Scared because of ex

I started a relationship with a boy when I was 17, we were together for two months when I became pregnant. It was the first time I had had sex and at the time it was a little bit forced but I wouldn't call it rape. About a month later I found out I was pregnant, when I first told him he said do more tests to make sure. Then after a week he broke up with me, I went on his house to tell him I was definitely pregnant and he punched me in my stomach - it wasn't really hard and I think it was more of a nervous thing than actually trying to hurt me. Although, I remember him clearly saying "if I hit hard enough will it go?" That was the last time I ever saw him. While I was pregnant he texted me once to tell me he wasn't sure if he wanted to be involved with his child or not. When I was 8 months pregnant I got a text from the girl I called my best friend, she told me that she was now in a relationship with this boy and he had told her about how I wouldn't let him see his child or be involved. I told her he was lying as our baby hadn't even been born yet and he hadn't told me whether he wanted to be involved or not but if he did then I would gladly let him. That started an argument with her about how she thought I was lying but I still didn't hear anything from him. After I gave birth he was the first person I texted to tell him our child's name and weight... still no reply. Our child is nearly 5 years old now and I have still not heard from him. Since the day I last saw him I have been really scared to leave my house. I'm scared in case he sees me on the street, I honestly don't know why. I don't think he'd do anything, to be honest I think he's probably forgot me or at least if he saw me he'd act like he has. I've dyed my hair blonde (it used to be dark brown), and I've changed my clothing style to make myself look different so he wouldn't recognise me. But I'm still scared. I love being outside, I love nature and if I could I'd never be inside! But I can only be in my garden otherwise I have panic attacks about him seeing me on the street. When I do go out I never go alone and I don't go to places that I think he might go to (shopping malls, town centres etc). This is really affecting my life as well as my child's life, I don't take her to parks or fun places unless one of my parents come with us. Then I spend the time stood in the corner constantly looking around while my parents play with my child. I'm planning on moving out of the county because I know he has family all over the country and I'm scared of him being there! I'm scared to get a job incase he comes into the shop, hotel, office or wherever I'd be working - I've started my own little home business instead. I haven't told any of my family about this, I tried to tell my mum when I was pregnant but she told me I was just being stupid. My brothers getting married soon and I'm going to be a bridesmaid however, I didn't go to my future sister in laws hen night because I was scared he might see me there. None of my family met him so I'm scared that they might somehow know him as a friend, without knowing our connection, and he might come to the wedding. Every little decision I make is based around him and I don't know, or understand, why I'm still so scared of him.  About 7 months ago, I took my daughter (with my father and two of my brothers) to a local toy shop to choose something for her birthday. She ran around the shop with my dad whilst I looked for a secret present for her. I saw him there with his new girlfriend (not my ex best friend). Within a second I ran to the toilets and threw up, I stayed in there for nearly an hour and when I came out I couldn't stop myself from shaking. I grabbed my daughter and walked as fast as I could out of the shop. My father and brothers didn't seem to notice me being away for so long, they thought I was just looking for this secret present. I haven't been back to that shop and I plan never to, I don't think he even saw me. The day before Christmas (2013) I found out he had gotten engaged and I was psyically sick. I lost every one of my friends when I got pregnant, most of them because of the lies he spread about me not letting him see our child. I don't speak to anyone outside my Immediate family (parents and brothers). Over the past few years my relationship with them has broken down and I cry every night because I feel so lonely and lost. I have posted this a thousand times on so many different forums over the past few years and I always get the same answers - stop thinking of him, go out have fun, see a counsellor etc. I know these are the things I should do but I just can't. I love my daughter more than anything else in this entire universe, but I cannot forget him because she constantly reminds me of him. She looks like him, some of the things she does are exactly like he did. As I said, I don't have a good relationship with my family anymore and no friends so I can't go out because I'd have no one to look after my daughter. Professional counselling is something I just can't seem to get, I know I need it but I just can't seem to convince myself to tell someone all of this face to face.  I'm sorry this is so long, if you managed to read it all then thank you very much.

Don't worry about us, we read WHOLE BOOKS, doncha know. ;-) First, define 'forced'. Did you consent to have sex with him in the first place or were you coerced and what you're talking about is that he got sort of unexpectedly rough? Secondly, "he punched me in my stomach - it wasn't really hard and I think it was more of a nervous thing than actually trying to hurt me. Although, I remember him clearly saying "if I hit hard enough will it go?"" More of a nervous thing? Are you kidding?! That sounds like a TEST punch to me! Even if he wasn't hitting hard enough to hurt YOU, what the hell do we HAVE here - him trying to kill an unborn child? Doesn't he know that counts as manslaughter? And if it HAD harmed and aborted the baby, then that certainly would have hurt you. Did he ask PERMISSION to do that as if it were something you both thought out of desperation might do the trick or did he just take it upon himself? When you say scared of him, do you mean you're worried that his initial disinterest and shunning might have over these last years turned to interest with your kid and that he might want involvement with it - which you don't want because it'd mean you having to have him back in your life? Are you wondering whether a retrospective court action for possible rape and possible manslaughter might do the trick to KEEP him out of yours and your kid's life? Or are you saying what he did back then has only now hit you for how wholly untoward it was, and that appreciating fully for the first time just how heinous his entire attitudes and behaviour were (downright sociopathic, actually!), NOW you're feeling more befittingly as scared as you suspect you should have back at the time? Listen, I doubt a mere 5 years would be enough for a man of THAT incredible level of immaturity to have suddenly grown up to the degree of wanting to be a father. But I think what's been happening here is that the seriousness of his mental imbalance has started to accumulatively dawn on you, via all these snippets of these and other unmentioned scenarios coming together like jigsaw pieces into a fuller picture, meaning, your mind has worked out by extrapolation just what lengths a man like that who'd displayed such worryingly OTT behaviour like that could go to. And the answer it's come up with is: much farther. And then you're taking these signs of his becoming less of a boy and more of a man (getting engaged) as indication that one of his next steps might well be to come looking for his (presumably) first-born child. I.e. that his NEEDS might have developed and grown despite it's unlikely his emotional maturity has risen with it. I repeat, I doubt he's any threat to you these days. But, still, you should be confiding in your family or at least just your dad or brother. So WHAT if one of them knows him, what difference would it make? Same goes for your relationships with some of them having broken down. Well, then, this is actually a blessing in disguise because there is NOTHING like a family needing to close ranks to make everyone forget about any pettier surface hassles like arguments and disagreements. It'll all pale into insignificance - POOF!, like magic. And I imagine those whichever family members would have welcomed the excuse and opportunity to just instantly forget all past fallings-out as well. And don't forget the simple fact that, fights with you or no fights with you - at the very least, but first and foremost, IT'S *YOUR DAUGHTER* - THEIR NEICE AND GRANDCHILD - THEY'LL BE BANDING TOGETHER TO PROTECT. You can't lose.

Sorry - ATTEMPTED manslaughter.

By forced I mean, I told him I wasn't ready to have sex and he stuck his hand down my pants, and I was too nervous to stop anything else that happened. I didn't actually say the words 'no'. I, in no way, condoned the punch on my stomach. He did that without saying anything and I thought as it wasn't too hard, that he was just joking. For the past five years I have battled with feelings of being scared to have him back in my life but also wanting him to come back and be a father. To be honest I think if he did come back to be a father then I wouldn't be so scared. I wouldn't take him to court for any reason and I would never stop him seeing our child if he wanted to. I have been scared in the exact same way since I last saw him in person, over five years ago now, and I am 99% certain that, if we did meet again, nothing bad would happen. Nevertheless, I'm still just as scared. After reading all of this I understand that it might sound crazy, stupid or whatever to other people. As I said I don't understand it myself and I don't know how to write it to help others understand it.

If you had issued him a statement about not being ready to have sex then that would include having a hand stuck down your pants as was the initiation to whatever then followed on his part. That general statement of yours means no to having sex in all or any of its formats. If whatever then followed wasn't penetrative sex you could at least have had him prosecuted for indecent assault, regardless that you froze or played along for the sake of the peace. But if it was penetrative then that is rape (ditto freezing or playing along). You aren't expected to have to express a wish in the negative more than once or in its most common form of En Oh. But you do have to still not want it in your head, i.e., can't experience a change of heart as then shows discernibly via your actions and demeanour as collectively overrides that initial No, and then only at some later date decide not wanting it had been your truer, more valid emotion. If the latter's the case then that's merely distaste kicking in once the rose-tinted glasses have finally fallen off. Yet here you now are, proving that that prior attempt to justify your feelings of negativity and dread about him (via aid of recounting certain of his more choice actions) are insufficient and adding that despite the man scares you enough to be a constant bane in your life as has you wanting to go as far as relocate away from everyone you know, then, said fear would cease if he were to prove a wish to be an active father to your child....And you can appreciate how this sounds [putting it mildly] crazy or stupid. Well, in that case SCARED is obviously the completely wrong word, isn't it? Would stressed be the word you're looking for? Or, full of angst? Or, highly anxious? Or have you some other latent and/or ongoing source of stress that you're pinning onto him because he seems the obvious, logical and pinpoint-able source when devoid of anything else you can explain it by? In other words, is your mind possibly displacing fear of A (unidentified) onto B (him)? If not, describe the sensation. Liken it to when in some fairly common situation or scenario. For example: in the queue for a scary rollercoaster ride; actually on the ride and not liking it; being about to jump from the high-dive board or about to start a race; last day of end-of-term vacation, haven't done my homework and now don't have time (sh*t!!!); like someone died; like someone died and it was my fault....(that sort of thing). Include what physical sensations accompany it. Obviously nausea to point of actual vomiting is one, correct? (And have you always vomited easily or a lot?) OR is it as easy as you simply trying to say this: I think my mind has maybe, due to hindsight, blown him and his level of menace out of all proportion, but I couldn't say for sure one way or the other; I'd have to come face-to-face and/or spend time around him again to know. Yet were I to take a chance on inviting or welcoming him back into mine and, now, my daughter's life, it might turn out that my memory and feelings-in-memoriam indeed WERE correct all along. Particularly if he hadn't changed a jot or, God forbid, had become even worse. The danger therefore lies in the fact that the very act of finding out would simultaneously make it TOO LATE for me to be able to remove myself/us from him and go into hiding a second time, meaning I'd be effectively done for. (?)