He's a Psychotic Bastard

Dear Bubbie - I haven’t checked out the site for a while (DearBubbie on Facebook) -- Hope you are well.

This will be a LONG one. You can read and respond once you’ve digested all I’ve written here, and perhaps consult with your other Bubbies if you feel so inclined. It’s regarding my husband, and he lives on Facebook, so best to keep my name out of it.

I am living in a NIGHTMARE and I need advice on what to do. I’ll try to keep this as brief as I can, but it’s a story 9 years in the making, so there’s a lot to tell. I tell people it feels like I’m living in one of those Lifetime made-for TV movies where everyone in town thinks the husband is WONDERFUL and perfect, and only the wife knows that he’s actually a psychotic bastard. Basically I need to know what you all think I should do about filing for divorce vs. separation vs. getting a restraining order for reasons of mental / emotional abuse (if possible). The options are important for a number of reasons:
1. Divorce means near-immediate division of assets (which are all MINE, not his, but the law is the law and he’ll get far more than he deserves).
2. He’s threatening a nasty custody battle over our 8-year-old son, which he would never win because he’s been emotionally negligent for all 8 years and my son will says so, and because he’s an unemployed prescription drug addict who does nothing to help support the family, and because I am THE caregiver for my son and he and I are very close.
3. I’ve wanted to relocate for years to Kentucky, and, if I file for divorce now, he can and WILL stop me from taking our son to Kentucky and getting our life going up there. My son wants to move, too, but he won’t want to the longer we stay here (more roots are growing all the time).

My husband has contributed very little since day 1 financially because he had child support to pay to his ex-wife. He brought home roughly $200 per week for 7 years. Within about 8 months of finally finishing his child support obligations, he managed to get himself fired and has now been unemployed since September 2009. He also made “mistakes” on his tax returns his first two years here which he claims were totally innocent (yeah, right), and I had to pay the IRS $7,000 on a credit card. With some medical expenses and other things going on credit because of his lack of an income, he has put me $20,000 in debt.

He is currently not looking for work, and he claims he wouldn’t be able to hold down a job due to some physical ailments, namely multiple ulcers that flare up every few weeks or so. You can’t tell him that people with ulcers work all the time, as do people with conditions far more serious than ulcers, because he will deny that and tell you that you have no idea what he goes through during an ulcer flare. On the other hand, when asked why he doesn’t get on disability and move to Plan B if he has no intention of seeking employment and helping his family, he’ll say that he doesn’t know if his illness qualifies him for disability and that getting on disability is very difficult and a pain in the ass. So, he’d rather do nothing, wait for unemployment to run out, and let me deal with the fallout.

When I tell people he’s been unemployed for over a year, their reaction is, “well, at least you have someone at home doing all the housework and cooking the meals, right?” Um, no. He does NOT do housework, he does NOT cook, he does NOT do repairs. Once or twice a month he’ll do something if I leave the “to-do” list out for long enough, or if I get angry enough and demand that he do something.

He lives on Facebook, and he has amassed a collection of over 800 “friends,” many of whom he doesn’t know, but he friends the friends of everyone he knows, and people accept out of name recognition, so his collection grows. People have written me after accepting his invitation and asked WHY he friended them, and I just say “I don’t know.” He tells people a slew of lies about me, such as that I belittle him and yell at him all the time (funny, but he used to say the same things to me about his ex-wife), and that I’ve had multiple extra-marital affairs, which is laughable because I do nothing but work all day and tend to my son when I’m not at work. My son and I are inseparable when we’re not at work / school, so I couldn’t possibly have an affair even if I wanted to!

I’ve tried to enlist the help of his family (sister in CA), but he is very convincing and she believes that he must be telling at least partial truths (which he is NOT), so she won’t help. I’ve asked her to think about how I could possibly have had affairs, and she said the HE told her that people have flown into Sarasota to see me. And what, had a passionate rendezvous at my office, with my boss and co-worker present? She had no response to that, just that she must side with her brother because that’s the right thing for her to do.

A few months ago, I found out he’s been having a long distance phone relationship with a woman who lives in Boston. He knew her growing up and reconnected with her on Facebook. They talk in the overnight hours, while I’m sleeping, and also sometimes during the day when I’m at work. I’ve caught him hiding in the back yard in the middle of the night, by the pool pump, talking to her on the phone. I’m always calm when I find him hiding out there with the phone, because I don’t care if he goes to her. I wish he would. What is really a slap in the face is the fact that I am supporting this bastard and he’s calling this woman on my dime, while I’m either sleeping or working. Every once in a while they get disconnected in the middle of the night and she calls back, and he picks up on ½ a ring, but I’ve actually called her back and asked her to please just not call in the middle of the night because I have to get up for work in the morning. I’ve also asked her to PLEASE ask him to move to California, but so far no luck. I’ve been asking him to leave for a year because it’s obvious he won’t seek the counseling he needs (he refuses) and he won’t seek employment (he just keeps saying either he doesn’t feel well enough or that there aren’t any jobs out there, when, in fact, he’s not looking, or that he plans on finding a job… someday). When I tell him he has to leave for our son’s sake, and tell him that he’s doing nothing but emotionally traumatizing me and our son, he laughs, looks me in the eye and says, “I’m not going anywhere.”

We sane people know that the right thing for him to do here is to pack up and leave, despite not wanting to acknowledge the end of the marriage, but that doing that is the right thing to do. He could go live with his father, rent-free, in the Tampa area, or he could go live with his sister, but he flat-out refuses to go. So, here I am, stuck with this truly psychotic, delusional person who refuses to leave, and who promises to lie and start a MAJOR custody battle if I make him leave. If I file for divorce, he will cost me thousands of dollars in legal fees that I don’t have, and he will prevent me from relocating with our son. In addition, he will drain me financially by taking his share of everything we have, even though he hasn’t contributed hardly anything in the way of income and has caused us to incur the above-mentioned debts.

I can try to tolerate this until the house sells, relocate, and then file in six months. However, the thought of getting up in the middle of the night, night after night, and finding your spouse lounging around talking to his girlfriend on the phone while YOU pay all the bills and take care of all the other responsibilities (house, child, pets, etc.) is not exactly bearable. Nor is it a healthy environment for my son. And that’s my priority – maintaining a good, healthy life for my son, and so far I’ve managed to do that despite his father’s lunacy.

I could try and file for a restraining order for reasons of mental/emotional abuse and have him removed, but I don’t know if I can get it, and he is also going to lie and make it look like he’s the injured party in some way and detract from my credibility. In addition, if I CAN get him removed and I can sell the house and relocate, the divorce then becomes two-state battle between FL and KY, and I don’t know what that would do to me.

I could maybe file for a legal separation and deal with it later, but that, too, becomes a two-state issue if I sell the house and relocate.

So, my options, as far as I see it, are:
1. File for divorce now and lose a lot financially, lose the right to relocate (probably), but gain my freedom from this nightmare.
2. File for legal separation, and I’m not sure what that would gain me.
3. File for a restraining order and have him removed, and I could (hopefully) relocate, but I would have a two-state battle on my hands and possibly travel expenses involved if he is allowed to have our son come visit him.
4. Stay the course and wait for the house to sell, relocate with him in tow and file after six months in KY. And put up with his bullshit in the meantime, no matter how ethically WRONG his actions are and how nuts I may go in the process. (By the way, renting out the house here is NOT an option because I can’t afford any major repairs should something go wrong, and it WILL because it’s a 197o house and it has a pool, and because I can’t be a long-distance landlord, and because I’d have to get a pretty hefty rent to pay the mortgage on it.

I have spoken with one lawyer here in town who warned me that I could end up having to pay HIM alimony if he convinces a judge he that he can’t hold down a job, for mental or physical reasons. He’s such a good liar he might just be able to pull that off. I have consulted with another lawyer online who echoed the same warning.

I wouldn’t mind consulting with another female pitbull of a lawyer here in Sarasota if you know of a good one. This woman I met with was quite nasty, but I’m not sure she’ll fight for ME rather than just doing what the law allows/requires. I want someone who will at least make an attempt to keep some of my assets from getting into his undeserving hands, and to keep me from having to pay alimony!

So, Dear Bubbie, what would you advise me to do, and do you know of a good female divorce lawyer in Sarasota?