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Relationships

Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

My dads girlfriend stalks us

43 replies

seasolar · 12/08/2023 07:13

Backstory. I am a fully grown adult. I haven't seen my dad in over a decade. He was exceptionally abusive, an alcoholic and all round terrible human.

He has a partner, long term. Very odd woman, clearly also an alcoholic however appears to be functioning. She's lost all her family due to her relationship with him (so my grandma, his mum, says). Ive never met his girlfriend.

Years ago my sister found her social media. Call me odd but I was compelled to look. It became apparent that she had been posting (indirectly) about me and my siblings. All of it total nonsense but some times she seems to find out elements of things and some things I have no clue how she would know. She posts on social media multiple times a day.

Its obsessive.

How do I deal with it?

OP posts:
Soontobe60 · 12/08/2023 08:25

YoBeaches · 12/08/2023 08:23

@Soontobe60 I don't agree.

It includes your example (harassment) but isn't limited to it. Also includes acts of defamation, false accusations, libel, slander, monitoring, doxing as other examples.

None of which has happened. Liking a post from a supplier to a bithday party is hardly a cyber crime 😂😂😂

AmeliPoison · 12/08/2023 08:28

@Sueveneers I have read it thanks there were no actual threats that's op's paranoia. My comment was clear, just because we don't share the same opinion doesn't mean I didn't read it well just because I didn't reach the same conclusion as you, how very arrogant and narrow minded!

Soontobe60 · 12/08/2023 08:34

https://www.norfolk.police.uk/sites/norfolk/files/2021-08/Cyber%20%26%20digital%20stalking.pdf

Heres some information about cyberstalking for those of you who think the OP is being cyberstalked. You will notice that the only point that could be classed as cyberstalking, ‘using social media… to monitor someone’ is exactly what the op is also doing. Does that mean they are cyberstalking each other?

https://www.norfolk.police.uk/sites/norfolk/files/2021-08/Cyber%20%26%20digital%20stalking.pdf

Awittyfool · 12/08/2023 08:38

How would you even know she “liked” a post from a party supplier you used in 2015 or earlier?

I agree it’s normal to check up on people who are posting against you. However I think it’s just the modern version of malicious gossip. It’s an outlet for her to be nasty.

You’ve moved on. Don’t be dragged back into your dads world over this.

Sueveneers · 12/08/2023 09:07

seasolar · 12/08/2023 07:45

You are all so right and I know that I shouldn't look.

But wouldn't you?

She keeps making thinly veiled threats that she's going to tell everyone everything. I don't know what she means she can tell people what she likes. Everyone knows what my dad was like and what he did. I've had to live the the shame of him and the embarrassment of him before I cut him out of my life.

It's just knowing that someone is obsessed with looking at you. Finding things out about you. Eg she finds pictures of you on social media... sees badges you are wearing and then makes comments about that club you are involved in. She follows all local businesses even though she lives miles and miles away! She even liked someone who supplied something for my party !

It can't be legal surely?

@AmeliPoison There is no need for you to be rude and nasty. You clearly did not read all of OP's posts. She says it here in her second post at 7:45am, before you replied at 8:04am:

"She keeps making thinly veiled threats that she's going to tell everyone everything."

Soontobe60 · 12/08/2023 09:18

Sueveneers · 12/08/2023 09:07

@AmeliPoison There is no need for you to be rude and nasty. You clearly did not read all of OP's posts. She says it here in her second post at 7:45am, before you replied at 8:04am:

"She keeps making thinly veiled threats that she's going to tell everyone everything."

Making threats to whom, about whom? She could mean ‘I’m going to tell everyone how my DH had been badly treated by his ex wife’.

royalwatch · 12/08/2023 09:20

Block her? She wont be able to see you any
More

Or. Send a friend request?

Thesearmsofmine · 12/08/2023 09:25

She can only see or use information that is out there in the public domain. Block her, put all your privacy setting on the highest options and stop looking at her profile.

HowAmYa · 12/08/2023 09:28

You're cyberstalking her OP. Understand that.

Put this behind you. Draw the line. Take steps to get over it. Get therapy if you need to help with the compulsion to look and the obsessive thoughts. But stop this.

RobinWoodPrinceofLeaves · 12/08/2023 09:29

Change your security settings on your social media so she can’t see your posts.

It’s only illegal if she is threatening you or causing you fear and alarm. She can check you on Facebook as much as you can check on her.

YoBeaches · 12/08/2023 09:50

@Soontobe60 and neither did I say it had.
I simply pointed out you were wrong.

It's better all round for women particularly to understand what may or may not constitute an online crime they can act upon, than to dismiss her concerns entirely.

seasolar · 12/08/2023 10:53

@Awittyfool

On Instagram the supplier posted a photo from my event. I follow the supplier. I wasn't tagged or mentioned but I noticed that the GF had liked it. This particular incident wasn't from 2015.. this was fairly recent.

OP posts:
seasolar · 12/08/2023 10:56

I understand the point about me also 'stalking' her by looking.

But I am looking at one outlet that I know she posts about me on. I don't care who you are or what you say, I am sure most people would do the same.

Really no need to shame me or others posting to help me . I was asking for advice on how to handle it not a moral dressing down.

Hope none of you get the same.

So sad after years of mental abuse from my dad I now have to deal with this kind of crap.

OP posts:
Pinkbonbon · 12/08/2023 14:31

I think some people on here obviously have no idea what it's like to feel that cold dread in the pitt of their stomach because they've discovered they are being stalked.

It's perfectly normal for op to check into her suspicions. To go down the rabbit hole confirming them. It doesn't mean she is stalking the person back ffs.

However...it could potentially become unhealthy.

Blocking may seem like the best route. But, what if this unhinged woman then starts to go further afield to spy on op? Blocking may also tell this woman - I know you've been posting about us. Which is probably what she wants.

I would suggest, setting some posts to 'friends only'. That way she only gets to see unimportant stuff. Though you must be careful to check your friends are all ppl you know. Not fake profiles she's made to spy. Delete any unknowns.

Blocking is fine too. Just maybe be on your guard for her showing up around the place. Eg: warn your workplace.

Be aware of what you are posting online. Don't link locations ect...

She might be all talk of course.
Also...is it possible HE is actually the one posting?

ChristmasFluff · 12/08/2023 16:24

Lock down ypu accounts on social media and block her anywhere she arises.

It's probably not her anyway, it's probably your dad using her account or pretending to be her to fish you in eventually. He's succeeding.

AvidMerrian · 12/08/2023 17:00

Just write her off as a nutter.

What is it that she thinks she could do some great drama about. No one will take her side anyway.

your best possible course of action is to live your life as if she has never existed.

mindutopia · 12/08/2023 20:16

You have my sympathies, OP. This sounds so very much like my mum, and if not for a few details being different, I would think it was.

My mum married a man who abused one, possibly both of his daughters. One hasn’t spoken to him since shortly after he was arrested and the other only very occasionally every few years. They were late teens at this time. My mum has said awful things about them over the years and has created a whole narrative (that he hasn’t denied, because it’s useful and distracting) about why they are NC to due with greed and money and their mum not getting as much as she wanted in the divorce, etc. No mention to anyone of how he sexually abused his own child. She does keep an eye on them on social media and tries to get details about his grandchildren (who he’s never met). It’s a weird and unhealthy obsession. She hates them (she’s only ever met the one daughter once for about 10 minutes), but also posts all sorts of rubbish on social media very performatively about how blessed they are for ‘their’ daughters and grandchildren - a daughter he molested and the grandchildren neither of them have ever met. 🙄

Interestingly, since I found all this out and went NC with them both, the same thing has started with me. Lots of social media stalking, harassing messages and ‘stories’ about my family and I that aren’t true. They’re almost exactly the same lies spread about his daughters. Right down to the ‘reasons’ we are NC, supposedly.

My advice and what I’ve done is to lock down all information about yourself - social media, public details, electoral roll, etc. And deploy your own flying monkeys.

I have friends and family who do still engage with them to a very small degree. I’ve made sure they know the truth and I ask them to correct any information out there about me that they hear that’s false. I also live my life quite honestly with people and they know me well enough to know there’s no way I would have done the things I’ve been accused of doing. Actually when I started talking, it turns out lots of people who had been hearing all these stories about his daughters all these years kinda thought they were a load of rubbish. They listened and nodded along, but they had a lot of doubts and questions. It turns out that people sniffed out the situation pretty accurately and could see right through the misinformation campaign.

I get it though because it does shake your sense of self. Even when you know something is untrue, you question yourself and your behaviour because it all sounds so outlandish that someone could be as crazy as they seem. Maybe I’m the crazy one?! It’s only when I occasionally tell the story to someone else that I realise how batshit they actually are and that it’s most certainly not my fault. It’s horrible to think that someone out there, even someone who doesn’t know you, thinks you’re a terrible person. I’ve had friends of my mum who I’ve never even met get in touch to say how awful I am and how I need to apologise for everything I’ve done to them. It’s really unsettling.

seasolar · 13/08/2023 13:06

@mindutopia

Thank you for sharing that. It is exactly how I imagine his girlfriend is treating us. I cannot imagine how it must feel for that to be your mum but pretty much everything you described about her partner, my dad is all those things.

Either way, I can't seem to shake this feeling that these people should just focus on themselves and not pretend like this.

Yes I will definitely take your advice and just ignore it. Pretty sure my socials are locked down. I've just deactivated some and I will leave it at that.

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