Nine years.
It's a long time to be doing anything. A long time to stay at a job, a long time to have the same hairstyle, a long time to be addicted to a particular TV show. Things change a lot in nine years. A child can become a legal adult. A new president is sworn in. A woman who was once madly in love with her husband finally admits that her marriage is toxic and she needs to get out.
That last one happened to me, but it wasn't a sudden thing. It was a gradual evolution over the nine years that we were together, the slow demise of my innocence and hope. I still love my husband. I have always loved my husband. Right now it feels like I will always love my husband. I can't see myself with anyone else, and I'm sad to think of my future without him. But I know I have to leave him, and I know why.
I'm not leaving my husband for me. If it were just me, I would stay. I'm doing it for my son and my husband's children. I need to show them that there are consequences to actions. I need to show them that it's okay to walk away from a bad relationship and that it's not okay to treat people the way my husband has treated me.
I might never see my stepkids again. I'll certainly never be on great terms with my husband again. He still isn't happy that I'm leaving, and of course it makes the situation that much more difficult that I have to share a house with him until the end of the month because I'm unable to put things in motion just yet. If I could move out today, I would, and that would make things so much easier.
I've been in this position before. I've tried to leave him before and I've always backed down. Most of the time I apologized and said I was the one in the wrong. In recent years, since I started getting more and more frustrated with his behavior, he has apologized and promised to change. It was all lies, of course, because when he said that he would deactivate his Facebook account, he lasted all of five days before he had reactivated it and was secretly emailing all his female friends again. When he promised there would be total transparency with his texts and emails, all that happened was that he started deleting everything so I wouldn't see it, as though a completely blank text message log made it any easier for me to trust him.
It took about seven years for me to start actively parenting his children. Before that, they were pampered guests in my home, spoiled rotten while I went without and bent over backwards to please them. Roughly two years ago I started putting my foot down about certain things. It was right around the time that my husband and I finalized the adoption of the foster child who had been living with us. I began to notice the discrepancies between how my stepchildren were treated and how my son was treated, and I worked to lessen those discrepancies. Of course that caused a lot of havoc. Not only was I spending more time with my son, which meant less time catering to my stepkids, but I was also unwilling to let so much of my stepkids' behavior slide. They're not bad kids by any means, but I had to apply the same rules to my son and my stepchildren. If I tell my son not to do something, I expect him not to do it. If I tell my stepkids not to do something, I have to expect the same result. But my husband doesn't see it that way. He just sees that I'm parenting his kids in a way I have no right to.
Step-parenting is awkward anyway. If you love your stepkids, you're automatically accused of trying to replace their mother. If you hate your stepkids, you're a wicked stepmother. If you're indifferent to your stepkids, you're a selfish bitch. There is no way to win that battle.
For a long time I've cringed at my 11-year-old stepson's fashion choices. He's an overweight, socially awkward kid, and of course some friend of his mom's gave the kid a leather bracelet slotted with silver bullets and an oversized trenchcoat. My stepson looks like a regular serial killer at school every day. I didn't say anything at first because I didn't think it was my place.
But here's the thing. There was a threat issued on social media over last weekend. Some punk kid posted on a Facebook group that he and some friends planned to shoot up a local school. The police caught the kid and it turned out he was just messing around and there was no actual plan and no friends in on it. People were obviously still spooked about it. Given that there are only three weeks left in the school year and that it's 75-85 degrees outside these days, I told my stepson not to wear the bracelet or the trenchcoat to school for the rest of the school year. He could wear it any other time, just not to school for the next month. Not because there was anything wrong with wearing them, I explained, but because I wanted to be respectful to people who were still scared about a possible shooting. I definitely didn't want anyone getting the wrong idea about my stepson.
I didn't think it was that big a deal, except my stepson apparently wants to sweat bullets because a couple days later my husband picked him up from school and he was wearing the dumb trenchcoat. I was annoyed because I'd told him not to. I told him I was taking the coat away, and I did. That's when all hell broke loose. In front of the kids, my husband ordered me to give the coat back. He didn't ask me to step into the bedroom to talk about it. He didn't support me in front of my stepson or back me up or even say something like, "This is only temporary, we'll give it back to you next week." That, at least, would have shown he supported my decision but wasn't going to let me keep the coat forever. Nope. My husband ordered me to give it back, like I was a petulant child or something, and when I refused, he physically pushed me up against the front door and tried to tear the coat out of my hands, all the while screaming in my face. I finally gave up the coat. I wish I'd socked him in the face instead.
This is the second time something like this has happened. The last time was over a year ago when I tried to take away his oldest daughter's keyboard after she stole a laptop and tablet from us. I was stupid not to leave him then. Obviously staying after he did that indicated to him that he could treat me however he wanted.
I'm at a loss as to how someone could look at another human being and think, "Gee, he/she isn't doing what I want. I will physically force him/her to do it." At what point does that cross someone's mind? If someone is pissing me off, assault is not the first thing that comes to mind.
I think it shows that my husband has absolutely zero respect for me. Over the years I have let him treat me so poorly that he has lost all respect for me. I let it happen. I let him disrespect me, I let it continue for nine years, and now I'm watching it escalate. Well, except that now I'm finally ending things. I had planned to stay home this summer to take care of my stepkids and my son, but there's no way I can expect my stepson to respect me after he watched my husband physically force me into reversing a disciplinary action. Forget that.
Ugh. I'm not happy about this either. It feels good to rehash the entire thing because it only strengthens my resolve to leave. Usually when I don't remind myself of what happened, I start getting mopey and pondering about whether or not I should stay. But it's decided now. I can't stay. I can't live like this anymore. I don't want my son growing up thinking that the way his dad treats me is acceptable. So I'm doing it this time. I'm going through with it. And damn it, I'm going to write about it the whole way.
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