I met my husband when he was at the tail end of a divorce. Not an ideal situation, but sometimes life happens unexpectedly and you meet the love of your life during a less-than-perfect moment in time. At any rate, my husband was very forthcoming about where he was in the divorce and I decided that he seemed sensible enough that I had little concern about a bunch of “extra baggage” that usually follows people post-divorce. We loved each other, were a perfect match and we had a great life mapped out ahead for us. What I hadn’t counted on was his Ex becoming obsessed with us.
It was shortly after my husband and I had moved in together that the “stalking” started. The Ex contacted my husband’s co-workers to ask about him. She sent e-mails to my husband asking about me, wanting to know who I was. We came home after a night out and found the Ex staked outside our home in her car. As soon as we pulled into the driveway, the headlights flipped on and she sped away, but not before she was recognized by the both of us. My husband sent her a very curt e-mail, letting her know her contact was unwanted and to leave us alone. We don’t even know how the Ex found us, except that we knew she had been taking some private investigator classes. Apparently, WE were the ones being investigated!
We didn’t hear or see anything from the Ex for almost a year after that night. We thought that maybe we had scared her enough (my husband had threatened her with a stalking order if she did not stop) and she had finally moved on and we could peacefully continue with our new life together. Then one day a woman who works with my husband spoke with him about an alarming number of phone calls she was receiving from the Ex. She felt compelled to warn my husband that his ex was still very bitter about the divorce and was obsessively asking questions about him. We discovered shortly thereafter that she had never really stopped inquiring about us; we just hadn’t seen or heard anything about it. She was using her private investigator skills to stealthily probe into our lives--personal records, etc--to satisfy her never-ending obsession.
Over the last three years, my husband and I have endured more of the Ex’s constant obsessive behavior. She continues to call various co-workers of my husband, seeking information about us. These people continually warn us that she is still obsessed and is still very bitter about the divorce. Some of these people have been so harassed by the Ex that they have had to threaten her with protective orders, too. She started going to the church of one of my husband’s co-workers and frequently asks him questions about me and my husband. She even applied for a job at my husband's place of employment! She drives by our new home all the time, sometimes coming to the door and snooping around our property when she thinks no one is home.
Why is the Ex so obsessed with us? Well, it was her obsessive nature that was partly to blame for the failed marriage to begin with. My husband had warned me when we first started dating that she was a bit on the crazy side. He had told me some of the harrowing details of his marriage to her and some of her crazy-psycho behavior. Details such as showing up during training exercises or at his place of employment to verify he was where he said he would be (much to his embarrassment and horror). She would call his bosses while in a drunken stupor after a fight to tell them what a horrible husband he was. She would call his place of employment to ask co-workers if he was cheating on her. She locked herself in the bathroom, threatening suicide and then shot a hole in the wall with a gun for attention. There were other factors as well: She flitted from one job to another, never satisfied with any job she had and was frequently unemployed for long periods of time because she did not want to work. She frequently drank to the point of passing out and soiling herself, leaving my husband to clean her up and put her to bed. These were just a few of the horrors my husband had experienced during the course of that marriage. It was pretty clear why he had decided to leave and end the marriage. Many of my husband’s friends and co-workers told me of their own encounters with this woman and I realized in no time that my husband had not exaggerated one bit about her wacko behavior!
From what I have been told by the people she has contacted, the Ex blames my husband for the misery in her life. She is apparently upset that she has to find a job to support herself, rather than leech off of my husband (even though she has been receiving an outrageously high amount of spousal support for years from my husband). She feels that I am reaping the financial benefits by becoming the new wife (even though I work and make good money, too)—benefits she feels ought to be hers. Perhaps the biggest problem is that she seems to be totally oblivious to her own behavior and how it drove her husband away (not that I am complaining--now he is my husband).
I used to actually feel kind of sorry for her. I mean, she clearly has not ever come to terms with the fact that her behavior and actions caused the demise of her marriage. I felt sorry for her that her life was so miserable and unfulfilling that she felt the need to continually obsess over our life together. I don’t feel sorry for her anymore, though. My husband and I have had enough of her intrusive and obsessive behavior and we are taking steps to put a stop to it for good. Unfortunately, everything the Ex has done up to this point has only bordered on illegal behavior (ie. stalking). She has been able to avoid facing any real penalty up to this point because she has maintained that fine line and has not crossed it (likely because of her private investigative training which would have taught her about stalking laws). But her ability to skirt responsibility for her obsessive behavior will be coming to an end very soon.
I hope the Ex reads this. I hope she realizes that she needs to move on with her life and stop obsessing over me and my husband. I hope she recognizes how foolish and desperate she looks. I hope she sees that her behavior makes her appear sick, sad, and pathetic. Most of all, I hope she seeks the help she so desperately needs and stops all of this nonsense before she gets herself into a lot of trouble.
Look for a future post on what steps you can take
to protect yourself from a stalker. In the meantime, feel free to
share your own personal experiences in dealing with an obsessive
ex.
