I have shared quite a bit of my story in former posts and today I just found out that my daughter, who has been angrier than all get out for the last month, received a post card from my ex about a month ago. He was travelling with his wife (her step-mom) in Europe and sent my daughter a picture of a donkey. On the card, he said that that the my daughter reminded him of the donkey. He also went on to say that he was having a great time and decided that he is never going to go back to work again.
Just to give you some quick background, my ex sexually abused my daughter from about age 3. as far as I can determine, up until about age 14. I was fully aware that she was being abused and did everything I could to stop it, to no avail. She protected him and absolutely refused to deal with it...taking all her anger and rage out at me. I left the marriage before my daughter was 2. Despite our best efforts, all kinds of therapy, reporting the abuse constantly, following all the recommendations of our county childrens services, going to court, my current husband (DH) and I were unable to get any meaningful help until she was 14, at which time my daughter admitted what was going on. By that time, she was so far gone that we had to place her in residential treatment for about a year and a half. I had to sue our county children's services to accomplish this. Needless to say, our life has been a nightmare for years. My daughter is still scarred and probably has mild BPD. Up until about 2 months ago, she seemed to be making progress, but for the last month, she has reverted into some very angry, abusive behaviours.
She lost her job about a month and a half ago and now works 2 part-time low wage jobs, which I had to threaten her with eviction to even interview for. She has no health insurance. She is behind on her rent to us and on her bills. When my daughter was about 8, my ex remarried a woman who is well to do. Initially they promised my daughter the moon, but of course never delivered on any of the promises. They initially promised that they would pay for college and get her a new car. Of course, now they do not want to help her with anything. When my daughter was in her last year of high school, they even went so far as to keep bugging her about interviewing for colleges, but made it known, in the most passive-aggressive way, that help to pay for college would not be forthcoming. Of course, my daughter does not have the maturity to succeed at college at this point, so it was just a cruel game.
About six months ago, her step-mother gave her a car which was far from new, but seemed to run ok. My ex paid for 6 months of car insurance. According to the ex and step-mom, the car had been thoroughly checked over. That turned out not to true....it may have been checked, but basically what they gave her was a junker that has everything wrong with it. It has finally broken down and the cost to repair it is beyond my daughter's means. It's just more cruelty.
For the past three weeks, I have been driving her to work at her two different jobs and picking her up. We have one car so I have also been driving my husband back and forth to work. My husband goes to work at 8 and gets off at 4PM. My daughter works from 4 to 10 PM at one job and 11-6 AM at the other job, so this is a logistical snafu and also interferes with my sleep. I also have a disability and all this driving is very hard on me. In addition, my husband and I are very close to the federal poverty level and if our car breaks down, we are screwed. In the meantime, my daughter was screaming at me and being totally nasty. I finally realized that she sounds just like my ex....and that she has really identified with the abuser in a very frightening way.
I finally sat her down a few days ago and told her that I was not going to tolerate her abusive behaviours anymore. I told her that I had put up with her father's abusive behaviour and speech for years and that she sounded just like him. I went so far as to say that I feared that she has turned out like him because she has identified with and protected him. I told her that unless the abusive behavior stopped that I was going to throw her out and that I guessed she would either have to hit the streets or go live with her father. I told her that I realized that her father had sexually abused her in the past, that he was a child molester, and that she probably wouldn't want to stay with him and his wife, but that I was not concerned that he would be interested in her as an adult. I have used some tough talk in the past to deal with her, and have had to make many tough love decisions along the way, but this is the first time I have ever told her that I feared she was becoming like her father. She was shocked. She neither cried nor apologized, but her behaviour changed immediately. However, like her father, the behaviour change is probably temporary.
Even though I just found out about the postcard and the insult about the donkey, as sad and as pained as I feel for my daughter, I don't believe that her problems with her father give her any excuse to abuse me.
Right now I feel very trapped. As she did when she was a child, my daughter seems to have fallen through the cracks. Without the stable home that we provide, I cannot imagine what her life would be like. The sad thing is that it is getting harder and harder to provide that home, not only because we are struggling financially, but because I am tired of living with an abuser.
