Re: Would you consider this controlling behavior? Is this love? I want to leave so ba
first of all, my apologies to everyone who offered me their sincere advice and were worried about the lack of feedback from me. I had initiated the legal proceedings and since my husband knew i frequent gs (he did not know my nick, rockon, but the post was enough to reveal my identity to him), i did not want him to have any inkling of my strategy, as he was forcefully living in the house that i was paying for and threatening to extend the divorce case for 10 years, so as to continue to live in the house (as laws here are in favor of the person in physical possession of the property and not the legal owner).
secondly, many of u are right in wondering, what exactly was i looking for in posting at gs. looking back, its very clear to me i was in extreme denial. i honestly couldn't see the elephant in the room because i was standing so close to it. honestly, thank u once more for your advice and support, because back then i was truly at the lowest point of my life, fighting my own parents and my entire family, for that matter, who somehow felt that i was wrong to demand a divorce DESPITE the threat to my life and despite the mental abuse
now, the outcome:
my husband did his best to delay the divorce proceedings as much as possible. it is ironic how he showed his true colors to my family in the last few months. when he received the first summons, he came to my parents and promised them he would rather divorce me, if thats what i really wanted, than drag me through a legal procedure which might be painful or insulting for me. his very words were, "i would never drag her through the courts. i love her so much i can't stand the thought of her running here and there in courts and running up against all kinds of unscrupulous people who may try to take advantage of her. So i will give her what she wants myself". my family was very impressed by these words. i told them to sit back and wait for the action to follow through. it never did, and i knew from experience it wouldn't. he was an expert in using words to get what he wanted in the short term.
anyway, he refused to show up despite repeated legal summons. he also refused point blank later on to divorce me when he was reminded of his promise. eventually he threatened my family to stop pursuing the case as he was in physical possession of the house and he would just not vacate it and using the law to get the house vacated is a near impossibility, especially if he is still my husband. But with this threat, my family finally saw him for what he was: a gold digger. and I was just his ATM, an ATM which also did the house work and wife work.
in his reply to the divorce law suit, he demanded all gifts be returned, including handbags and shoes. this one really left me speechless. i couldn't stop laughing at his petty mindedness. considering that my parents had even gifted him a plot which we didn't ask to be returned. gifts are just not taken back. its really really bad taste.
long story short. he eventually showed up in court and tried to prove i was a psychiatric patient, which obviously he couldn't. the judge awarded the khula on the spot.
he was still in no mood to vacate the house. he asked us for a one year court order permitting him to live in the house for one year, without paying me rent, even tho i was paying the mortgage myself. my lawyer advised me that once he had such a court order, he would simply get stay orders issued against it and never vacate the said premises. needless to say, i never gave him such a court order. he eventually vacated after a month.
looking back at the 7 years of my life, i feel immense regret for the fact that i have wasted 7 years of my life. but i am relieved to be out of this ordeal without any children to keep me attached to him, its a clean break from him and i am grateful for that.
if there is one lesson i have learnt from this mistake, it is: NEVER go into marriage thinking you can change yourself or your spouse; no one ever changes their basic fundamental personality unless their belief systems are challenged and changed. i was a free spirited independent young woman and i settled down for all the dysfunctional treatment handed out to me because i kept telling myself i could change into a submissive woman, because thats what everyone kept telling me women are supposed to be. well guess what? it just didn't happen. i was a living dead person trying to be someone i wasn't, killing off my true personality. (I'm not talking minor adjustments here, i know marriage is give and take, but personality swicthes just don't happen). so both spouses have to know and accept each other for their true personalities, warts and all. for that, u both MUST share similar beliefs about life and goals in life
it was difficult for me to see how much this marriage had suffocated me because once your mind tries to rationalize abuse as something u must put up with, its very difficult for u to define boundaries. i had become the proverbial frog in hot water: if u put a frog in a pot in hot water and raise the temperature one degree at a time, you can boil the frogs brain and kill him before he realizes what is happening to him.
the second major lesson i learnt was, your decisions are useful only if they are timely. Time is your biggest weapon, use it to ur advantage or it will be used against u to someone else's advantage. i have seen so many bitter marriages where men or women realize after 20-25 years of marriage that they have wasted the most youthful, healthy and energy filled part of their lives with spouses who do not value them or their efforts. such poisonous marriages poison the children as well. i am not advocating divorce for all, but i truly fail to understand the indo-pak mindset which considers the institution of marriage as sacrosanct and will go to all lengths to praise a woman who puts up with an abusive husband. women are not doormats. they are as human as the men they married.
if women leave their families behind to start a new life with their husbands, why don't the husbands leave their families behind and start a new life with their wives?
(rhetorical question) :)
I'm glad to read your update and see that things went relatively well. May Allah make whatever is to come easy and beneficial for you.
