It might be useful to know the
Florida Department of Law Enforcement page on domestic violence in that state:
http://www.fdle.state.fl.us/FSAC/Publications/SACNotes/domestic_violence_94-95.asp.
As for the advice about never marrying, look at the passages I emphasized below to see other relationships that are subject to the state's domestic violence law:
In Florida, domestic violence is defined as any "assault, aggravated assault, battery, aggravated battery, sexual assault, sexual battery, stalking, aggravated stalking, or any criminal offense resulting in physical injury or death of one family or household member by another who is or was residing in the same single dwelling unit"; which, with the exception of robbery, includes all violent crimes. Further, "persons who have a child in common regardless of whether they have been married or have resided together at any time" are also covered by the domestic violence law.
I'm not a lawyer, only a person with some ability to read plain English and a little ability to understand it.
It seems to me, though, that any two or more people who live together for any length of time under the same roof could be covered by the domestic violence law--regardless of their sex or their relationship. A girlfriend (or boyfriend), a roommate, another resident of your college dormitory--any of those people and others
might be able to claim protection under the domestic violence law. My suspicion is that a visiting friend who stays overnight or whose home you visit overnight might be able to claim coverage under the law too--especially if he or she claims that it's part of an arrangement in which sometimes she sleeps at your home and sometimes you sleep at hers. I don't know: they're guesses, and the argument's credibility would depend upon case law (with which I'm unfamiliar) and the claimant or her lawyer.
And if I read the law correctly (again, as a layperson) divorce does not affect that coverage if the two people have children in common, whether natural or adopted or in some kind of informal arrangement where the person stands in the father's or mother's shoes. (Think of "My girlfriend's little boy was like my own son" or "My son thinks of him as the father he never knew.") Again I don't know, but I guess that surrogate parenthood probably does make the participants in a sufficiently intimate relationship to create the possibility of domestic victimization, which I think is among the issues such laws attempt to address.
I don't think
anyone wants to encourage or even tolerate situations in which people in domestic relationships kill, beat, or prey upon each other. We want domestic relationships to be warm, loving, and supportive, which is as they should be. But there obviously is the possibility for abusing what society intends as protections
against abuse. People who serve in the military and law enforcement officers seem to be especially vulnerable to such abuse because claims of domestic violence can terminate their careers. Judges, I suppose, probably choose to err on the side of the claimant because they don't want to risk making mistakes that could end in someone's death.
At the same time, it seems to me, that the only good (but still imperfect) safeguards against being victimized by a false claim of domestic violence would be never to marry, never to have children (in or out of marriage), never to share a home with anyone (at least not for long enough to be seen as a resident situation), and never to enter into any deep or lasting friendships that could be misconstrued as domestic relationships. Be a loner. Never get involved with anyone. Don't sleep with anyone. Disappear from the life of your family: especially don't let your parents, siblings, or any of your children or an ex-wife know where you live or how to find you, and stay away from them all.
Who would want to live that way, or could?
I feel for you, by the way, and I should have said so at the beginning.