In Home Stalking
Stalking doesn’t always feel like stalking because they do it within the walls of your house.
What would you call it?
Most people call it hovering, controlling, snooping, micromanaging, helicoptering, emotional abuse, or eggshell walking.
It’s what happens inside the homes of countless people. They are being abused and supervised by their ex-partner. They are followed, harassed, and watched.
They are being hunted within the walls of the place they are supposed to find sanctuary and peace.
This is stalking.
And it flies under the radar because they live there as well.
Broken Up But Not Moved Out Yet
It’s bad enough when it happens inside of the relationship, and it blows up into a bigger more twisted issue after the relationship ends.
With the housing market the way it is and prices for everyday things rising, moving out immediately after a breakup isn’t always feasible. There are lease agreement terms to navigate and shared responsibilities that need to be dissolved.
This means that people who are no longer in a relationship have to spend time within each other’s line of sight. It doesn’t take much to imagine how hard this makes moving on and starting over.
When one person doesn’t want to move on, it can be even more strenuous because they now have a legal reason to be in the other person’s space. If that person is narcissistic or worse, they will ensure this time in-proximity-but-not-together is spent in Hell.
Narcissists are crafty at coming up with plausibly deniable situations. I would be rich if I had a nickel for every time I heard a story about a narcissistic ex-partner who was acting out in legal ways to harass their victim.
“You can’t stop me from driving down a street.” After they repeatedly drive up and down the road in front of the house or past their place of work.
“I can shop there. It isn’t your business.” Because they stopped to get coffee at a shop on the same block as their victim’s home.
“I have a moral obligation to report my truth.” When they call their ex’s workplace to report an alleged crime or misconduct so they will either lose their job or get in trouble.
Yes, they can legally do these things. However, they are only doing them because they are trying to make life hard for the person they are stalking. They want to control every aspect of their life, keep tabs on them, and let them know that they can never get rid of them as long as they don’t want to be gotten rid of. They also want them to know that there are consequences if they don’t give in to what the stalker wants. It’s coercive control.
When they have a pass to be in the home because of a loophole like cohabitating, they have even more time and opportunity to be menaces and stalkers while denying their actions.
It’s Diabolical And Dangerous
Any average person wouldn’t want to continue living in the vicinity of someone they just ended a relationship with. If this is a necessary evil, they do what they can to minimize interactions and establish clear boundaries. They want to cut ties as much as possible until a move-out occurs.
Someone who is either in denial that the breakup happened, delusional about the current relationship status, or is too dysfunctional to accept it, won’t like the new boundaries.
Often, the perpetrator of in-home stalking has a history of controlling, manipulative behavior. They likely went through phones, tracked locations, attempted to isolate from friends and family, and managed interactions with people they deemed threatening to their spot in the relationship.
Whether or not that spot was in a romantic sense doesn’t matter. It’s the closeness and interpersonal connection that does. This spot can be held by friends, coworkers, as easily as those they deem as romantic rivals. Their dominating tactics won’t work as well if their target has someone to confide in, so the name of the game is partitioning.
They want to create a line of demarcation between their victim and anyone or anything that may be able to come to their aid. If they can create an atmosphere of fear and obligation, they can assert their will into the scenario and keep their target from reaching help as easily or gathering outside perspective.
Perspective is necessary in this kind of situation. Without it, the victim is left to the chaos in their head and is bogged down by FOG (fear, obligation, and guilt)
The stalker relies on the “kindness” of their victim. I say kindness because that is what it looks like from the outside. The victim may even convince themselves that they are being kind when the reality is that they are walking on eggshells inside their home. It isn’t kindness at all; it’s survival.
The victim is trying to keep the peace by acquiescing to the stalker’s demands. They do attempt to push back and enforce their boundaries, but it’s extra difficult because they cannot make them leave. They live there too, so the victims’ hands are tied.
It’s a seemingly impossible situation to get ahead of.
It Often Ends With Domestic Violence
Not every time, but the dominoes are lined up for this outcome.
Unless the coercion worked, at some point, the in-home-stalker will face the fact that their victim does not want them there and is not going to get back together with them.
This is an enraging thought. All of their effort is for nothing, and they don’t want to lose. This is an unacceptable conclusion.
A talker does not want to feel obsolete. Their actions are based on their constant need to be seen and heard. They don’t simply want to be noticed; they crave it like a drug. They need their fix. They are control and attention junkies.
If their drug is being denied to them, they do what you’d expect -> whatever it takes to get control back.
This is dangerous because it’s not a public place. The people in the area are accustomed to seeing the stalker there at all hours. They don’t think twice about them coming and going. They don’t question things. It’s just another day in the neighborhood.
A lot can happen behind the walls of a home in an instant.
Is This Your Situation?
If it is, get out ASAP.
The structure of this kind of cohabitation is a setup for failure.
If the person you are trying to break up with won’t accept it. Keeps tabs on you. Refuses to accept your boundaries. Goes through your belongings. Follows you in and out of the home. Attempts to scare you. Is making your life hard to live within the walls of your space. Has a history of stalking or DV after a past breakup. Kick them out, or you leave.
Make plans faster to be away from them. Your life may depend on it.
