Day 3

Earth Bound ©Lindsay Archer

The ex is now registered as a sex offender, and we have an address for him, where he will be living with his mother.  This indicates that he must have checked in with his probation officer. Honestly I was half expecting him to run off into the Appalachians and disappear since he was big into the survivalist thing, but I guess it's a good sign. Just blows my mind when he claimed his mother sexually abused him, but his sisters said that he was spoiled rotten by her.  But then he lied pathologically and his mommy bought him a shiny new lawyer for the court process.

We discovered that cops go around Atlanta on Halloween making sure that sex offenders are not handing out candy to kids.  Not sure if they'll be doing that in the little town of Ellabell, but it was a comforting thing to hear.

Yesterday I got a FB friend request from a friend of mine's stalker and it just couldn't have come at a worst time.  I'm so full up on drama that I feel like I could throw up most of the time.  I'm already looking in my rearview mirror for that damned fuchsia Pontiac Sunfire that I was tied up in the back of, since he used to follow me.

Yesterday was my appointment with my counselor.  Talking doesn't seem to be doing the trick anymore.  For the most part I'm good at knowing why I feel the way I feel, and I've had to recount the events so many times that other people get more upset than I do. It happened, and it's horrible, but I'm on the other side of it.  However, now, with this new addition, I feel like I'm screaming inside and no one can hear.  I'm wearing a mask to try and stay together for my family, but it's so hard, especially when people put demands on me, and Morgan is very demanding.  Not her fault.  To her there's not much difference from October 22 to October 23. She doesn't understand why mommy is staring out the window, or on edge, or having optical migraines. Trying to just stay prepared and be ready is exhausting, and full blown depression is seeping in, making me want to do nothing but sleep.  The weight now falls on me to be ready, because he basically goes from complete incarceration to mostly free except having to check in with a probation officer.  This seems like a drastic shift to me.

The only thing that would truly make me feel safe would be a gps tracker that would send my phone an alert when he was within 100 meters of me.  Hell they do it with tornados!  The tech is there, and it would truly help.  Just stick an anklet on violent criminals maybe for a year to ensure a transition back to integrating into society.  Probation officers could see on a terminal if the criminal went near schools or if they were in the area when a crime happened.  It just makes sense... and it makes so much sense that it won't happen... not when we have victimless crimes to gripe about... instead of real threats to society.

Amidst all of this I'm getting lots of unwanted advice from people who have no experience with this. On top of that I'm drowning in platitudes and scripture verses on one hand, and then being told if I think about him, he'll come after me on the other.  This all seems to negate free will, his free will to me, and also tends toward the victim blame end of the spectrum.  What I need are real things, real support, real answers, and real friends who don't mind listening even if I'm "negative" because I'm lacking positive thoughts. Fortunately I do have a network of loving supportive friends who are checking on me and are "there" for me.  If I didn't, I would be falling apart for more.

The thing is, the first time, I was all alone. I lived next to the Sheriff's daughter and she didn't call it in.  There was no time to call, it was sudden, unexpected, and he had waited till I was vulnerable and alone.  At the end of the day, it's up to me.  Half the people I knew then, didn't believe that I was in danger, as many don't believe now.  So this is me waiting to see if he's moved on to find wife number 5 to abuse or if he's going to come after me and finish what he started, because I held him accountable.  Regardless, I'll be looking in the rear view mirror hoping that objects appear closer than they really are...