Would you change your life?

Ok let me give you some background.

When I was 18 years old I married a man I had only known for 3 months. (yes I'm already aware of this stupidity lol) After I married him things changed drastically. He became possesive and verally abusive. He didn't want me to be in contact with any of my old friends and would become violently angry if I spoke to them. Within a couple of months things went from bad to worse. He became more and more violent and abusive. I became pregnant and he told me often that he would take the baby far away where I could never see it if I defied him. I lost the baby because he kicked me through a hotel room door. I finally did get a friend who helped me realize that this treatment was not normal and that I needed to get out before he killed me. We were together for about 8 months and married for 1 year from wedding to divorce being final.

He spent years harrassing me. He threatened to burn down my mother's house, where I was living. He followed my friends and I around town when we went out. I got a protection order against him but he still made sure I knew that he was watching.

Finally he met someone new. They married and she became pregnant. I had also met someone and become pregnant. I didn't hear from him for months. Then, after we both had our children and he had driven his wife insane and put her in a mental home, he showed up at my apartment while my fiance' was at work. He said he wanted to apologize. I had heard this before and told him to leave or I would call the police.

This was the last I saw of him for 18 years. Then, about a year ago, he contacted me online. He joined a meetup group I was running and began harassing me on the site. I closed the group and called the police. They immediately accessed the old records and went and spoke with him. I stopped hearing from him but I was already afraid. He only lived about an hour away. He knew where I lived. He had been watching me all this time.

Then we moved out of state. Far away from where he was. We didn't do this because of him at all, it was a change we had been planning for a long time. Again he found me online. He didn't say anything, just made sure that I knew he had found me on this new site and that he was watching. My heart skipped.

I began thinking about changing my name on every site. I began thinking that I needed to go offline. I was frightened. But I am a writer and I use my real name. I want to become a well known writer. I need to continue to use my name to do that. I realized that he was just trying to frighten me and control me. Was I really willing to give my power up to this man as I had done so long ago? NO!

So what if he came and found me. I doubted he would try anyway because of the distance and how little this would actually be worth to him. But more to the point I did not want to give up my personal power. I have changed since he knew me and I did not want to become that frightened, easily controlled girl again. My husband supports my decision but he worries about it. He still thinks I should have removed myself from everywhere on the net. But he does understand why I won't and supports it.

What would you do? Would you change your whole life just to avoid the chance that this idiot might find you?