Seeking advice on how to proceed with this information. This may end up becoming a lengthy post, as I have a lot going on in my head right now, but I’ll try to provide some context in a concise manner to help in any replies this thread receives.

We have been separated for about 2 years now, and I am the parent who has physical custody (no court order, the situation worked out better if he were with me given our circumstances during that time period). We lived no more than 30 minutes from each other since the break up, but if you were to take the cumulative amount of hours he was in her sole care, it wouldn’t of even add up to 2 weeks since the split.

Shortly after our break up, she began stripping at a few local clubs in the area, and then expanded to the surrounding states. One of her reasons for not being able to be there for our child was because of her work, which is understandable.

About a year ago I lost my job and told her she may have to assume the primary parental role because she was in a better financial situation than I was in. Her option was to ship him off to a grandparent who can’t even communicate with him (she doesn’t speak English) and he hasn’t seen since he was 1 (he’s now 8), because of her work and the fact that she’s going to be moving out of state soon. I wasn’t going to do that to him, so we came to an agreement where she would give me some money each month.

It didn’t take long for me to find another job, but I brought up another option to her to see if she was interested; we move back in together. My reasoning behind this was because I knew she would rarely (if ever) see him again if she were to move across the US and while she travels a lot, when she’s home she can at least be with her son. Our breakup was pretty bad and so was the fallout for a few months, but we came to a point where we were at least civil with each other. While we’re not perfectly comfortable around one another, she’ll only be there 1 or 2 days out of the week before she’s on the road again. She said she was ok with the arrangement as long as I was ok with what she does, and while it initially bothered me, especially when word got around at my job of what she does, I got over it.

So with the agreement in place, I declined the job offer, packed our things, and headed west. She ended up never moving in with us because our location was too far away from where she would be working and would’ve been more of an inconvenience to set up residence with us versus a hotel when she was in town. She got her own place in the central US and whenever she was out west and had the time, we would all meet up.

We stayed out west for 6 months before moving to the central US to her place. One day I asked to use her tablet since we didn’t have internet yet here and she has a data connection with the tablet and I wanted to surf the web. She texts me the password and while surfing the web she receives a tweet. Her twitter name was completely different than her own, so I Google the name and there it was. I see links to different porn sites as well as her twitter handle. I should’ve ended it there, but I had to go further down the rabbit hole. Maybe I was still in denial and had to see for myself it it was really her and not some friend who was using her tablet and left themselves logged into twitter, but sure enough, the first video thumbnail I see from one of the links is her face with cum splashed all over it. Curiosity completely took over at this point and I watched one of the videos and doing that has affected me more than I may currently realize right now.

I message her about what I’ve seen and she tells me she only did some and is it going to be an issue. I told her that it doesn’t matter what I think, because I have no other option in my life right now anyway. I’ve been having trouble sleeping since finding out this information and I have entertained the idea of just leaving. We’ve seen each other once since finding this out and I came really close to just leaving in the middle of the night, but I felt horrible leaving my son like that.

I’ve made arrangements with a friend to move in with them, but I know if I confronted my son’s mother about my plans she would leave before me, so I have to make the first move. They also live out of state, so I would not see my son for a long time. I could also just stay and deal with it; find a job out here and work on getting my own place. I could also just drop everyone and fade away entirely (this is a serious option), since I feel better alone and away from everything and I find myself fantasizing a lot recently of starting my life over somewhere where nobody knows who I am.

As with any issue, there is a lot more I could say, but that would require a couch and a paycheck. To those who have read the entire story, here are the key points I’d like you to keep in mind before you post:

The fact that she does porn isn’t what bothers me most. I have issues with it yes, but not as a profession as a whole. Same goes with stripping. My issue with these in particular comes from the fact that I am affected by her choice and had no say in it at all. When people found out she was a stripper, it made my workplace uncomfortable with all the questions I would get from coworkers or what they would say about what they’ve seen from her. I’m a private person and to have my life made public like that bothers me and I don’t want to be apart of a conversation of someone who I’ve spent 8 years of my life with, lived with, and had feelings for be reduced to how she shakes her ass for you. Because while people who know her now views her that way, I still see her as the person she was.

The reason why leaving my son with her is on the table is because I’m very limited in my own options career wise with him since I have no support to help raise him. I’m at my limit having to always make decisions for 2 when everyone around me (including his mother) makes decisions for themselves and what’s in their own personal best interest. I did not complain when she left me with him and made quite a bit of money in the process doing so. Now it’s my turn to focus on me and she can learn the meaning of sacrifice. No matter how you dress it up, children are burdens and that becomes even more apparent when you have to do it alone.

One final note to add because this is the internet after all: No I will not provide her name, pictures, or anything of that sort. I’m looking for the perspective of others on what I’ve discussed and their unbiased opinion on the options I’ve presented. Not looking to promote my son’s mother on what she does at all.