Karen, I appreciate your perspective and believe me - I've thought of that and often. I hate to admit this, but my biggest fear is MY safety. An alcoholic always has one person they feel the need to dump on and with him it's me. The police by him really don't care to deal with this domestic stuff, even though it's their job, but it's a bigger city and they have bigger fish to fry. They refused to deal with the harrassing phone calls - I had the department by me deal with it. If he wasn't an alcoholic, I never would have moved up here in the first place.

I am SO much happier up here! I have moved a half hour closer to him and asked him to move a half hour closer as well when he sold the house (which puts him closer to his work and in a cheaper to live county) and he refused. Up here he's close to my family and my ex's family so he gets to see them often, which he wouldn't get to do if we lived in Madison. For now we will stay here. Maybe in the next couple years, after my doggies are gone, I will consider moving closer. For now, we're doing the best we can with what we have.