In a nutshell my sister went out with a total jerk ( I'm restraining my language for the boards!) He occassionally physically abused, her constantly mentally abused her, slept around and made her bankrupt by running up huge debts in her name. When they split up we all had the flags out *but* over the last year or so he has crept back into her life and now she is seeing a fair amount of him. After her fire her words to me were  'The only person I want to see is Chris, I can't wait to see him so he can give me a big hug'  Alarm bells rung as she has been talking about him  and seeing him a lot lately. Not a single one of her friends or family like him. and she knows he is a waste of space. He is currently living with another girl and has already run up debts in her name too.
My parents feel they will have no choice but to cut her off if she does go back to him and my brother doesn't wamnt to know fullstop. I'm not sure, and am so worried about her.I think I will tell her I will still see her but not him and that when I am in her company I don't want to hear about him. Deep down she knows he's bad news but she says he's the love of her life.......................................

In a nutshell my sister went out with a total jerk ( I'm restraining my language for the boards!) He occassionally physically abused, her constantly mentally abused her, slept around and made her bankrupt by running up huge debts in her name. When they split up we all had the flags out *but* over the last year or so he has crept back into her life and now she is seeing a fair amount of him. After her fire her words to me were  'The only person I want to see is Chris, I can't wait to see him so he can give me a big hug'  Alarm bells rung as she has been talking about him  and seeing him a lot lately. Not a single one of her friends or family like him. and she knows he is a waste of space. He is currently living with another girl and has already run up debts in her name too.
My parents feel they will have no choice but to cut her off if she does go back to him and my brother doesn't wamnt to know fullstop. I'm not sure, and am so worried about her.I think I will tell her I will still see her but not him and that when I am in her company I don't want to hear about him. Deep down she knows he's bad news but she says he's the love of her life.......................................
that's a tough situation Gis, but it sounds like you all are dealing with it as best you can and giving some thought what to say to her. It's gotta be hard to try to convince her to let this guy go, he sounds like a user, just using her and spending her money and getting her into debt and physical abuse too. I'm sure you'd like to see him be out of her life. I hope it works out and that maybe she can find a decent bloke that will treat her right. good luck

I'd hire someone to break his legs.  Probably not the best solution though lol

You could always have some sort of intervention to make your sister realize that she's heading in the wrong direction by being with this guy

I'd hire someone to break his legs.  Probably not the best solution though lol

You could always have some sort of intervention to make your sister realize that she's heading in the wrong direction by being with this guy
Funny you should say that, that was my brother's answer too!  ;D

That is a very unfortunate situation, and it's a shame that everyone around can clearly see that this guy is bad news..but there is such a thick smokescreen, that your sister cannot see the truth. Believe me, I have been though this before with my first husband. Everybody warned me about him, but I just didn't listen. It took ME finally opening up MY eyes to see the truth...sadly, nobody else could do it for me.

That is a very unfortunate situation, and it's a shame that everyone around can clearly see that this guy is bad news..but there is such a thick smokescreen, that your sister cannot see the truth. Believe me, I have been though this before with my first husband. Everybody warned me about him, but I just didn't listen. It took ME finally opening up MY eyes to see the truth...sadly, nobody else could do it for me.



Same here. And it took me about 6 years of living in hell to see the light.


Unfortunately Gis, there really isn't anything you can do. As the old saying goes, "You can lead a horse to water..." Your sister has to realize this for herself. I don't think that cutting her off is the right thing to do because abusers want that. They want their victims to be totally isolated so they can have total control over them. They will tell their victims that the abuser is the only one who will put up them and after a while, the victim will believe it and their self-confidence and self-worth is in the toilet. I know from personal experience. After 6 years of having someone telling me that I am worthless, I believed it. My advice is to present your sister with the facts (whether she knows them or not) and KEEP reinforcing those facts over and over again. It is up to her to make her decision. She is going to do what she wants even if it is not in her own best interest. And be sure to be there for her either way. If she finally decides to leave this jerk, it will be hard for her. But if she stays with "it", it will be even harder and she will need her sister there either way.


Cat

Same here. And it took me about 6 years of living in hell to see the light.


Unfortunately Gis, there really isn't anything you can do. As the old saying goes, "You can lead a horse to water..." Your sister has to realize this for herself. I don't think that cutting her off is the right thing to do because abusers want that. They want their victims to be totally isolated so they can have total control over them. They will tell their victims that the abuser is the only one who will put up them and after a while, the victim will believe it and their self-confidence and self-worth is in the toilet. I know from personal experience. After 6 years of having someone telling me that I am worthless, I believed it. My advice is to present your sister with the facts (whether she knows them or not) and KEEP reinforcing those facts over and over again. It is up to her to make her decision. She is going to do what she wants even if it is not in her own best interest. And be sure to be there for her either way. If she finally decides to leave this jerk, it will be hard for her. But if she stays with "it", it will be even harder and she will need her sister there either way.


Cat


That's great advice Cat.

Gis....I am a guy myself but if I had a little or a big sister who went out with a bad boy who I don;t like  I would give her my 2 cents but than again I would just let her make her own mistakes and hope she would have to learn from them.

See....the more you and the rest of your family talk negatively about this guy the more she's gonna want to be with him.

but by the same token.....

he has already bankrupt your sister once and abused her. You just have to hope she eventually gets back to thinking in terns of reality about this guy and seeing him for what he really is.

I think part of the current problem is they have been seperated two years now and it's almost like she has blanked out all the bad stuff.
I can understand my parents point of view, they have been supporting her financially as well as emotionally and to be fair to them they are pensioners and can't really afford it. It's a case of withdrawing the financial support if he's back on the scene because they don't want him getting his hands on it.
She has done so well picking herself up and rebuilding her life it's hard to bear the thought of her going back there.

Gis,i feel so bad for you and your family,'cause something similar has happened in my family...my younger sister has this tendency to date the lamest men around,i mean if he's a loser she's going to fall for him,she's really sweet and innocent and thinks she's going to change them,and no matter how much we try to make her see the truth she refuses to listen to us.
I avoid lecture her 'cause i'm not one to talk,but i tell her about my past 'cause fortunately i learned from my mistakes,she's only 18 so we all hope this is just a phase she's going through,i believe it's part of growing up when we realise that there are things that are bad for us and therefore we have to let them go,even if it hurts a lot,in the long run it will prove to be worth it.

Gis,i feel so bad for you and your family,'cause something similar has happened in my family...my younger sister has this tendency to date the lamest men around,i mean if he's a loser she's going to fall for him,she's really sweet and innocent and thinks she's going to change them,and no matter how much we try to make her see the truth she refuses to listen to us.
I avoid lecture her 'cause i'm not one to talk,but i tell her about my past 'cause fortunately i learned from my mistakes,she's only 18 so we all hope this is just a phase she's going through,i believe it's part of growing up when we realise that there are things that are bad for us and therefore we have to let them go,even if it hurts a lot,in the long run it will prove to be worth it.
Unfortunatly my sister is 44 and she hasn't grown out of the habit of falling for dodgy blokes, but you never know miracles do happen!

Cat gave some great advice.  Just keep reminding her of what he put her through before and the fact that he's living with someone else. 

I basically had to do that with my best friend after she got divorced from her first husband.  One of her boyfriends was so emotionally and verbally abusive (and on one or two occasions, what I'd consider physically) and controlling, I just kept telling her how I saw the situation.  She finally came to her senses and dumped him, but it took about 9 months.  When she did, he really went ballistic and threatened to take her kids (they weren't even his), take her to court and all kinds of stuff....he even threatened to bring charges against ME (although I have no idea for what, he just said "you and your so-called best friend will be hearing from the police") because he figured out that I was the one who kept telling her to dump him and refused to take his side.

Yeah Gis, I'd kick his F****n head in. Then steal his wallet and his shoes or something, just ruin his day..

Yeah Gis, I'd kick his F****n head in. Then steal his wallet and his shoes or something, just ruin his day..



You share my brother's train of thought, though I have to say the thought has crossed my mind once or twice too!

I'd hire someone to break his legs.  Probably not the best solution though lol






Yeah Gis, I'd kick his F****n head in. Then steal his wallet and his shoes or something, just ruin his day..



I'm with these guys.  Bash him up good, let him know when she gets hurt-he gets hurt

You share my brother's train of thought, though I have to say the thought has crossed my mind once or twice too!


You could do my old favorite. Brick the twat.

This is definitely a frustrating situation and I believe there is nothing you can really do except let her know how you feel and be there for her.  My mom is in a similar situation.  The guy isn't physically abusing her, but he's a total A-hole and basically uses her.  He has a job, but lives in her house and pays a very minimum amount of rent.  We have all told her how we feel about him.  Nobody likes him...none of her three daughters or her nine sisters.  I won't even stay at her house anymore because of him.  She has been with him for about 11 or 12 years now.  I really feel like on a subconscious level my mom wants to be with someone who treats her badly.  My mother never had a good relationship with her own father because he favored her younger sister and wasn't as nice to my mom.  I feel like my mom is in a similar relationship to the one she had with her father in an attempt to correct the situation and make this guy into the person she wanted her father to be.  I don't know if that makes sense, but it is common for people to do.  Perhaps your sister is doing the same thing or maybe she has a low self esteem and doesn't believe that she deserves somebody better?  By no means am I saying this is what is happening with your sister, but just throwing out ideas.  If only there was a way to get her to realize what is drawing her to this guy and then maybe she could get so help in that area. :-\\ 

I'd hire someone to break his legs.


You took the words right out of my mouth, whistle.  And I have some *ahem* pals in Detroit who would do that in a heartbeat.

Same here. And it took me about 6 years of living in hell to see the light.


Unfortunately Gis, there really isn't anything you can do. As the old saying goes, "You can lead a horse to water..." Your sister has to realize this for herself. I don't think that cutting her off is the right thing to do because abusers want that. They want their victims to be totally isolated so they can have total control over them. They will tell their victims that the abuser is the only one who will put up them and after a while, the victim will believe it and their self-confidence and self-worth is in the toilet. I know from personal experience. After 6 years of having someone telling me that I am worthless, I believed it. My advice is to present your sister with the facts (whether she knows them or not) and KEEP reinforcing those facts over and over again. It is up to her to make her decision. She is going to do what she wants even if it is not in her own best interest. And be sure to be there for her either way. If she finally decides to leave this jerk, it will be hard for her. But if she stays with "it", it will be even harder and she will need her sister there either way.


Cat



Gis....I am a guy myself but if I had a little or a big sister who went out with a bad boy who I don;t like  I would give her my 2 cents but than again I would just let her make her own mistakes and hope she would have to learn from them.

See....the more you and the rest of your family talk negatively about this guy the more she's gonna want to be with him.

but by the same token.....

he has already bankrupt your sister once and abused her. You just have to hope she eventually gets back to thinking in terns of reality about this guy and seeing him for what he really is.

I agree with both these posts.

I sort of have some residual secondhand experience with this, since my mom was with a guy like that for, like 2 years on and off in the mid '90s. For the most part, he was just a loser and a d*ck. While he was never actually physically abusive that I know of, verbally he sure was and had a temper. I hate to think of how he could be if he'd been mad enough at the wrong time.

I wouldn't take any action myself unless it was an extreme situation (i.e. physical abuse or something else that could endanger her). Unfortunately, sometimes people need to make mistakes and learn from them. Since you mentioned he could be violent, I'd keep my eye on this dude, if not go to the police should something happen again.

Thanks so much for all your comments. You have helped me to clear things up in my mind about the situation. I am going to see my sister next weekend so I'm going to see how the land lies then and let her know what I think and just see how that goes.

Failing that I guess I could just use the brick over the head idea!

Gissie-

I can relate to this....totally.

I have a sister-in-law who, unfortunately, was with me before my current wife.

She was VERY abusive, in ALL forms.
She would run up outrageous bills, in my name, and then expect me to pay them.
She would party all night, sleep all day, and leave me to care for her then-2 yr. old son.
She would beat me, for no reason at all.....and then blame ME for something.
She would pawn her child off on anyone she could, just to party/sleep around on me.

When the questions came, I would only have lame excuses to show for it.
When I finally left, she not only threatened to have me jailed for "rape" charges, but also her sister (my wife), for who knows what.
To this day, she blames my wife & I for everything wrong in her life....her children being taken away from her, her family virtually disowning her, every man in her life subsequent to me leaving her, her cars all getting totalled....by her!, etc.

My guess is: she won't leave, because she's so far gone, esteem-wise, that she feels that this is the only sort of cad she can get. She is probably afraid to be alone, and will go through Hades & back, just to have someone in her life, no matter what sort of misogynistic ponce he is.

Having been through similar circs, I recommend the following:

-Let her know that you will be there.....for her, and her alone
-Let her know that "tough love" will come into play, but that you don't want that
-Remind her of the proof in the pudding, so to speak.
-In case of a tantrum on her part, simply turn around, and let her calm down
-Dodge any thrown objects
-Advise her about therapy
-As a "backup" plan, find out what his favourite snack/dessert is. Make it, and lace it with any of the following: Croton oil, castor oil, Maximum Strength Ex-Lax, Salt peter, or in the case of liquid, Maximum Strength Visine.

Failing that I guess I could just use the brick over the head idea!


.. sing the song whilst your at it.

HE WAS JUST A POOR LITTLE *ETHNIC SLUR!*
HIS FACE WAS ALL BATTERED AND TORN!
HE MADE ME FEEL SICK!
I HIT HIM WITH A BRICK!
NOW HE'S NOT LAUGHING OR SINGING NO MORE!

:)

This of course goes on the assumption that he's Irish, Scottish, Welsh etc.. otherwise, just twat him.