An abusive relationship can wreak havoc on the lives of the kids and adults involved, and this story is no different.

When a child’s moment of carelessness inadvertently targets their mother’s abusive ex who’s been stalking them, it sets the stage for a surprising and satisfying act of justice.

Read on for the full story!

Ex abusive stepdad stopped stalking us after he got the blame for something I actually did

When I was about 8 years old, my mom married her 2nd husband.

The guy was an AH. They were married for about a year and a half.

He was a real piece of work, to say the least.

He punched her in the face on Christmas because she let my brother and I spend the holiday with my cousins instead of his side of the family.

She was hospitalized and needed stitches.

They were always fighting and he would go psycho over the stupidest things.

Thankfully, she had the good sense to leave him, but he didn’t let go of her or us very easily.

But the family couldn’t be rid of him that easily.

He stalked us for 3 years. He would drive by our new house constantly.

He would call me when my mother went to the store and try to get my brother and I to tell him what store she was at.

He would scream at me through the phone and even came over a few times.

But he didn’t just stop at threatening phone calls.

He tried violently kicking our door in while I hid in the living room with my mom crying in the corner. There is so much more, but I’ll spare you for the sake of time.

My mother eventually got a restraining order, but he never complied.

By the time we called the police, he was long gone. It was crazy that he kept this up for 3 years.

Why did it stop at 3 years you ask? Well, queue my revenge.

The revenge started off innocent enough.

It started out as a mistake on my part and wasn’t originally intended to get him in trouble, but it ended up that way and I did nothing to stop it.

I was a forgetful kid. I always forgot my house key and would end up stuck outside until my older brother got home from school. It sucked.

So one day I come home from school and discovered that, yet again, I forgot my house key. I did not want to sit and wait 2 hours for my brother.

So they take matters into their own hands – literally.

This time, I go to a window that looks like it can easily be forced open. I pressed hard into it and applied pressure inward and towards the back.

I have no idea how I did it, but I broke the window. It wasn’t shattered, but a big piece of glass broke across the pane and a big triangle came out.

They tried to pretend like nothing happened, which didn’t work.

I panicked and left it alone and just waited for my brother.

I didn’t tell him or my mom that I broke the window because I knew I would be grounded for a month.

Well, of course my mom noticed. I didn’t fess up.

They had no way of knowing what would happen next.

Next thing I know, the police are at my house. I was freaking out.

They asked her if she had any enemies. She brought up her ex. The police immediately put him as the number one suspect.

I didn’t speak up because I knew I’d get in HUGE trouble and this had gone way farther than I ever anticipated.

But they wonder, is it really such a bad thing?

I also knew he deserved it and maybe it would deter him from continuing to stalk us.

The police went to his house and harassed him for a bit.

I guess he was pretty bewildered and insisted it wasn’t him. Well, of course it wasn’t.

The police scared him, but were unable to prosecute because there was obviously no evidence.

The police made quite an impression on the stalker.

He was pretty shaken up, but then again, so were we when he tried kicking in our door.

He went crazy and was like, “I have no idea what you’re talking about! It wasn’t me!”

The police said they’d be keeping an eye on him and roughed him up.

It appears the police scared him straight.

He never drove by again (at least that we saw). All the craziness stopped, and we could breathe again.

I told my mom 20 years after the fact. She was so shocked. We shared a good laugh! 🙂

The stalker got more than what was coming to him.

What did Reddit think?

A guardian angel was certainly looking after this family.

Funny how a broken window actually led to a positive outcome here.

This empathetic redditor is glad the child took action.

This commenter would hate to see what would happen if the child didn’t intervene.

The child’s innocent mistake became the catalyst for reclaiming their family’s peace, sending a once-dominating figure back into hiding.

Fate has a funny way of working sometimes.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.