How did you work out the particulars of

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
How did you work out the particulars of
1
Mon, 01-10-2005 - 1:35am

a R.O. being served?

Here i am, unable to sleep AGIAN at 1am, b/c i am lying in bed worrying about the way this will all work.

The plan is when i do it (Feb? March at the latest, or sooner if needed) i will be planning a trip away w/ our dd, to my families 2 hours away, which isnt anything out of the ordinary. But this time i will take the animals w/ me ... he shouldnt know b/c he will be at work when i leave. One issue is i never know when he will get out of work. I am lucky if he works a 3-4 hours day, & some days at the last minute, he doesnt have to work at all (he works for a small business owned by 2 men, & its just him & the 2 of them so they close easily) so that doesnt leave much of a window, does it??? I dont want him served in our home, for fear he will trash or take stuff that he shouldnt. I WILL have anything i really cherish out & safe, jic (eg: photos, jewlery). (my stomach hurts just THINKING of all this!!!) Why cant it be EASY & me say "I want a divorce, please leave".

I guess i can sneakily have his clothes packed, right under his nose. I am quite disroganized w/ laundry & he is NO help, so it gets done & folded, but hardly ever put away. It will not be odd at all to have 3 or 4 laundry baskets of his clothes sitting there. Unfortunatly we dont have a garage ... but i was thinking i could leave his belongings outside in our fenced in back yard, if its good weather, that morning i leave. I woudl also leave anything of importance to him - but nothing of major value for fear of being accused of it being stolen or something. I will be happy to give him the rest of his stuff thru his brother after the fireworks burn out. I will have all the house keys & we will all leave once he leaves for work the day he is to be served. & i will be getting a new alarm system put in b4, so if he DOES break in while i am gone, he will be arressted. The plan would be to stay away, out of town, for at least the 1st few days for safety reasons, until he calms down. I dont yet know whether i will haev our dd in the Restraining order, i woudl like to *not* include her, but i WILL insist on only supervised visitation w/ her at that point for fear of abduction & what will certaintly happen, his attempt to tell her that "mommy kicked him out, he wont be able to see her anymore", "he wont have anywhere to live", "mommy is a liar", etc. I KNOW he will say these things if this happens, b/c he already tells her this MAY happen, in front of me. Imagine what he will say when furious, backed into a corner & having lost everything.

This just makes me so sick to think about. How has it come to this???? I had a long talk w/ my brother & SIL this past weekend, & told them more than i ever have b4 about the abuse. My brother is insistent that i DO file the restraining order, he said "I know you dont THINK he will hurt you, but who DOES do it? Unstable men on meds for Depression, who have lost everything & go out & get drunk & beat the crap out of, or worse, the women who they blame everything on". He also told me that "i woudlnt be suprised if i got that phone call one day that he beat you to within an inch of your life. I hope i am wrong, & you do know him better, but i dont think he will be able to stop himself, no matter how close he is to Averey & how much that will make him lose her all the more". Ugh. Scary. & then when i come back home, my brother will stay with me, then my Dad, then freinds, whoever i need ... for as long as i need. I want Averey back to her normal routine as quickly as possible, as long as it is safe - so hopefully we can come back w/in 3-4 days & he will be calmed down. I know he will be going NUTZ w/o contact w/ Averey. I want them to be able to see eachother - IF he can hold it together - for HER sake, not his. It will be a HUGE void in her life to just suddenly have him gone.

& what do i SAY to her? (she will be 5 in feb) If we do include her in the RO, she wont see him for at LEAST the 3 week waiting period. That will traumatize her, i know it will. They are very very close. I bought some kids books on divorce today (hidden well) for when the time comes. Just like when my mom died, i read her the appropriate books & they were a huge help in her understanding, & for me explaining. *IF* we do the RO w/ her, & it will be that long a time - i dont want to tell her right off that we are getting divorced. If i do that & she CANT see him, i think she will be very confused & it will be harmful to her psychologically having him out of her life & knwoing we are getting divorced. The one MAJOR thing i must convey to her is that even though Mommy & Daddy cant live together, she will still see us both when she wants, & she is still loved by us both. I do NOT want her to feel abanodoned by him, unless HE chooses to abanodon her. I dont want it due to my keeping her from him. I am willing to let him SHOW ME (or the person at the supervised visit) that he can see her & not do more harm. But ONE chance is all he will get, when the time is right. So ... if we do end up w/ her in teh RO, i almost want to tell her at 1st that Daddy is "away", or something. Then, once it is lifted, b4 seeing him, i will tell her what is happening. I want to protect her that way, but i also dont want to lie to her. She is a very astute smart kid for her age & it will be hard to pass anything by her. I need to do what i need to do to protect her physically & emotionally obviously, & i will. Do you think telling her he is "away" or "working" will end up biting me in the you-know-what? I just cnat see saying "Honey, Mommy & Daddy are getting divorced ... he doesnt live her anymore ... & NO, you cant see him for weeks". Does this make any sense?

& of course, all day he was totally loving & sweet w/ Ave (as usual), & totally normal & sane to me. But have no fear, he will remind me why i am doing this, soon enough.

Sorry so long, any opinions or ideas are greatly appreciated R~

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-24-2004
Mon, 01-10-2005 - 8:53am
I just told my daughter what was going on from about a week before I moved out. I don't worry so much about belongings. Just take the really important ones and the really sentimental ones. The others it may be expensive to replace but in the end does it make a difference? Things wear out or break down or go out of style or are no longer useful, so in the end it doesn't matter. I choose to drop my kids off at my moms and if he wants to see them he can see them over there or pick them up from there. I don't deal with him and he doesn't come to my house and I don't go to his. But not everyone can have that option available. But I heard about drop off centers for visitation. There is a fee with those. It would be nice if you could just be co parents, but how is an abusive husband going to become a cooperative coparent? I can't even to to my ex husband about the kids because he will find a way to turn it around into what I'm doing wrong as far as raising them and then run with that about all the things I ever did wrong when we were married and how it's all my fault and blah blah blah.