urgent : help needed (DV/mental health)

[ktgrok]

deleted

Edited February 25, 2020 by Ktgrok

[Jyhwkmama]

She needs to file for emergency custody asap. People at the shelter can tell her how to do that.

Burner phone is perfect advice. She should take her regular phone to a tech service that can identify the tracking software and document it for court later.

The Legal Advice Forum on Reddit can be helpful. She needs to be sure and identify her state local laws vary.

 

I also want to add this inspirational Reddit post. It may help you think about the kinds of things the husband may be doing and what can be dome to remedy it. ,(car tracker, phone tracker, etc...)  <edit--I deleted the post because it had foul language in it. I did not even think about that, but I would not normally post anything with foul language on this board. If you want the link, please PM me.)

 

 

Edited February 19, 2020 by Jyhwkmama
Foul language

[Jyhwkmama]

Want to also say that I am sorry your friend is in this situation.

[ktgrok]

I would appreciate that. I found a hotline for her to call, but that's about it. 

I'm suggesting she get a prepaid card to use for purchases, hoping they can help her with more. She's such an incredible person - worked for years at a non profit helping women get back on their feet, has a special needs kid, just strong woman but right now she's in a panic and frozen. 

Edited February 20, 2020 by Ktgrok

[73349]

Pick up money at a Western Union in a Kroger, Publix, etc.: https://www.westernunion.com/us/en/agent-locator.html

Edited February 20, 2020 by whitehawk

[catz]

Local church communities sometimes help people in crises.  Honestly, I would call the police immediately and indicate it's a mental health emergency.  It sounds like he needs immediate inpatient.  

As an aside, does she know you are posting this info on a public board?

[moonflower]

call the police, they will tell her the number of local shelters.  The shelter is designed for this exact situation and they will help her with legal paperwork, temporary food and shelter, etc.  If she knows no one, the shelter is the place to start.  

The local one may be full but will give you references for another one.

[desertflower]

Circle of hope is a shelter for women going through domestic issues. It is in the northeastern part of ga. I don't know where in relation that is to clayton.

Hope she gets help.

[ktgrok]

Thank you all! She now has some numbers for local resources, who can help with legal issues. The concern with calling police first is this is backwoods georgia - the kind of place where it would not be unheard of for domestic violence to be swept under the rug. Hence wanting to speak to someone local who was trained and experienced to walk her through this, which we found for her it seems. 

And yes, I did look up churches near by that I thought could help as well, and if all else fails will call my parish and ask if they can contact people up there for her. I know they do that sort of thing. Again, I worry about accidentally steering her to the type that would counsel her to just pray and love him more, but via their websites, denominations, etc I hopefully found some that would be able to offer legit help. 

And I'll be deleting all this shortly. But she asked for us to reach out for help, and knows I'm spreading a broad net via homeschool forums. 

[annegables]

54 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

Thank you all! She now has some numbers for local resources, who can help with legal issues. The concern with calling police first is this is backwoods georgia - the kind of place where it would not be unheard of for domestic violence to be swept under the rug. Hence wanting to speak to someone local who was trained and experienced to walk her through this, which we found for her it seems. 

And yes, I did look up churches near by that I thought could help as well, and if all else fails will call my parish and ask if they can contact people up there for her. I know they do that sort of thing. Again, I worry about accidentally steering her to the type that would counsel her to just pray and love him more, but via their websites, denominations, etc I hopefully found some that would be able to offer legit help. 

And I'll be deleting all this shortly. But she asked for us to reach out for help, and knows I'm spreading a broad net via homeschool forums. 

To be clear, Jonesboro isn't so much backwoods, as it is not remote and rural. It is poor and about 20min from the Atlanta airport. The rest of what you said I agree with:). 

[moonflower]

she doesn't have to give specifics to the police at this time, she just has to say hi, I need the number to the closest 2-3 shelters.

[catz]

I also think there is a danger in not at least filing a report with police with mental health history in case he starts reporting things like kidnapping of the kids, etc.  I can see wanting to have resources and settled first, and maybe legal aid can give her advice along these lines.  Some crises shelters will have good protocols and resources in place to help get things in motion from a legal/protection prospective.  

[caedmyn]

She should be able to file for a temporary restraining order/order of protection.  Those are typically granted initially without notifying the respondent (the husband in this case) as long as the judge feels there is cause.  Then there would be another hearing where he has a chance to appeal it basically.  If a RO is granted, after he is served he can be arrested/have a warrant put out for him for violations of it (ie contacting her, being within such and such a distance, whatever the provisions are)...though enforcement can sometimes be variable.  The shelter should be able to advise her on this.

[sassenach]

You should call the local police for her. I don't think people on the internet can help as much as local law enforcement.

[ktgrok]

1 hour ago, sassenach said:

You should call the local police for her. I don't think people on the internet can help as much as local law enforcement.

The idea was to get her some local legal advice before contacting the police, if possible, given the area she lives in. But there was a plan in place fora  friend to call them if she wasn't safe and settled by a certain time. 

[Ottakee]

28 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

The idea was to get her some local legal advice before contacting the police, if possible, given the area she lives in. But there was a plan in place fora  friend to call them if she wasn't safe and settled by a certain time. 

The police idea might be more to get a paper trail and try to get her dh some help if this is a mental health crisis.  If he is normally a nice, loving, husband when stable/on meds then that is different than an abusive husband that continues to get worse.  Atlanta should have some mental health hospitals to get him some help.  Do they have any mutual friends where a few guys that he respects go to him and try to get him to go in for an evaluation?

[ktgrok]

46 minutes ago, Ottakee said:

The police idea might be more to get a paper trail and try to get her dh some help if this is a mental health crisis.  If he is normally a nice, loving, husband when stable/on meds then that is different than an abusive husband that continues to get worse.  Atlanta should have some mental health hospitals to get him some help.  Do they have any mutual friends where a few guys that he respects go to him and try to get him to go in for an evaluation?

He's been institutionalized before, and yes, it will probably need to happen again. But she doesn't want him to be arrested if it can be avoided due to impact on working, jobs int he future, etc. And in this state he won't listen to anyone, and I don't think they have local friends.

[plansrme]

I appreciate that you are trying to help your friend, but you keep referring to "backwoods Georgia" when (1) Jonesboro isn't any such thing, and (2) seriously--on what Smokey and the Bandit movie are you basing your perceptions?  The police in Jonesboro are no more or less likely to screw up a domestic violence complaint than the police in any other jurisdiction anywhere in America.  Even if  it were rural, which it is not, rural law enforcement hardly has a monopoly on DV successes or failures.  I find it bizarre that your friend has been locked out of her house without pants but that both of you think the better course of action is to forgo help from all local law enforcement and turn, instead, to a massive community of strangers on the internet.

[Paige]

Unless spouse is somehow connected to law enforcement? 

 

 

Edited February 20, 2020 by Paige

[moonflower]

Even backwoods rural communities, small towns in the middle of nowhere in the midwest/south, ime have decent police forces who have seen it all (ish) before and know how to protect her and how to deescalate dangerous situations and get things back in order.  They're not going to say, oh no ma'am, we can't do anything, it's normal enough to lock your wife out of the house with no pants, just go back home.

[ktgrok]

10 hours ago, plansrme said:

I appreciate that you are trying to help your friend, but you keep referring to "backwoods Georgia" when (1) Jonesboro isn't any such thing, and (2) seriously--on what Smokey and the Bandit movie are you basing your perceptions?  The police in Jonesboro are no more or less likely to screw up a domestic violence complaint than the police in any other jurisdiction anywhere in America.  Even if  it were rural, which it is not, rural law enforcement hardly has a monopoly on DV successes or failures.  I find it bizarre that your friend has been locked out of her house without pants but that both of you think the better course of action is to forgo help from all local law enforcement and turn, instead, to a massive community of strangers on the internet.

Well, I'm was going based on her description, and she's had law enforcement involved in the past with an incident, so I guess that is the vibe she got then? The past incident was DV, it was a mental health issue, but that was the vibe she got and expressed. 

She was also reluctant to contact them due to not wanting to further jeprodize his career/earning potential if/when he gets past this. 

but, all that said, I'm VERY glad to hear that the town in general is not that way! I know she's had issues with the schools and that incident with the police, but that could have been outside the norm. and I'm very very glad to hear it. In truth, she's very liberal, so it might be her clash with the area more than the truth. 

Honestly, I was starting to suspect that myself last night given that I was able to find an Episcopal church only a few miles away that is openly affirming of LGBTQ, lol. I mean, that doesn't scream super conservative to me, lol. I wanted to be sure to give her a church contact that wasn't accidentally going to shame her about either mental health issues or DV (I've never seen that myself but have heard people here warn about that) and figured an open and affirming episcopal church was safe on that score. I also trust Catholic Charities, and would trust most mainline protestant but didn't see any within a few miles of her house. 🙂

[ktgrok]

Ugh, so she's (going to call her M) not responded to her best friend (call her E) calls, nor my DH's request to call once she had a new phone. E had warned M that if she didn't call by a set time last night that E would call the police for a well check. She did so, and the police will only say "everything was fine". Well, at BEST the husband is having a manic episode and possible psychotic break, so not "fine" but I guess she's alive. Still not responding to E (DH isn not calling or texting due to something I'll clarify below)  and we don't know if that is due to embarrassment for calling them for help and then not leaving or because her husband has her phone or destroyed it. Or is watching her, although he's supposed to be at work. But that doesn't mean he is. 

I saw her text to my DH and as someone familiar with gaslighting, abuse dynamic, etc I could tell immediately this has been going on a long time - not a sudden thing. She was acting as if she doesn't deserve help, was imposing, etc..hard to explain but very weird. And she admitted that the last time my DH texted her, back a few months, just a random funny post about a freak snow storm, her DH yelled at her for two days - I guess about jealousy, infidelity or something --which is super crazy because DH and her have been friends for over a decade since they broke up, and her DH was FINE with it and in fact they have all visited us as a family more than once! So yeah, he's totally out of it and not just this one episode, or the other one, but ongoing for at least months, I'd guess much longer based on her reactions. She also comes from an abusive background, and admitted she is finding her self back in that mentality. She did call the hotline, and they gave her information on what to do, but as of yet she isn't acting. 

there is also a phone number to call, same place, if you are trying to help a friend. I said that E,  who is female, should call and see if they have more ideas on how to help. E has also offered to fly in and show up on M's doorstep but doesn't know if that is wise. 

DH is worried, but honestly, not as worried as I am. I've been around someone having a manic episode who was delusional, I know HOW out of touch with reality they can be. And I know gaslighting. I know how it messes with your mind. And as a woman..I just know how vulnerable she is. She also has a heart condition that makes her physically weaker than most. So, I think I'm way more scared than he is. I don't think guys get it the same way...they haven't ever felt that vulnerability. 

At this point, we are stuck. He'd drive up there if it was the right thing to do, but we don't know that it is, or wouldn't make things worse, given what he found out about the jealousy paranoia stuff. (going back to delete identifying details)

[ktgrok]

If anyone who mentioned/quoted the location could delete it, I'd appreciate it 🙂

[kiwik]

On 2/20/2020 at 12:21 PM, Medicmom2.0 said:

Is he a decent guy when on his meds?  If so, it sounds more like she needs to call 911, explain that he’s got a diagnosis and is off his meds and in a mental health crisis.  Here in NY it’s called a mental health arrest where the police take the person to a psych ER for evaluation(some places; in the county I work in the police fill out the paperwork and the ambulance takes the person to the ER). It usually ends up being an inpatient stay for medication adjustment and management.  A shelter should be able to help with this, but a good 911 dispatcher and police can get the process started for her.

I was going to say can she get him committed until his meds are sorted.

[QueenCat]

On 2/19/2020 at 3:18 PM, annegables said:

To be clear, Jonesboro isn't so much backwoods, as it is not remote and rural. It is poor and about 20min from the Atlanta airport. The rest of what you said I agree with:). 

 

I wasn't sure if she was talking about the county in the metro area OR the city in the far northern part of the state. Same names... The city is rural, the county is not. 

Edited February 25, 2020 by QueenCat

[ktgrok]

so, to update, friend stayed, her DH is back on meds, she had an appt to see a therapist. I'm praying. 

meanwhile today another friend is in a situation involving DV and I'm trying to help her with navigating everything. 

and just feeling down about so many people in so many crappy situations. And the worst is knowing that the kids may end up repeating the cycle. 

[ktgrok]

I will say that I told DS20 today that if/when he ever gets married I am going to pay for him to go to pre-marital counseling first. Even the best matched couples need to have certain relationship skills, communication skills, etc. I will probably pay for a few sessions of individual therapy too at that point. Ugh. So many of the people around me are in horrid unhealthy toxic situations. And a lot of it doesn't have to be that way.