You Must Have Zero Tolerance for Domestic Abuse
People do not change. You must leave and never look back.
Dear Jeanie,
I need you to read this one very carefully, because what I am about to tell you is not just financial advice. It is about your safety, your dignity, and your life.
If your boyfriend, partner, husband, or anyone you live with ever hits you, threatens you, or makes you feel afraid in your own home, you leave. Not tomorrow. Not after one more conversation. Not after you see whether he means it this time. You leave immediately, and you do not go back.
I mean zero tolerance. Absolute zero. There is no version of this situation where you stay and things genuinely get better. I need you to understand that clearly before it ever becomes relevant, because the moment it is happening to you, the emotions involved will try to convince you otherwise. They will tell you he loves you. They will tell you it was a mistake. They will tell you he is under stress, that he is sorry, that it will never happen again. And you will want to believe it, because you love him and because the alternative is painful and frightening and complicated. But Jeanie, people who cross that line almost never stop at crossing it once. The situation does not get better. It escalates. And the stories that end in hospitals, or worse, almost always started with someone deciding to give it one more chance.
Abuse Does Not Always Leave a Bruise
I need you to understand something equally important. Abuse does not always leave a bruise. Psychological and verbal abuse are just as real, just as damaging, and just as unacceptable as physical violence, even if they are harder to see from the outside.
If he constantly criticizes you, humiliates you, or belittles you in front of others or behind closed doors, that is abuse. If he controls what you wear, where you go, who you spend time with, or how you spend your own money, that is abuse. If he screams at you, calls you names, manipulates you into doubting your own judgment, or uses your insecurities as weapons against you, that is abuse. If he makes you feel small, worthless, or like you are lucky he even chose you, that is abuse.
None of these behaviors are normal. None of them are acceptable. And none of them are things you should ever learn to live with or make excuses for. A person who genuinely loves you does not tear you down to feel powerful. They lift you up. They respect you. They make you feel safe being exactly who you are. Anything less than that is not love. It is control. And control dressed up as love is one of the most dangerous things a person can experience, precisely because it is so easy to mistake for the real thing.
This Is Why Financial Independence Matters
This is also one of the most important reasons I have pushed you so hard toward financial independence. When you have your own income, your own savings, and your own resources, you always have a way out. You are never trapped by circumstance. You never have to stay somewhere unsafe because you cannot afford to leave. That freedom is not just about career satisfaction or building wealth. Sometimes it is about survival.
Let me be very specific about what financial independence means in this context. It means having your own savings account, in your name only, that only you have access to and only you control. Not a joint account. Not a shared account where he can see every deposit and every withdrawal. Your own account, with your own login, connected to your own email address that he does not have access to. That account is your escape fund. It is the money that makes leaving possible when leaving feels financially impossible. Build it quietly, maintain it consistently, and never tell anyone outside of your closest and most trusted circle that it exists.
It means having your own credit card, in your name only, with its own account number and its own statement that goes only to you. Not an additional card on a joint account where every transaction you make is visible to someone else in real time. Your own card. Because the moment things become unsafe, that card is how you pay for the hotel room he cannot track, the gas station in the city he does not know you are in, and the attorney’s consultation he will never see on a shared statement. A joint credit card in the wrong situation is not a financial convenience. It is a surveillance tool.
It means having your own income, your own career, and your own professional identity that exists completely independently of your relationship. Not because you do not trust your partner. But because trust is not the same thing as dependency. And financial dependency is what turns a difficult situation into a genuinely inescapable one.
I have watched women, smart and capable and strong women, stay in situations they desperately wanted to leave because they had no money of their own, no independent credit history, no savings in their own name, and no career to return to. They stayed not out of love. They stayed out of survival. Because every financial resource they had was shared with the person they were trying to leave, and leaving meant losing access to everything simultaneously. That is one of the most heartbreaking things I have ever witnessed. And it is entirely preventable with the right habits built early enough.
Your financial independence is your safety net. It is your freedom. It is the thing that means you always have a way out, no matter what happens around you. Guard it fiercely. Build it deliberately. And never give it up entirely for anyone. Not even someone you love deeply and trust completely. Because circumstances change in ways nobody predicts. And when they do, your own account, your own card, and your own income are the difference between having options and having none.
What To Do If He Ever Hurts You
If he ever lays a hand on you or threatens your safety in any way, here is exactly what I need you to do.
Leave the house and get somewhere safe immediately. Do not wait for a better moment. Do not wait until he calms down. Do not wait until morning. Get out and get to safety. That might be a neighbor’s house, a friend’s apartment, a hotel room down the street, or our home. Wherever it is, get there now.
The moment you are out of that house, before you do anything else, turn off your location on your phone. This is critically important. Most phones share location data automatically through apps, through the phone’s built in settings, and through shared family plans. He may know exactly where you are at every moment without you even realizing it. Go into your phone settings immediately and turn off location sharing completely. Check every app individually, maps, social media, messaging apps, all of them. If you share a phone plan, consider turning your phone off entirely and borrowing someone else’s until you can get a new number or a separate plan. Do not let technology become the thing that puts you back in danger after you have had the courage to leave.
Use only your own personal credit card for every purchase you make after you leave. Not the joint card. Not the additional card on a shared account. Your own card, in your name only. If he has access to a shared account, he can see every transaction you make in real time. Every grocery store purchase tells him what neighborhood you are in. Every gas station tells him which direction you are traveling. A hotel charge tells him exactly where you are sleeping that night. Use your own card exclusively and pay cash whenever possible.
Once you are safe, here is the complete sequence of steps I need you to take without delay and without skipping any of them. Call the police immediately and file a formal report. Speak to a lawyer about filing a restraining order. Contact a family law attorney if children are involved. And begin the process of filing for divorce. Do not let his apology, his tears, his promises, or his family calling to plead his case change any of those steps. And do not let the years you have spent together change them either. I do not care if you have been living together for two years or ten years. None of that changes what happened. None of that makes it acceptable. And none of that makes it safe to stay. The report gets filed. The restraining order gets pursued. The divorce gets started. Those steps are not negotiable regardless of how long you have been together or how much you have invested in the relationship.
And once you are safe and the immediate steps are handled, I also need you to begin the process of filing for divorce. I know that word can feel enormous and final and overwhelming in an already devastating moment. But here is the truth. The moment he crossed that line, the marriage as it should be was already over. Staying legally bound to someone who has harmed you only prolongs your exposure to risk and delays your ability to fully protect yourself and your children going forward. Find a divorce attorney, ideally one who specializes in domestic violence cases, who can work alongside the family law attorney handling your custody situation. Many attorneys handle both simultaneously. The legal process of divorce will take time, and there will be moments when it feels exhausting and complicated and never ending. But every step of that process is a step toward a life that is completely and safely yours. Do not let fear of the process keep you legally tied to someone who has already proven they are not safe to be with. File for divorce. Protect yourself completely. And trust that the life waiting for you on the other side of that process is worth every difficult step it takes to get there.
If You Have Children
If you have children with this person, hear this clearly. Your first priority is your safety and your children’s safety. Getting out of an unsafe situation is not abandoning your children. It is protecting them. Children who grow up witnessing abuse carry that experience with them in ways that affect their entire lives. When you leave, take your children with you. Do not leave them behind with the expectation of coming back for them later.
Once you are safe, contact a family law attorney immediately. Not eventually. Immediately. A family law attorney who specializes in domestic violence cases will understand the specific legal steps that protect both you and your children in your state and your specific circumstances. Every state has different laws around emergency custody orders, protective orders that cover children, and the legal standards that courts apply when domestic violence is part of a custody dispute.
Document everything. Every incident of abuse, every threat, every moment of unsafe behavior, written down with dates and details and any evidence you have. Photographs, text messages, voicemails, witness accounts, all of it. That documentation becomes critically important in any subsequent custody proceeding. Courts take documented evidence of domestic violence seriously, and the more thoroughly you have documented what happened, the stronger your legal position will be.
Do not try to navigate custody alone. Get professional legal help immediately and let the professionals guide you through the process. And do not let anyone convince you that staying is better for the children. A safe parent in a safe home is always better for children than an unsafe situation held together by the fear of disruption.
Choose Your Partner Wisely Before It Ever Comes to This
Before you commit to marrying someone, I strongly encourage you to live with that person for at least five years first. The first year or two of any relationship is essentially a honeymoon. Everyone is on their best behavior. The real person, the one who shows up under stress, under financial pressure, under the weight of daily life and exhaustion, does not fully reveal themselves until much later. Five years of genuinely sharing a life together will show you things about a person that no amount of dating ever could. Who they are when things are hard. How they handle conflict. Whether they treat you with consistent respect when the excitement of new love has settled into the ordinary rhythms of real life.
And please, do not have children before you are married and before you are certain about who this person truly is. Children make everything more complicated, including leaving. Protect yourself by being certain before you make that kind of commitment.
You Will Always Have a Place to Come Home To
If you ever find yourself in a situation where you feel unsafe and you do not know where to turn, you come home. You call me. You call your aunts, your uncles, your cousins. You show up at any of our doors at any hour of the day or night and we will be there. No questions asked. No judgment. Nothing but open arms and complete support.
Leave the belongings behind. Leave the furniture, the clothes, everything. Take what you can carry and walk out the door. Things can be replaced. You cannot.
Your safety is the only thing that matters in that moment. Everything else can be sorted out with time, with lawyers, and with the support of the people who love you.
Do not accept abuse from anyone. Not once. Not ever. The moment someone raises a hand to you, controls you, or tears you down with their words, the respect is gone and it will not come back. You deserve to be loved safely, consistently, and completely. Never settle for anything less than that.
Love, Dad.
Get help
National Domestic Violence Hotline
If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse of any kind, physical, psychological, verbal, or financial, please reach out for help immediately.