AboutAnnie Kaszina Expertise All questions relating to women's experience of domestic violence and recovery. I am not qualified to talk about men's experience.
Experience 20 years in an emotionally abusive marriage. Since then I have worked with thousands of other abused women to help speed them on the road to recovery. My website www.EmotionalAbuseRecoveryNow.com and blog www.lifemadesimple.typepad.com/abusednomore offer insight, information and support,
Education/Credentials Educated to Ph.D. Level. NLP Master Practitioner. Diploma of Life Coaching.
Question Hi. I have been seperated from my ex for about 2 1/2 years now. There was a long string of domestic violence in our marriage that got worse after the pregnancy and birth of our son. He is 5 now. I am remarried and we have been divorced. It took 2 years to get divorced. Every time domestic violence calls were made to the sheriff department, they said everything was fine and left. Even after he pulled a gun on me. So during our trial there was no evidence of abuse. My son was even sexually assaulted while my husband was keeping him from me during the seperation. I reported him stalking me many times and the sheriff deputy stated that until we were legally divorced even if we live 50 miles apart, they could do nothing. Now he is granted alternate week visitation by the judge even after a social worker investigated and stated i needed custody of the child and he needed supervised visitation. He is showing up with a gun to pick up my son for his possesions. The gun is in his lap or right next to him. It is a rifle and in texas it is not illegal to have, Ive been told. He has been told by me not to bring it as he is getting increasingly worse when he shows up and has gotten to the point where he does not even speak to me or our son. I am now very pregnant and my current husband works shifts so i am left alone for long periods of time. My son is starting to show severe behaviour problems as well. I can not afford an attorney and the sheriffs department will still not document the continued verbal and threatening abuse. What can i do? as per the court order the possesory exchange must occur at the residence the child is at before the exchange, and i can not move out of the school district.
Answer Hi Rachel,
The situation you describe is a very worrying and threatening one indeed.
Clearly, the Sheriff department is not responding appropriately.
My first thought is, have you put in writing to the Sheriff exactly what has been going on and the risk you feel that you and your son are exposed to? Perhaps you need to do that repeatedly.
Second, I would urge you to contact local Domestic Violence groups and Refuges. I am based in the UK and therefore not particularly knowledgeable about how best to proceed in Texas; they are likely to be able to offer you far more constructive advice.
The most important thing is this: there are at least some things that you can do to take charge of the situation, but you need to contact the right people to find out what they are.
