5 Things You Should Do After You've Left an Abuser

A victim is at risk when she has left an abusive person. You need to take steps to protect yourself after you've left an abuser. The abuser will try to find you. Do not be foolish to believe that he will simply let you walk away. Here are five things you should do after you've left an abuser.

Send Mail To Your Male Friend

Do not make the mistake of telling the post office your new address. Make sure to have all the mail forwarded to a friend so that he can't find you. All it takes is somebody writing "address service requested" from a business envelope to find the new address that the post office has on file for you. You want the mail sent to a friend that you know will not give up your real location. Male friends work out best just in case the abuser has the guts to show up there.

Switch Banks

You might want to open up an account online. The online bank accounts give you the chance to decide on several different banks. The abuser won't be able to detect what place you bank at when you establish a new bank account online. Make sure to have the statements sent to a po box or email.

New Email Address

You want to get a new email address. Make the password to the new email address something that he can never guess in a million years. Make sure that you change your birth date and security question to a fake answer so that he can't find out it belongs to you.

The abuser may be smart enough to hack into your old email account. It doesn't matter how many times that you change the password and security questions since the abuser can find a way around it.

Use Internet Phones

Don't make the mistake of calling family and friends with a landlines or cell phone. The land line and cell phone can be traced back to the city that you are at each time that you called them. Internet phones such as Vonage and MagicJack do not tell them the city that you are located in since it works over the internet. You can even change the number to a 800 number or out of state number. You have a variety of options. Skype is another option that people frequently use as well.

Use New Credit Cards

Don't use any of your old credit cards. Make sure to put monitor alerts on your credit report so your abuser can't use it to make your life miserable or find you. Obtain new credit cards from banks that are on the Internet for safety reasons. Make sure to have the statements sent to you via email each month.

The top five things that you should do after you've left an abuser is forward mail, switch to online bank, and create a new email address. You want to use internet phones and obtain new credit cards as well.

Sources: www.vonage.com www.magicjack.com www.skype.com