and continued watching the site, throwing up occasionally at the posts. Knowing that while I was at work, he was sitting at home on the computer looking at porn, visiting porn chat sites and wishing he was with these women he'd posted pictures of. Finally, I couldn't take it any more and I confronted him. Not only did I confront him with this issue, but with another issue that had bothered me for quite awhile.
He had a female friend for as long as I had known him. They had been friends for many years before we met and I liked her. She lived in Germany and would call occasionally and send emails. When he and I married, she flew home for our wedding. During the rehearsal I was told that it is bad luck for the bride to walk down the aisle, so she is the one that stood in as the make shift bride. When the pix from our professional photographer came back there was one of him and her walking away from everyone (we were married outside) and they were holding hands. If I didn't know any better and had seen this photo I would have thought it was a picture of lovers holding hands. So.....with all this other stuff running thru my mind I asked him about her. He admitted to me that he and she had been more than friends before and that he had a long term affair with her when she was married to her first husband. So....he has his mistress at our wedding!
I was ready to leave, but we talked and talked and decided to try and work it out. He promised to merge our finances, put my name on our property and to stay away from the porn.
Two years later our finances and property were still separate and he was approaching his 3rd year of unemployment. One Sunday night I asked him what his week looked like and he said, "I start class tomorrow." I was shocked. Start class? What are you talking about? He had decided to go back to college and get yet another degree, this being his 3rd, and had not even discussed this with me. He had not worked in almost 3 years, me being the sole bread winner, so he had taken the money out of savings to pay for college and had not discussed any of this with me.
I decided he was trying to make a better life and I tried to forget that he had not considered my feelings on the matter, nor had he included me in this life changing decision. So, he went back to school while I continued to work.
About a year after he graduated I was diagnosed with cancer. I went thru surgery and several stays in the hospital but was finally deemed cancer free. Two years after my recovery I was laid off from my job of 5 years. I was devastated. But the worse part was the fact that my husband would not put me on his insurance during my unemployment of 11 months. The reason he wouldn't put me on his insurance is he would have to admit that I was legally his wife. Without a marriage license his employer wouldn't allow me on the insurance. He could have signed a form stating I was his significant other, but he wouldn't do that either. So, I went 11 months with no insurance, praying I would not have a cancer relapse. Thank goodness I did not.
This action flipped a switch in me, a switch that I couldn't and can't get to flip back. Last year on our anniversary, I was still trying...but I woke up and he was gone...I spent the entire day by myself. At dinner that night there was no anniversary gift either.
I have a new job and I travel now. In February he told me he was happier when I was gone. Our lease was expiring soon and he told me to find my own place to live and he would find his. So...after all this I finally decided that it was time to move on.
Now that I have left he has changed his mind. He is obsessed with having me back. And the part that scares me for my safety....when he was 18 his mother was going to leave his father and his father killed his mother and then killed himself. He left a letter stating that he couldn't leave without her but that she needed to be judged. AND last week after we had a long talk attempting reconciliation he told me that he didn't want to live, when he went to sleep he didn't want to wake up and what made me start sobbing, he said, "I now understand how my dad did what he did." He then made comments like, "You are MY WIFE! Your body is mine! I can't stand the thought of another man touching you." Yesterday he showed up at my apartment banging on the door at 6:00 in the morning, yelling, "I know you are in there."
I'm truly worried I'm going to meet the same fate that his mother met.
Background as to issues....I don't know that I should say "separated" as we were never legally married. He insisted on a wedding with no marriage license. His reasoning was "I don't want the government to be part of our marriage." And, I loved him so much that I agreed to this condition. After we were married, the only thing we shared was a bed. We did not share finances or property, we did not file our taxes together. This was all part of "not allowing the government in our marriage".
The economy did a number on his business, so he sold it and was unemployed for 4 years. During that time I continued to work and maintain insurance on our family. During this time I realized he was becoming depressed. And then one day a friend of mine sent me links to 2 threads on a website forum. The links were to 2 different threads on the same website. The first thread was "My Hot Wife" and there were several posts by him that included my pictures and how he thought he had a "hot wife". That was all flattering....until I opened the link to the 2nd thread....."Hot Babes"....thinking I'd find more pix of myself that he had posted. That is not what I found. Instead I found nude pix of other women, pictures that had been taken from porn sites. In the posts with these pictures were comments like, "I sure would like to spend the weekend in there" and "I'd love to give her a hard time for the weekend. Wonder if she could handle it?" I was crushed. And what was even worse than knowing he'd posted these pix and messages, was knowing that many of our friends had seen it and knew who he was even though he had a login that was not his real name.....he had ON THE SAME DAY posted pictures of ME in the "My Hot Wife" thread!!! Did he not think people would know who he was?
I waited a while and continued watching the site, throwing up occasionally at the posts. Knowing that while I was at work, he was sitting at home on the computer looking at porn, visiting porn chat sites and wishing he was with these women he'd posted pictures of. Finally, I couldn't take it any more and I confronted him. Not only did I confront him with this issue, but with another issue that had bothered me for quite awhile.
He had a female friend for as long as I had known him. They had been friends for many years before we met and I liked her. She lived in Germany and would call occasionally and send emails. When he and I married, she flew home for our wedding. During the rehearsal I was told that it is bad luck for the bride to walk down the aisle, so she is the one that stood in as the make shift bride. When the pix from our professional photographer came back there was one of him and her walking away from everyone (we were married outside) and they were holding hands. If I didn't know any better and had seen this photo I would have thought it was a picture of lovers holding hands. So.....with all this other stuff running thru my mind I asked him about her. He admitted to me that he and she had been more than friends before and that he had a long term affair with her when she was married to her first husband. So....he has his mistress at our wedding!
I was ready to leave, but we talked and talked and decided to try and work it out. He promised to merge our finances, put my name on our property and to stay away from the porn.
Two years later our finances and property were still separate and he was approaching his 3rd year of unemployment. One Sunday night I asked him what his week looked like and he said, "I start class tomorrow." I was shocked. Start class? What are you talking about? He had decided to go back to college and get yet another degree, this being his 3rd, and had not even discussed this with me. He had not worked in almost 3 years, me being the sole bread winner, so he had taken the money out of savings to pay for college and had not discussed any of this with me.
I decided he was trying to make a better life and I tried to forget that he had not considered my feelings on the matter, nor had he included me in this life changing decision. So, he went back to school while I continued to work.
About a year after he graduated I was diagnosed with cancer. I went thru surgery and several stays in the hospital but was finally deemed cancer free. Two years after my recovery I was laid off from my job of 5 years. I was devastated. But the worse part was the fact that my husband would not put me on his insurance during my unemployment of 11 months. The reason he wouldn't put me on his insurance is he would have to admit that I was legally his wife. Without a marriage license his employer wouldn't allow me on the insurance. He could have signed a form stating I was his significant other, but he wouldn't do that either. So, I went 11 months with no insurance, praying I would not have a cancer relapse. Thank goodness I did not.
This action flipped a switch in me, a switch that I couldn't and can't get to flip back. Last year on our anniversary, I was still trying...but I woke up and he was gone...I spent the entire day by myself. At dinner that night there was no anniversary gift either.
I have a new job and I travel now. In February he told me he was happier when I was gone. Our lease was expiring soon and he told me to find my own place to live and he would find his. So...after all this I finally decided that it was time to move on.
Now that I have left he has changed his mind. He is obsessed with having me back. And the part that scares me for my safety....when he was 18 his mother was going to leave his father and his father killed his mother and then killed himself. He left a letter stating that he couldn't leave without her but that she needed to be judged. AND last week after we had a long talk attempting reconciliation he told me that he didn't want to live, when he went to sleep he didn't want to wake up and what made me start sobbing, he said, "I now understand how my dad did what he did." He then made comments like, "You are MY WIFE! Your body is mine! I can't stand the thought of another man touching you." Yesterday he showed up at my apartment banging on the door at 6:00 in the morning, yelling, "I know you are in there."
I'm truly worried I'm going to meet the same fate that his mother met.