[Firestorm2018]

Hi all,

I've been dealing with an issue in my relationship for the last 4 months or so and I literally don't know what I should do about it. Last Nov, my partner Maria told me that when her brother Mark was 12 he molested their 4 year old cousin and had Maria (who was 6 at the time) watch. When she told me this I was horrified and saddened and so livid. She comes from a family who would rather ignore and sweep things under the rug than deal with it, and that's what they did for this situation too. Maria recalls no strict punishment although she doesn't remember their parents minimizing the situation either. He wasn't harshly punished or put in counseling or anything. After the incident occurred she remembers them talking about it as a family once and from that point on ignored it. Maria has pushed this out of her mind for over 20 years and now it's come up again. She decided to confront Mark about it and spoke with her parents about why it was never discussed much or really addressed. They pretty much blew her off saying that it was in the past and asked her why she's trying to start trouble by bringing up irrelevant issues. Maria was in counseling for a bit to help her work through her issues with it. I think the confrontation helped her and doesn't seem to have much anger or sadness over it today.

I on the other hand am torn over what to do. Sadly I have a long history with sexual abuse at the hands of a family member and don't have the desire to associate with a molester. I told my partner that if she plans to have contact with him again I wouldn't be able to continue a relationship with her. She was hesitant but agreed that she feels like she would also never be able to have a relationship with Mark again anyway. There have been a few times in the last 4 months that we've talked about it, mostly me asking if she's sure that this is something she can do. She's aware of my history and understands my position. I absolutely HATE telling people what they should and should not be doing but this is an absolute deal breaker for me which I was upfront about with her. There are times that I feel she is only going along with what I want because she's afraid of losing me, although she's reassured me that she also agrees she shouldn't have contact with Mark again.

My partner and I have been discussing marriage lately. We aren't officially engaged but we have set a wedding date for later this year and booked a photographer. Lately the family issue has been bothering me a lot and I obsessively think about it and fear I will end up divorced because in the future Maria decides to make amends with Mark.

Am I being unreasonable? I think about the future when Maria's family will be my family, and the thought of being in the same room with someone who has molested in the past it makes my stomach turn.

I'm unsure of how to go about this now. Lately this has been eating me up and I want to discuss it again with Maria however whenever we talk about it I get the feeling that she's only going along with what I want. Her family is really into texting each other and they have a constant running group text where they will all discuss the happenings with each other. I've asked Maria if she texts Mark and she says she doesn't although they share the same group text message with everyone.

I'm at a loss. It's not my place to control this nor is it my responsibility to manage her family relationships. I just don't want to have a wife who has contact wtih a molester. This brings up so many traumatic memories for me and I feel like I need a lot of reassurance. Any words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated.

[Skeezyks]

Hello Firestorm2018: The Skeezyks' perspective with regard to this is that before you & Maria tie the knot, the two of you need to put this to rest once & for all. Maintaining a long-term marital relationship is difficult enough without something like this hanging over it. The Skeezyks dislikes making suggestions... but it seems to me that this is a situation that cries out for some in-depth pre-marital couples counseling. My best wishes to you...

Firestorm, do yourself a favor..... Postpone the wedding and get counseling for yourself first on this... It sounds to me like she is protecting her molester which is part of the denial process and unless she comes clean you do not have a sure foundation of trust to base your marriage on.... tc

You really can only put demands on yourself about this. You can refuse to be at family gatherings where that person is present, but to demand your partner do the same may be too much.

I chose to set a firm boundary FOR MYSELF that I would not be in the presence of my molester. I let my family know that so they would be aware of why I might not attend certain family events, but I did not put any demands on my family to do the same. I can't set other people's boundaries for them.

In demanding your partner set a boundary, you may be setting up a situation that your partner may resent you for at some point. Can you set the boundary for yourself and allow your partner and the rest of the family to come to their own decisions in their own time? They are dealing with this in their own way themselves. It may take them longer to get to where you are because they have the additional weight of actually being related to this individual -- it does add a layer of internal conflict for them.

By the way, eventually my family got there too. They just needed time to find their way through it and to that point, but I let them get there on their own.

[amandalouise]

if this was me I would first take into consideration the time frame in which this situation happened and whether legal charges /prosecution was done. you said when he was 12. so I take it this person is no longer a 12 year old. laws and times change. what is now molestation may have been legally defined as normal childhood show me yours and Ill show you mine, play house and other fantasy/ sexualized play.

my point if this was me I would not be jumping to conclusions and letting this mess with my head or affect my relationships with the significant others family. bottom line no one can say this person as an adult is going to molest a child now. how many of us did things as children that we would not dream of doing today...stealing, lying and yea crimes like shop lifting, getting into fist fights (now fist fights and cat fights are called the crime of assault) does that mean what went on in your childhoods define who and what we are today and what we are going to do today.

the fact that the parents are all moving on past what happened years ago says to me what ever happened has most likely already been dealt with to the satisfaction of all involved at the moment that it happened (ie the parents of the two children involved, and the two children involved.) years ago thats how this was dealt with ..with in the family with only those parties involved in the situation.

As for how do you deal with this...well only you can say how you want to deal with this. you have options...

you can continue on and accept that this was years ago and had nothing to do with you, it happened before your time with this family.

you can get therapy to help you deal with this in what ever ways is best for you.

you can call off the relationship with your girl and her family

you can call off the relationship with the girls family (in turn this may or may not cause isolate and cause your girl emotional problems due to being split between you and her family, for me I would never ask someone I love to make a choice between me and their families regardless of what their family has done before I even met them. )

my point only you can decide what you want to do in this situation. me I would consider it water under the bridge and move on because the situation doesnt involve me. I would leave it up to the one I loved to figure out what she wants to do about it for herself since its her family problems

[seesaw]

Firestorm,

I totally understand that you do not want to be in the same room as this person. In your opinion, they did something totally heinous. But to your partner, this is her brother and she still has familial feelings towards him. Also, he was only 12. You don't know that he did anything like that any other time in his life. I'm not condoning it, I'm just saying that people, especially children, deserve the opportunity to rehabilitate and grow up. I mean, that's one of the reasons children's court records are sealed up, so the silly mistakes they made as kids don't always follow them everywhere.

I think you need counseling over this. The fact that you want to control whom your partner sees and doesn't see is very disconcerting to me. What else of her life are you going to want to control because of YOUR past? Soon you won't want her to be around her own parents for fear they mention her brother's name.

I think the other responses are dead on in that you need to get some counseling for this individually, and perhaps do couples counseling as well. And definitely you shouldn't be thinking about getting married if this and controlling your partner consumes your thoughts so much.

Best of luck,
Seesaw

[Bill3]

Maria has pushed this out of her mind for over 20 years and now it's come up again.

How did it come up again?

What has Maria's relationship with Mark been like for the past 20 years?