Friend in bad relationships

[Hardoption]

This is my first post and thank you for reading this story.

 

About thirteen years ago, at the age of fourteen, a friend of mine had her first sexual relationship with her boyfriend who, at the time, was nineteen years old. Their parents found out and ended the relationship. About a month ago she, now 27 years old, found him on My Space and started communicating with him.

 

Currently she is married to an abusive husband who is in prison but will soon be released. He is a multiple felon who violated his parole on a charge of domestic violence. They have been married for about ten months, but have been together for about three years. During that time she has had him arrested for battering on numerous occasions, but kept taking him back. When he is not in prison he is not able to hold a steady job and often lives in a halfway house or on the street when he is not with her.

 

Her old boyfriend is married, but is in the process of filing for a divorce. He has two kids and has been married for about six years. He has a successful business and is able to support his family, but wants to be single again.

 

When she started communicating with him, she was very flirtatious and suggestive, reminding him of their past relationship. This rekindled old feelings and they have planned on meeting again to see if there was a possibility of starting a relationship. She is open to leaving her current husband for him.

 

Now this is where is gets complicated. Her old boyfriend is also her stepbrother and for the past five years, in order to support herself, she has been working as a prostitute and has been arrested for solicitation. Her boyfriend/stepbrother does not know this.

 

I know she would be better off leaving her husband, but to start a relationship again with her old boyfriend/stepbrother might also be disastrous. She has strong feelings for him and I really don’t know what advise I should give her. I have already tried to tell her to get professional help, but that fell on deaf ears.

[Tony T]

Being her stepbrother is no big deal BUT he will surely learn of her job as a prostitute and that will end it all.

 

This gal has to get out of her current marriage...being married to a guy who has to go to prison for abusing her is just plain insane. Once she gets a divorce and a NEW, legal, acceptable job she can find a decent man for herself.

 

If she plans on continuing the prostitution, she may make a decent living. However, no man worth a hoot will accept that and most will make a negative judgment and want nothing to do with her. STD's can be fatal in today's world. Advise her once she has a legitimate job to NEVER, EVER tell any man she may be interested in about the way she made a living as a prostitute.

 

Any person who puts up with abuse for more than five minutes has got serious issues, particularly in the self esteem area. She needs counseling to work on that.

[Hardoption]

I think the reason why she is with her husband is that he accepts what she does and he also allows her to have many guy friends. He is not very intelligent and she likes the fact that she can control him. Until they start arguing and he gets violent.

 

She is very needy and has abandonment issues, but she does not believe in counseling. She also has a substance abuse problem, but will not go to AA because she thinks the people who go there are weak minded and that they should be able to control their drinking by strength of will.

 

When you get to know her, she is a very sweet person. Unfortunately because she has been doing this for five years she has no education or marketable skills to find a legitimate job. She also has social anxiety so that also limits her on the type of job she can apply for.

[Lizzie60]

Hum.. I guess she is 'stuck' with her felon husband.. since if she divorces him and hook up with the stepbrother, he will most likely find out from her the husband...

 

Depends what she wants... since he (stepbrother) will most likely find out about her past, she should tell him herself.. maybe he won't care if it's her 'past'...

 

Otherwise, I would just keep this my ultimate secret.

[saraispiel19]

It's great that your such a concerned friend.

 

I'm my prespective I see that your friend is just talking to the ex because well one he's another breathing male who doesn't beat her and there was a spark between the two years ago. Funny things with ex's is that you can rekindle that "flame" - only if you want to... However moving onto another relationship would not be to her benifit (niether his), she definately needs time to grow and re-discover herself (I believe after an abusive , emotional or not, you end up with almost a hole inside you and a feeling of emptiness. People that stay in those type of relationships really do have a problem, co-dependcy perhaps?... Whatever the underlying issue it may be with her at this time she needs seperation from that man and ultimately time to grow and persue a better self.

 

Does she have any children? If so I suggest she gets legal aid or some sort of way to get a lawyer and find a way to get away from her current spouse. She definately needs to leave the relationship (by the way your describing it) and needs for her kid(s) to be safe.

 

Prostitution? That well is not a very great profession my dear. Has she no education (can't she go back to school to persue one?) to move onto a different career? I'm pretty sure in your state or province there is an unemployment office where she can get another job. Hey you have to start somewhere and she's already at the bottom. Prostitution most of the time goes hand in hand with drugs- I really hope she isn't into that if so she needs to get cleaned up.

 

I wish the best of luck to your friend.

 

Keep us posted!

[Hardoption]

Unfortunately when she was arrested it was her sister and mother who had to bail her out. Her whole family knows and her grandparents shunned her when they came to visit recently.

 

Her stepbrother does not know because after being caught with her he was kicked out of the house and has had very little contact with the family. He also comes from an abusive background and wanted to get away from that situation.

 

I told her that she if she is going to start a relationship with him she has to tell him everything. He is filing for divorce and if his current wife finds out that he is going to rekindle a relationship with his stepsister who is a prostitute, it might affect his child custody options.

[saraispiel19]

I think the reason why she is with her husband is that he accepts what she does and he also allows her to have many guy friends. He is not very intelligent and she likes the fact that she can control him. Until they start arguing and he gets violent.

 

What a little man he is. He does not care about her if he did he wouldn't allow her to do those things (be a prostitute, do drugs, etc.). This is a very toxic relationship for her- she needn't a leech like him.

 

She is very needy and has abandonment issues, but she does not believe in counseling. She also has a substance abuse problem, but will not go to AA because she thinks the people who go there are weak minded and that they should be able to control their drinking by strength of will.

 

Well of course she is the way she is look at her past the poor girl has made one bad decision to the next. She needs help! However you aren't her so it's a little harder- some people need to be at the very bottom I guess in order to push themselves to make the first step for improvement. If she doesn't want to go to counciling fine- but she does need to stand on her own two feet at some point and become a woman, a stronger one that is.

 

 

 

When you get to know her, she is a very sweet person. Unfortunately because she has been doing this for five years she has no education or marketable skills to find a legitimate job. She also has social anxiety so that also limits her on the type of job she can apply for.

 

I'm very sure a workshop (for the unemployed) is available in your community- as her friend maybe you should research it and find out where she could go to improve herself, in the end you can give her the numbers/location/brochures and it'll be her descion. She can get cleaned up (anyone can do it if only they are willing..) and get a job even if it's being a waitress (you have to start somewhere and it is much better and MUCH safer than doing what she does).

 

 

 

In the end this is her descion you can lecture her, nag her, push her into the right direction but ultimately she has to be willing to change, willing to once again improve herself. Even if she does it by obligation she'll go down the sprial (since she wasn't truly willing to do so).

 

 

I'm feel a great compassion for your friend and hope she betters herself.

[Hardoption]

I just wanted to thank everyone for their comments and I really appreciate your opinions.

 

I’ve known her for about six months now and I really do care about her, but I don’t think I can do this any more. Part of her is a very caring person that I enjoy spend time with, but the other part is selfish and manipulative. She has made a lot of bad decisions, both financially and emotionally, but she is not a bad person.

 

Her husband will be getting out of prison in two weeks. I have not met him, I don’t want to meet him and I don’t want to get caught up in this toxic relationship.

 

I have tried to help her financially to get back on her feet but all I got were empty promises and no results.

 

About a month ago I finally got feed up with her behavior and just walked out of her house without saying goodbye. When I get angry I usually take some time by myself to collect my thoughts and will usually call the person after a few days.

 

One of our friends was also with her that night and told me she went ballistic. She felt that I had abandoned her and was so angry and depressed that she wanted to hurt herself. I finally wrote her an email explaining why I was angry and she told me that I was insecure and that we would never be friends again. She told me not to come by her house, call her or email and that she never wants to see me again.

 

After a week she starts sending emails and IM and we started talking again. I think that incident made us closer as friends, but she still hasn’t made any real efforts to change her life.

 

Friendship is about accepting someone for who they are, but in this situation I can’t accept the fact that she is hurting herself and want to help her become a better person.

Now I question myself whether what I do really makes any difference.

[Chrome Barracuda]

If she cant make the hard decisions for herself and do it on her own how is she ever gonna learn. She got herself in this situation she can ger herself outta it.

 

She already made a whole mess marrying this guy in the first place. Now she's gonna have an affair with her married stepbrother to get outta it???

 

Is that the way to fix your problems??? WTF?