Physical & Emotional Abuse Support Group
Abuse is a general term for the treatment of someone that causes some kind of harm (to the abused person, to the abusers themselves, or to someone else) that is unlawful or wrongful. No one deserves abuse, period. Abuse can be emotional, physical, or sexual.
Hrllo. This is the first time I'm posting in this group. I am in the divorce group but have a question. My 15 yr old daughter is dating a 14 yr old who has some serious Control issues I believe snd my almost ex wife believes. We have witnessed him yelling at her on the phone and sending random one letter texts in the hundreds within minutes to get her attention. This is called spamming aparently. he is in therapy for depression and home life issues. But the latest problem is last week he contacted her through text telling her his mom was being so nasty to him telling him to leave and never come back. He was telling g my daughter he's going to kill himself. She was extreemly upset and asked my ex wife what to do. She emidiatly told me about this and we discussed calling child services but my daughter started getting extreemly angry at us for considering such an action. She was being told by this boy that she needs to come pick him up and get him out of his house.or he will kill himself. He has had a history of wanting to do this before. And always gets my daughter upset. But this time we are seriously getting scared that there is abuse . At least mental at his house to him. Which is resonating to my daughter. He has in the past caused problems with her friends not wanting her to hang out with them. She has shut down emotionally due to him and mine and my wife's impending divorce. We both see it. She always wants to see him he's constantly texting her. And when she dosent answer he " spams" her phone til she answers. While this occurrence was happening and we were talking to our daughter abiut that he needs help if he wants to kill himself her phone which was in out hands at the time was freakishly buzzing out of control. He sent over 176 text messages within 5 minutes trying to get her to respond while we were talking to her. He finally called and I answered the phone . Told him if he's in fear of his life we will call someone to help. His responce was he was better and all is ok now. And didn't understand why he coundlt talk to my daugher. We are at a loss of what to do. Do we report his mother and father to child services because of the aparent abuse ? Do we call them because of him possibly doing this to my daughter for attention? Call the cops? I told my daughter not to delete the messages because I wanted to take pictures of this for proof but she deleted them. So I have no physical proof that this happened besides two kids
You have a daughter living at home, and it's her mother and your job to protect your daughter. AKA, cutting ties from this dysfunctional, abusive situation.
If you don't hear back within 24 hours of the first day back from school, go there IN PERSON the next day.
I sill say, take away the phone for a few days to calm the situation.
in my state, the
coalition against
domestic violence
is supposed to serve
both women and men,
and also has had a
program to get teenage
girls information about
abusive relationships.
I don't know about other
states. Just speaking for
my own. I'm disappointed
to hear that the one you
contacted seemed so
unconcerned about
attempting to even
talk to your daughter.
Be prepared for some backlash though. There may even be a safety check visit on your daughter (by the police). At least that's what happens in our school district.
Good luck.
Then still go to the school. And if the mother's boy starts slamming you on FB or anything else continues, go to the police station.
I'd also put spyware on your daughter's phone. You can tell where she is and you get an email of all texts... did you know about spyware?
You may even want to go onto the infidelity board to learn about that!
Gather all information of previous bullying and turn it over to the cops.
I am praying you and your wife are on the same page in terms of protecting your daughter and that you all go 100% No Contact w/the kid and his family/friends.
Trust me, if there is no written anything such as, texts or whatever evidence you need to submit to the proper authorities, because I did see you mention that the Center for Abused women said there was nothing they could really do, they are not going to take this situation seriously.
Just to be on the safe side, make sure every little detail is put into a file, and kept for safe keeping. I know you're saying NO CONTACT, is harsh, but being a parent that doesn't want to step on anyone's toes, in this situation, is not very protective of your daughter.
If this was my daugther, knowing what I know now, I would do exactly what MTC suggests, take your daugther's phone for now, change the number, AVOID ALL CONTACT FROM THIS BOY, and call the proper authorities. That's what I would do for my daugther. You see in today's world, people are always saying, well we didn't want to hurt their feelings, or it seems a bit extreme, take all precautions necessary. She is still a child and needs your protection.
(((hugs))) I know this is confusing but when you do the proper things you may just be able to sleep a little bit better at night.
Realize that your daughter will lie to cover her and her bf's actions. So will the mother.
I'm usually a pretty hands-off parent, but in THIS case, you need to helicopter. Watch her get on and off the bus, or drop her off and pick her up yourself. Check with attendance in the morning to make sure you are notified if she's reported absent.
If you do NOT unplug her from the phone as suggested, at least demand her phone and all electronics at night- laptop, pc, etc.
Do a middle of the night bed check... don't think she's not capable of sneaking out the first few weeks of No Contact.
Get that spyware (don't tell her about it) if she still has the phone and demand the password to her phone and computers.
Explain to her that this IS a crisis situation.
Did you have "the meeting" with your STBX and daughter and the BF and mother yet??? I'd do it before school starts... You need to get this over with so you daughter can concentrate on what's really important at this age: school.
And remember that at the very least, if you log things as a journal, you can use that as evidence, too. Document every little thing.
Finally, how about getting her involved in other activities to take her mind off things... do you belong to a church? Take her to youth group. A book talk at the library... even consider getting her a pet to show affection to instead of this other family...
How often is she at your house??? You could even use your STBX's hesitance to protect your daughter as reason to get custody!
I don't have kids nor have I handled a situation like this before, also I did not put as much thought and time as I should have. So I apologize.I should not have replied.
I hoped things got better.
I've lost track of how many times I've seen women post on this site about how they went through nearly identical situations to what your daughter is going through: met boyfriend in their teens; boyfriend was controlling/abusive and used threats of suicide; boyfriend came from a dysfunctional home where they were abused and the boyfriend's family was also abusive to the girl at times; girl's parents didn't do enough to get her to stop seeing him; girl's parents were divorced or getting divorced at the time; etc.
If you ask the women here how many times they've seen this scenario (or a nearly identical one) and I'm guessing they'll tell you the same thing. A few here have seen enough of these scenarios so many times that they now have professionally crafted prewritten responses for most scenarios that people post about in this group.
The fact of the matter is this: children learn what they live. What your daughter experiences now in her teen years WILL be learned as the social norm for life. That's part of why she has learned to manipulate both you and your ex and play you against each other.
Also, from the sounds of things right now she doesn't exactly have a stable example of what a healthy relationship looks like given the pending divorce and how rough it sounds like it is on the family. With this being the case (in addition to the hormonal changes teens go through) she is likely latching onto this boy since he provides her with what her mind perceives as the closest thing to the type of healthy relationship she has internalized as "normal".
If she had met a different boy with healthier behavior first then she may have latched onto them instead and internalized the healthier relationship as normal.
This boy she is dating only knows how to be abusive. That is how he was raised and his brain developed in such a way that it now views abusive relationships as both "normal" and as the type of relationship he is most familiar with (and thus most likely to gravitate towards).
That being said, his abusive behavior will only continue to get worse unless he is: removed from his abusive home environment; he is given appropriate counseling; and he actually WANTS to get better. Otherwise his abuse towards your daughter will only get worse as time progresses.
The longer your daughter stays with him, the worse things will get for her.
You should watch Dr. Phil's Wed and Thurs shows... what happens when parents choose to ignore issues at home... a 15 year old girl met a 40 year old man online, chatted for 3 weeks, went with him and wound up being abducted.
This could be in your future... http://drphil.com/shows/page/family_reacts_to_teen_claims
I keep thinking about your daughter and hoping she's okay...
Any updates?