practicalities - mail

[frogjumpsout]

Hi everyone,

Sorry for this rather boring question, but a boundary-defying letter from my NM has left me verklempt for days with sadness and panic. We are going to move this spring, and I won't be sharing our address with my estranged FOO. I don't want my new address coming up in an Internet search, so should I switch to a PO box? One of those online services? And would my partner have to switch, too?

Thanks for reading!

[Andeza]

As far as I know there's only two ways to hide your address. Make and use a trust to purchase the house, or change your name.

In our family, we just know that mail will come sometimes and we chuck it. As you heal, you might or might not find yourself getting to the point where you pull a letter from her out of the box, snort and shrug your shoulders, drop it in the trash on the way inside, and don't give it a second thought.

[JustKathy]

These days it's all but impossible to hide your address. As Andeza said when buying a house you'd have to use a trust. Even if you rent, they'll still find it. Once you turn in a change of address to the post office it's out there. The post office actually sells change of address info. I used to work in retail advertising and that's how we would locate customers who had moved. If you've ever wondered how certain junk mail always finds you, that's how.

If you're going to be moving near your estranged FOO a PO box may keep them from finding your house (at least for a while), but if someone is really determined they'll find you. I also tried ghosting with no forwarding address and my father was able to get it from a magazine that he knew I subscribed to. He called them and said he wanted to buy a gift subscription and they confirmed my address. I figured this out when the magazine, which I had canceled, started showing up again. I called them and told them I had canceled my subscription and they informed me that my father was now paying for it. I asked for a supervisor and tore into her pretty badly, but the damage was done.

You might be able to hold them off for a while by not turning in a change of address to the post office and instead notify anyone important of the new address with a postcard. It's really impossible to hide forever, though. If they wanted to spend the money on a private investigator they could probably have your new address in a matter of days.

[frogjumpsout]

Thanks very much for your replies, Andeza and JustKathy! Not being found by determined crazy people is probably a pipe dream. It's too bad, but it's an important truth to acknowledge, and I really appreciate your honesty.

In my own case, I would be renting a place a state over from the FOO. They came to a previous rental apartment when I was previously NC so I'd been hoping to avoid that scenario as well as the unwanted mail. However, see above !

That's so devious of your father, JK, I'm sorry. Andeza here's hoping I get to that awesome place of "meh" you describe!