I (23F) recently moved out of my sisters (28F) house because of her and her boyfriend, who I’ll call Dickerson. They’ve been off and on for over 3yrs. He’s in his 60’s, married, and has adult children of his own. Their relationship has always been chaotic: arguing, cheating, and a lot of control issues on his part.
I only lived with them for 2 months, but during that time I saw how unhealthy their relationship was. He was rarely around unless it was for food or sex, yes she constantly goes back to him. I tried talking to both of them. He told me he “loves her too much to let her go.” 🙄 Please
Things hit a breaking point when they had a huge fight and the cops were called. My sister, who doesn’t trust or like the police, jumped out the bedroom window in freezing weather (3 inch of snow, around 20degrees ) wearing only socks, leggings and a T-shirt. She disappeared. The cops searched for an hour and couldn’t find her. So Dickerson and I went looking. Found her under my neighbors porch.
She has 2 kids (8&9). The 9 yo woke up during all of this (it was 3am) and had her first panic attack, so I tried to calm her down while trying not to freak myself.
When I brought my sister inside she had mild frostbite and kept repeating, not Dickerson, I don’t want him and I’m gonna be ok, it’s gonna be ok. She also kept asking me if the doors were locked.
I barely slept. When I finally did I woke up to Dickerson knocking on the door. This was my breaking point. I left and stayed with a friend. The next day I came back to get my things and asked that he not be there. He was. I left and waited 2 hours for him to leave. When I finally moved all my stuff out I saw his car parked a few down from mine.
I don’t get why she keeps going back when it clearly puts her kids in the middle too.
Would I be the asshole if I involved my parents with some kind of intervention? Does that ever work? Is it worth it?
NTA
For the safety of the kids, family should step in.
NTA Someone needs to,protect those kids.
NTA. Your sister jumped out a window in freezing weather to escape him and got frostbite. Her kid had a panic attack at 3am. This is domestic violence.
Don’t do a traditional intervention it can make DV situations worse. Call the National DV Hotline for guidance. Tell your parents. Consider calling CPS for the kids.
You’re right to be concerned, but get professional help on how to intervene safely.
WNBTA for holding an ‘intervention’—although maybe that’s not what this is and don’t all come down on her and making it out like she’s made poor choices or is in the wrong.
But you need to be prepared to what may happen from this. Definitely make sure Dickerson is no where near when all this takes place. Remember to be supportive. She’s showing battered woman syndrome and many people that go through DV end up going back to their abuser for multiple reasons. You need to be very careful with this. I would call a help hotline to get suggestions on how one goes through this and how to handle this with care.
NTA. This is clearly an abusive relationship, and she needs help. Just make sure you do the proper research in order to do the intervention right.
esh you can’t fix your sisters life. stay out. your sister is dependent to an abuser, allowing trauma to her own children. CPS welfare check is required. support what you can from a distance. be well bearer of burdens.
NTA, but I doubt it’ll work. She’s in the exact relationship she wants and she’s clearly not ready to leave it.
But for the record, he’s not her boyfriend. She’s his mistress, she will never be his girlfriend. And of course there is cheating; he’s married. He’s not loyal to your sister or his wife and has probably not been loyal to his wife for a very long time.
If the kids are in danger, involve CPS. Talk to your sister (without her “boyfriend” there) to see if you can make her realize she and her kids are in danger, and if possible someone needs to tell this man’s wife what he’s been up to.
Nta. At this point, I would get cps involved. This is no longer about your sister. It’s about keeping those kids safe. Maybe having cps intervene will be the final breaking point for her. Maybe not. But, at least the kids will be safe. Something tells me you won’t be able to take them in, but, hopefully your parents or another trusted family member can step up. Please. Make the call immediately. You can even do it anonymously.
He’s married. Eat him out to his wife. Problem solved.
I think I might be too high for Reddit lol. I cannot figure out what your comment means. “Eat him out to his wife.” I know you meant something my brain is refusing to understand. 😁
I’m thinking it’s a typo, should be ‘rat’ instead, the *r* being next to the *e* on qwerty keyboards
Dickerson indeed
NTA, for the children’s sake. Witnessing that degree of domestic abuse is clearly traumatising them: something needs to be done sharpish.
If parents don’t make a difference then time to get services involved – perhaps via the children’s school counsellor to support them?
Without knowing where you are (and I don’t recommend you comment it tbf), I can’t make a specific recommendation. But I think you should reach out to a domestic violence shelter before trying anything on your own. They should be able to provide resources and maybe even coaching for you to be as effective as possible. And if the first one you call doesn’t, try another. I know at least some of them have extensive programming, resources, and staff to help victims of domestic violence. I also agree that a call to Child Protection (or whatever the equivalent in your area is) is warranted-they do generally work really hard to keep families together (sometimes this is good, sometimes this is bad), so they will likely try to help your sister find stability before removing the kids. I also recommend giving her the crisis phone number written on a piece of paper-someone did that for me and without that paper I never would have called.