A Living Nightmare: Surviving Domestic Violence

Across the United States, indeed all over the world, women are imprisoned in abusive, controlling relationships. Many believe there is no escape and still others have no concept of another life, pain-free and filled with love, respect, and safety. Despite the wealth of education on spousal abuse in its various forms, this epidemic cycle is still widespread with no end in sight. Many who have escaped this vicious cycle counsel those still trapped, offering hope and friendship. I am not a counselor nor is this yet another how to...or signs of... article. My name is Pat and this is my story.

My first marriage, to David, was very short-lived; lasting a mere eight months before he walked out. He showed definite signs of being abusive and controlling yet he was the one who left, not I. Growing up with my father in control of everything, I thought nothing of David's behavior. In fact, his father was often drunk and abusive to his family and it seemed he would continue that destructive cycle. He hit me once, apologized profusely, and during the remaining five months of our marriage, never did it again, but the controlling side of his nature was very evident.

I rarely left our apartment and never had so much as fifty cents in my pocket. He controlled the money, and me. Since I didn't have a driver's license and didn't know how to drive, he would even go to the grocery store with, hand me the money at the cash register, and then demand all the change, no matter how small the amount, for himself. We had a joint bank account, but he carried the check book, took out whatever he wanted, and refused to let me access the money. That account was opened with the five hundred dollars my father sent as a wedding present yet I was not allowed to touch it.

In time, I learned not to take so much as a short walk in case he called from work. If he called and I didn't answer the phone, he came home angry and read me the riot act, insisting I account for every minute of the day. Rather than be yelled at, screamed at, and accused of acts I never considered, let along committed, I simply stayed home. Thus I had no friends outside of a girlfriend stationed in Korea, where long distance rates prevented phone contact.

On the other hand, with the typical hypocrisy of the control-freak, he frequently went out for drinks after work without so much as a phone call. I would spend hours worrying until he stumbled home drunk. He didn't care that I worried, agonizing that something had happened to him. He insisted that since he worked, he would do as he pleased and that I do as I was told. He even limited my own alcohol intake to two beers during social gatherings, stating he didn't want people thinking his wife was a lush. Yet, I could hold my liquor better than he. We proved it one night with two six packs when he challenged me. Now, I am not a saint. I do like to drink on occasion and this is no exception. I accepted the challenge. After four beers straight, he passed out. I finished the rest, including the two remaining of his six pack and my own, and went to bed. Despite the proof, he still insisted I only drink two while he drank as much as he wanted, often too drunk to do anything. I did as I was told: limited my alcohol to two beers or drinks, and let him do whatever he wanted, when he wanted. It was simply easier that way.

The first and only Christmas/New Year's holidays we spent together, he drove us to Ohio to spend Christmas with his family. His father, a recovering alcoholic at that point and no longer abusive after treatment, welcomed me with open arms, as did his mother and brother. While there, his own family cautioned me about the dangers of abused children continuing the cycle with their families. Certain he would never hurt me, I gave appropriate responses but didn't think about it again.

Low on funds, we went to his bank for travel cash as we were heading to Texas to spend New Year's with my family. He'd often told me he had over a thousand dollars in his account but couldn't access it. He never explained the details of an account he couldn't touch and I never asked, simply took his word for it. Getting a glimpse of his savings book, I noticed a balance of only 100.00 dollars. Again, I buried my head in the sand to the point I never thought of it again and he obtained a signature loan of 400.00 so we could continue our trip.

Christmas night, his parents out for a few hours, he showed me a few of his old comic books, part of a collection. Feeling playful, I pulled it from his hand, but he tightened his grip and I inadvertently ripped a tiny piece off the corner of one page, hardly noticeable. In an instant, play turned to anger and he smacked me hard enough to leave a deep red handprint on my thigh. I cried out and, tears blurring my vision, went into his parent's room. As I lay on the bed, crying in silence, I heard his brother scolding him for slapping me. He basically read David the riot act. David came to the bedroom, apologized profusely, and it never happened again. Instead, his abusive tendencies took a more subtle approach.

Though we rarely experimented with sexual things outside the normal activities, he began to show a more marked preference for anal intercourse. I find this act painful and would rather not participate but he liked it on occasion. After the trip to Ohio, he demanded it more often, especially for some perceived slight, something I needed to apologize for, and used it as emotional black mail. Basically, if I was sorry about something, I needed to let him perform this act on me. It became more frequent a he displayed more dominant, controlling behavior. He did nothing to make it easier or less painful, only did what he wanted, and left me to cry myself to sleep-in silence of course. If he heard me cry, he would twist things around until I felt even guiltier.

Still I didn't think I was being abused. Quite frankly, the idea never entered my head. Even when he came home from work one Friday and told me he wanted to spend a few days alone, in a hotel, to think, I thought nothing of it, nothing unusual. He returned Monday, after work, stated he wanted a divorce, packed some clothes, and left to stay with others. I cried, begged, pleaded with him not to leave me, Over the next few days, I called him at work several times, trying to get him to talk things over and possibly try to work something out. I apologized for anything and everything, promised anything and everything, until he stated that he'd made up his mind and would get the divorce no matter what I said. When I asked him why he married me, he told me flat out, it was out of spite since everyone he worked with warned him not to do it. That marriage lasted eight months and I've never regretted the day he walked out on me, except that I wasn't the one walking out.

In the same apartment complex, I met my second husband, Bill. He helped me with the divorce, and stayed by my side, a true gentleman. Or so I thought for a long time until he showed his true colors, brought to light by alcohol. I escaped bad times, only to find myself in the midst of hell, a fifteen year nightmare, when I finally opened my eyes to what was going on around me.

I met my second husband, Bill, at the small rundown apartment complex I lived in with David before he left. Reeling from my husband's desertion, still coming to terms with it, I hung out with the manager's son, whom everyone knew as Doc. He introduced me to Bill and, not facing the fact of David's controlling tendencies, I accepted the friendship, and then the interest, of another man. The night we met, we only drank a few beers and talked for a few hours, where I learned he, too, was divorced but had four children from the eight year marriage. He admitted he'd enjoy having sex with me but I shied off at that point. He walked me the short distance to my door and didn't even try to kiss me goodnight, a perfect gentleman. Over night, I changed my mind.

During our last civil conversation, David told me to 'have some fun' if I could even find a man interested in me as a woman. No longer sad, but getting angry, I followed his sarcastic suggestion. I waited all day for Bill to come home from work. When I spotted his motorcycle parked at his door, I stepped outside, encountering Doc. We both knocked on doors and windows but received no answer so we walked the short distance across the main street of Sierra Vista to the Sorry Gulch saloon for a few drinks. I went to bed alone that night.

The next morning, Saturday, I found Bill tinkering with his motorcycle and chatted with him. He took me for a fun ride to Tucson where we walked through Reid Park holding hands, talking, and to the Swap Meet, the movies, etc. Night fell and we headed back to Sierra Vista, stopping at the I-10/I-92 intersection, which back then was empty except for a lone street lamp in a patch of dirt. We shared that first kiss and then, back in Sierra Vista, had a few drinks in a hotel lounge and then took a six pack of beer back to his apartment. I stayed the night and we weren't just talking. That first time was more retaliation against David and his parting comment than anything else. The rest was mutual interest, man to woman, between Bill and I. It was a weekend fling as I took the bus back to my home in Texas and stayed there for two months waiting for David to do the divorce, which he never did. I had to come back to Arizona and do it myself.

We'd kept in touch, Bill and I, over the phone and through long letters, some conversational and some hot and heavy, so he met me at the Tucson Bus Terminal when I came back at the beginning of August. During that time apart, I began to love him and it deepened over the next weeks as I stayed with him and took care of the divorce, with Bill's help. He remained a gentleman, and we openly went out, dating, having an affair. In the long run, I should have kept it to an affair status but hindsight is often twenty/twenty when foresight is blind. He behaved so differently from David, I couldn't help but love him. Years later, he would eradicate that love, but in 1988,I loved him with all my heart.

In October, we discovered I was pregnant with my first child, my daughter. I had been working at a nearby hotel cleaning rooms and in December my hours were cut to weekends only-thus, I quit. When I got home, I told him and he said..."You'd better find another *&^%$#@ job." He worked as a bouncer, paid under the table, at a bar owned by a local band. He knew the members well and we often spent the evening there. After that initial outburst, we settled into a routine. Though he spent several months working at the bar, he was collecting worker's compensation for an on the job injury and later unemployment when the worker's compensation paid off and his doctor released him back to work. He worked as an electrician, journeyman foreman, until the injury. When he started looking for work, the construction industry was in a major nationwide slump and jobs were hard to find. No one was hiring. After our daughter was born, he got a job at the cable company, as an installer. He stayed with that company through all the ownership and name changes, until Cox Communications acquired it. In a burst of temper fueled by a stunning hangover, he would later quit, but in Sierra Vista, we began a more stable life.

During this time, drugs were a part of our lives-marijuana and what was then known as speed or powder cocaine-on a casual use basis. We sometimes bought a little, often did it partying with friends, but my daughter always had a babysitter for those nights so she was never part of it. Many of our friends were bikers who belonged to the Nomadens, a biker group who also did much fundraising for charities. One day, Bill got the brilliant idea to buy a bunch of speed and sell the major portion of it. He got the stuff but instead of selling it, over time we did it all ourselves, partying with others as well. The scene was getting hot and heavy when the company transferred him to Wilcox, taking us away from the bikers, from the drugs, and down the road toward more stable future, or so I believed.

In Wilcox, we rented a one bedroom apartment, our baby girl sharing the bedroom with us-she was eighteen months old and already knew how to operate the remote control, which was perfect as she got up early and watched TV. The transfer included a raise but we never saw a regular paycheck those first months as the cable system was in such bad shape service calls were rampant and overtime abundant. We even bought car and Bill taught me to drive, in a standard transmission. Over the next six months, the overtime tapered off and things settled into routine.

Complacent, content, I began looking for a job. We were not married but had a daughter to raise, and I was tired of collecting welfare payments and food stamps. I have an Associate of Arts Degree from Brazosport College in Texas, but I'm not really trained or qualified to do much of anything except wait tables and clean. Though he made just enough to maintain our household income, he wanted me to work to help increase the funds while I pursued my first love, writing fiction. He didn't mind the writing but since I wasn't even published, it became a hobby rather than a career and I got a job waiting tables at the Solarium Dining Room of the Best Western Motel. Decent tips and a two dollar and fifty cent an hour paycheck barely replaced the welfare money and food stamps. That job lasted a few months, until I called in sick one Saturday and the manager drove by, saw the car gone, and no one answered the door. He fired me. The car belonged to Bill and he'd taken it and our daughter to Benson to visit his parents. It was Independence Day and a family get-together which he demanded I attend, paying no attention to the fact I had to work that day. A sign of the control-freak factor? Possibly. I paid no attention to it and simply found another job.

Mind you, during these early years, he was sober over ninety percent of the time. When he did drink too much, he usually simply went to sleep so I thought nothing of the drinking. It was infrequent and nothing odd happened, for a while. He did buy an SKS Chinese rifle, but guns don't bother me. I spent time in the military and know how to handle firearms. I also enjoyed target shooting and was quite frankly good at it. I rarely missed the target.

He also had swords, kept with the gun on a homemade rack hanging from the wall, well out of our five year old daughter's reach. One night, in pain, he went to the hospital, had a cortisone shot, and came home, and then started drinking. This drug reacted with the alcohol to cause a bizarre reaction as he got drunk. Early in our relationship, he'd told me of his background as a Navy SEAL, in combat missions in places like Honduras and Panama during the early eighties. He began to have what can only be called a flashback, though how he managed to fake it, I don't know. I found out years later, or rather accepted years later, that it was all a big lie.

He pointed that loaded rifle at me so I ducked behind a heavy piece of wood furniture, the bar. Aiming at me through the wood, he said, "You can't hide from me." I shook so hard my teeth chattered and my heart raced out of control. I couldn't believe this was happening. I stared down the barrel of that gun and froze, body and mind. He only looked at me, saying nothing more, for a few minutes before he finally ordered me to call Frank, a friend of ours. Frank worked in Public Works, actually he ran it. He came over and he gun was put away. After checking on our daughter, sleeping soundly, I stayed in the bedroom.

The first one awake the next morning, I stayed in the kitchen/living room, drinking coffee while the entire thing rolled through my head over and over like a bad film loop. I started shaking again wondering how bizarre a mood he would be in when he did wake up. He called out to me and I went to the bedroom doorway, crossing my arms over my chest, protecting myself it seems. He held his arms out and, unable to resist that silent plea, I went to him and believed the profound apologies he poured out. I told him how much he scared me, how terrified I had been, and he apologized even more, swearing nothing like that would ever happen again. I believed him. Two uneventful years later, we got married and life was as I wanted it, or so I thought.

But I'd believed him and fooled myself that things would only get better, but that was only the beginning of a nightmare. It went from good to bad to hell over the next ten years, complacence is shattered and the fire raged out of control.

Settled in the three bedroom house we owned along with the mortgage company, we decided at my instigation to have another child. It may seem silly and old-fashioned to some, but I was happy then. I wanted my daughter to have a brother and I wanted to give my man a son, a boy who'd grow up to be just like his Daddy. These days, while I would never wish my son had never been born, I'm so glad he isn't like his father.

For two years we tried to get pregnant, but during this time Bill's alcohol consumption steadily increased proportionate with his discontent at work. More and more often he came home from work, ate dinner, and started drinking. He stayed up later and later, always griping about the job and the company. A job he had enjoyed for the better part of ten years now irritated him. the new department manager in particular. HE complained, often and loudly about how much work was loaded onto him, how office personnel couldn't do their jobs right, and about the new manager. He didn't just voice his discontent. He repeated the same complaints over and over again for several hours a night. The drunker he got, the more he repeated his complaints until he began to sound like a sound loop on replay. The more he drank, the more he complained; the more he complained, the more he drank. It developed into a pattern and then into a never-ending cycle. Nor did he confine his drinking to weekends, Friday and Saturday. He drank, getting drunk, more frequently during the week until it became every night. Sometimes we didn't go to bed until three or four, or even five o'clock in the morning. If I wanted to go to bed before he did, I was told "No you're not." And made to stay up. The one time I went to bed anyway, he rummaged through CD's talking loud enough for me to hear. "No, I won't snap that one. My wife likes it." Or he'd say things like, "You don't care." That one became a constant litany over the years until I got so sick of it...anyway, that comes later.

During that time, for the first time, he ordered me to get out. The command stunned me so much, I did leave. Now, I had a car but I was so shocked that I grabbed my keys and walked. I got as far as the end of the street before I came to my senses, realizing I had a car and didn't have to walk. I went back and entered the house to find the lights off. Bill came out of the bedroom, dropped to his knees, almost prostrate on the floor, apologizing profusely. This began to establish a pattern though I didn't realize it at the time.

Normally I only had beers and drank water the rest of the evening during these tirades. I began to drink a little more and discovered, though I didn't know why at the time, that I was better able to assert myself if I drank along with him. So my own drinking gradually increased though not the extent his did. I could react rather than my normal reaction of just going along with everything he said and did. I didn't realize it then but I had begun, in fact, to be afraid to cross him. If I pissed him off, it came out badly for me.

Let me try to explain thought processes that, at the time, were more emotional than rational. I loved him still and didn't want to hurt or upset him in any way. Nor did I want to anger him, but that element contained a certain amount of fear since, as I believed, he had a combat background and had become increasingly irritable. He'd snap at people, me included, and yell at me when he was actually angry for reasons that had nothing to do with me. Basically, he took it out on me.

Even now I'm not sure if I simply ignored these shifts in behavior or didn't realize what he was doing. Since I left him, I chose not to think about it often until I decided to write these articles. This is not a Look for These Signs series of articles, nor is it full of advice or How to.... This is my attempt to put straight into my mind how this all escalated and how I fell into the trap of enabling him to not only continue this behavior, but to allow it to get so much worse before I smartened up and escaped.

At any rate, we had been trying to get pregnant again and one day, after missing the start of my period, which had always been regular as clock work, I used a home pregnancy test kit. It was positive. I was so excited, I called everyone even before a doctor confirmed it. I had called my mother when we decided to have another but her reaction was less than supportive. She only said, "Well, if you think you need another one." I didn't realize then that Bill's increasing alcoholism had affected the rest of my family even though they were so far away.

If he'd said anything horrible to them, I wasn't aware of it. We did often call, even at night, but I thought it was all in a friendly, keep in touch manner. My mother did mention she thought he was an alcoholic but I didn't listen to her. My father drank often but his behavior was quite different. But, I digress.

When I found out I was pregnant, I told everyone. I even called Bill at work on the company cell phone and told him. That night we celebrated. Admittedly, I did have a couple of glasses of wine but limited my intake to only two glasses. He didn't limit himself and our celebration soon turned into his usual litany of complaints, loud and obnoxious. When I got tired and drowsy, around midnight, I stood up and stated that I was taking me and baby to bed. He said, "No, you're not. Sit down." He looked so harsh, his expression said or else. I forced myself to stay awake, struggling to keep my eyes open as he continued his tirade.

When he finally fell asleep on the couch, I went to bed. My alarm clock went off at around 6:30 or so. I sent my daughter, then about seven or eight years old, off to school and then made sure he went to work. Of course, he had a hangover so he snapped and snarled, grumbling the whole time. After he left, I slipped back into bed and slept for the next couple of hours. This pattern continued, and got worse. Even now, all these years later, I still have trouble maintaining any kind of regular sleep schedule. I still often find it difficult to sleep at night and often find myself napping in the afternoon, or even going back to sleep in the morning for most of the day.

Again, I digress. I was pregnant and very excited about it. So excited, that during the first week, I had a suitcase packed for the hospital and began thinking about names, I made an appointment with my doctor, our family physician who was also, at the time, an obstetrician. We had excellent HMO insurance through Bill's company and no financial worries at the time. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be. I suffered a miscarriage less than two weeks later. During those two weeks, the late night drunken tirades continued. Sleep became sporadic as I was working on the first book, later published. Even then, I still put a lot of what I thought Bill was into my fictional hero. Now, I don't think I'll ever be able to think of that book the same way I did while working on it, or after it was published. To be honest, a lot of what happened between us went into that story but my hero handled it much better than my husband.

It is not my intention here to malign the man unnecessarily but to put the story straight. He had many people fooled, including his own family to a certain extent. They, however, saw the light far sooner than I did.

The night I knew I'd miscarried, confirmed by my doctor, he saw me that day, I let my own emotions get out of control. I attributed it to wacky hormone imbalance and I drank far too much that night. Bill, of course, was drunk, too, but I am not blameless in this incident. Drinking wine, playing with the computer and online chat rooms, I became engrossed in chatting with another writer online. Bill, looking over my shoulder between bouts of work complaints, started telling me what to say. I got irritated, told him to do it himself or leave me alone. He got irate and started yelling at me. From there, things get blurred. I reacted but not in the usual way. This time, I went on the offensive, so to speak. I yelled back at him, even chased him away from me until I finally shoved him away. He stumbled, lay on the floor glaring up at me, and I said, "I won't be afraid of you anymore!" From then on, I was able to defend myself, both verbally and physically when necessary.

As time passed, incidents became more frequent. He would even, when drunk, pick fights with me that ended in physical confrontations. I did hit back, frequently, and yell back at him but it never stopped the developing pattern of violence. I did have a son, in 1997. The baby was born two weeks early by cesarean section due to his breech position. HE was two years old when my father passed away, also due to alcoholism and liver disease. We made the trip from Arizona to Colorado to see him in hospice before he died. The first night, as I was making Bill a drink, my mother told me after taking my father to the hospital, there was no drinking in her house. I had no problem with that. Bill did. Instead of keeping alcohol in the kitchen, he kept it in the car, where I would make his drinks. He thought no one knew but they did, as I found out when I talked to my mother after we returned home.

One night, before my father passed away that Friday, he ran out of rum. IT was dark and Milliken has one convenience store which does not carry alcohol. He demanded that I drive into the next town, fifteen miles away, in the dark and unfamiliar with the territory. I refused. He said, "Fine!" in a very sarcastic angry tone. A few minutes later, he went to bed and passed out, having been drinking all day.

Before that, we had many skirmishes and when we returned to Arizona, that continued. My father passed away in July. Shortly after we got home, Bill quit his seventeen plus dollar an hour job during a hangover induced temper tantrum. During his job hunt time, he began drinking during the day, weekdays, that is. It escalated one night into a fierce fight, this one involving my daughter, who had not yet gone to bed. HE started yelling at me about accepting responsibility. He still claimed to be an ex-Navy SEAL with combat experience and that he had visited the families of colleagues who had died on their missions. He claimed I didn't love the family and didn't care. I'd had a few beers myself, had quite a buzz going, and dared to argue with him. Once again, he grew enraged and told me to get out. I did. I grabbed my keys and, since I didn't' have a running vehicle at that time, walked to a friends house. It was small town so its possible to walk from end to end in about forty-five minutes. I made it to Ed's in about twenty minutes. Bill had called to tell him I was coming, correctly guessing my destination. I spent the night with him and his wife, sleeping on their couch.

The next morning, I woke up to knocking on the door. Our daughter had walked our two year old son to join me, stating that her father had kicked them out too. Ed got very upset with Bill and called him. Bill never slept that night, was still drinking and so drunk he could barely talk. He stated he had the guns out but had taken them all apart. At that time, we had three rifles and two pistols.

During this time there had been another incident, another drunken evening. I don't remember what initial argument was over but I have a vivid memory of looking down a loaded rifle and telling him not to point that thing at me. He left the chair and put it in my face, so close the end of the barrel touched my cheek. I grabbed it and shoved it away. He put it back, pressing harder. I pushed it away again. This time he put it back against my face, pressing hard enough to bring pain. He snarled, "Grab that barrel again and I'll blow you're [expletive] head off."

I made no other moves. He stood over me for a few more seconds, the longest in my life, and finally sat down, but kept the rifle pointed squarely at me. I noticed the safety had been disengaged. If he even twitched a finger, I was dead if that gun went off. I started shaking, tears rolling down my face, and wondered if I'd survive the night. He left the room, came back only seconds later and started asking me who I was talking to. I hadn't spoken to anyone. The phone was across the room and I was petrified, to scared to move. I couldn't have called anyone but he was convinced I'd been talking. Finally, and I still don't know why, he told me to call Ed, who came right over. I left the room and the next morning, he apologized again and swore it would never happen again.

On, the morning he also kicked our children out of the house, Ed drove us back in his truck. Sure enough, all the guns had been taken apart. Bill had called his father, told him he wanted a divorce. His father came and picked him up. Bill, still drunk, raged at me to go back to Colorado. Now, I've never lived in CO. My family moved there after I was out of the house for a few years. His father asked if we had enough money. We had over three hundred in the bank. So I considered our finances fine for a few days.

Bill came home three days later, he'd been sober the whole time he was gone, but immediately started drinking. While sober, we talked and, I thought, ironed out some things. But as he grew more drunk, he got nastier. Finally, he said, "Just go [expletive] your friend Ed," who had been nothing but kind and supportive to me and the children. I stood up to leave the room and he apologized, saying that was out of line. I dropped the subject and we did go to bed.

Our sexual relations also grew more strained over time. I no longer initiated physical intimacy. Part of me, deep down, didn't want to, but I would respond if he initiated it. Alcoholism and abuse affect all areas of a relationship, not just the obvious.

Not long after he kicked everyone out and came home, we moved from that small town to Tucson, where he worked, and still does, as an electrician doing commercial construction. I thought that with a change of scenery, that by relocating, things would get better as we started anew; in effect, starting new lives. I was wrong. It only got worse until it cost me three of the most important things in my life.

Bill continued to drink but the violence all but stopped. We moved into a nearby mobile home park, a more rundown place than we wanted, but it was affordable. It was a small, cramped trailer, hardly enough room for two children, a boy and a girl, and two adults but I knew we'd make it work. The first job I had was down the street at a nearby motel. I was the front desk clerk from 3:30pm until 11:30pm. We often had a few drinks at the bar right next door to the mobile home park. Soon, it became a pattern for Bill, already drunk at home, to call me at work and want me to meet him there. A couple of times he wanted me to leave work early and meet him there, claiming some reaction to combat or a memory, or a bad night due to combat-combat he was never in, I later realized.

Ultimately I lost that job. I was accused of stealing towels and money. I am not a thief and I did not steal anything, let alone a cart of towels. Soon after, though, I applied for and was offered two different jobs. The first, part time, was to do housekeeping/clean empty apartments at an apartment complex. The second, full time and paying more, was at a call center. I discussed the options with Bill. The apartment job was Monday through Friday, half a day, for 5.00 an hour. The call center offered forty hours, at 8.25 an hour-he agreed I should take the call center job even though it would not be a regular schedule, and would likely involve nights and weekends as the hours of operation were 24/7. He even agreed that with both of us working full time, he would have to help with household chores, etc. I should have known better. I took the job, and thus began the real fighting, the abuse that continued until the day I left him.

My work hours were all over the clock. Starting a shift at different times, ending it at different times. Sometimes I didn't arrive home until 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. Then, I'd really get an earful. Even worse, if our daughter might still be up and awake because he was yelling at her about not cleaning house. She was only twelve years old, but rather than pitch in as he'd agreed to do, he raged about things not being done. He wanted laundry washed, the house cleaned, yet all he did was come home, start drinking, and start yelling, throwing temper tantrums. He often stated, several times in a night, every night, that he was not going to work full time, an eight hour day and come home to do housework. In my defense, I told him I, too, worked full time. Why should I do all the housework while he sat around getting drunk? That really angered him. Our daughter, if she was lucky, could sneak off to bed while I handled her father. The screaming matches were incredible! Vicious, nasty name calling. Now, I have been called a b**** in my time but it always hurt to have my own husband refer to me that way.

This pattern continued, even after I discovered I was pregnant again. This was a high risk pregnancy. I was over thirty-five and working full time as well as trying, unsuccessfully it seemed, to keep the household running smoothly. He refused to lift a finger to help me. So I struggled with an inconsistent work schedule and all the household responsibilities. Needless to say, some things didn't get done. Our daughter began to take over more of the every day things so I could work and sleep-which was never for very long.

The pregnancy grew complicated and more risky. I bled a lot, had several bouts of early labor, bouncing in and out of the hospitals. Still, he maintained that he would not work an eight hour day and come home to do any chores. My daughter tried as much as she could but at twelve, she simply couldn't manage it all to his satisfaction. He also had a tendency to tell her she had done a good job when he arrived home, but as he got more and more drunk, he would start yelling at her about doing a terrible job. She began to suffer the same psychological abuse he heaped on my head-while I was at work and unaware of this. Now, my daughter remembers things that I do not. Perhaps I've simply wiped them out or have only hazy memories. To keep up with his tirades, and react to him, I drank more as well. Alcohol lowers inhibitions and I guess I needed that crutch to defend myself from his verbal, and sometimes physical, attacks.

This high-risk pregnancy became so complicated, especially with all the unexplained bleeding that I saw my doctor nearly every week. I also had arranged with the doctor's staff to fax paperwork to my supervisor if I stayed home from work. Soon, the doctor put me on a part time schedule and I had the paper work in place for family leave to start as soon as I went to the hospital. I was supposed to stay in bed as much as possible and never lift anything heavier than a piece of paper. These conditions did nothing to sway Bill from his refusal to help with the housework.

I came home from a short shift one night to find a pile of dirty clothes in the kitchen floor that had not been washed. This was a sign of his anger that laundry had not been done. Now, the mobile home park laundry facility was right next to our trailer. He would get home from work about 3:30pm. But he refused, while I was working, to wash a single load of laundry. I told him off but he still reiterated that he would not work and then clean house. Yet he expected me to do so-I called him a hypocrite. He told me if I didn't like it, I could leave. I just snorted and told him that if I left, he wouldn't be able to do anything for himself. That raised our fighting to a whole new level for the next several years.

Another of his favorite gripes, usually at the top of his lungs, was sex. He didn't complain that I didn't want to, or didn't do it right. His beef was that with my work schedule, he couldn't just come home and have sex whenever he pleased. He was a member of the Electrical Union, and complained so much about my work schedule, he yelled that I was a union wife and my employer, a non-union call center, should honor his schedule wishes. It was the most ridiculous thing I ever heard. That kind of thing went on every night if I was unlucky enough for him to be awake when I got home.

Our baby was born 6 weeks premature, through emergency surgery since she was in breech position. I went into labor at the hospital during a routine stress test and they managed to stop it but kept me there for a week. Labor started again and my youngest daughter was born. Bill did the dutiful, loving, concerned husband thing, visiting me in the hospital but still had my oldest daughter doing the bulk of the housework, I found out.

The baby spent two weeks in neonatal intensive care. I went back and forth to the hospital every day until she came home. Having just had abdominal surgery, I had to heal and recover. Spent a good portion of my time not able to lift much weight or do a lot until I healed. More and more household chores slid by the wayside. I could barely get enough done to survive. Our finances suffered, but he didn't care enough to stop spending money on alcohol. He got drunk every night, throwing temper tantrums and refusing to do anything once he'd get home and park his butt in the chair; always screaming at me, telling me to get out, etc. I started to warn him once in a while to be careful what he wished for, he just might get it.

One night, early in the evening but he was already drunk, we all sat in the living room watching tv. Well, the kids were watching tv. I was getting griped at again. I'd had a few drinks myself by then, keeping up with him, I suppose, so I wouldn't tremble while he yelled like I used to do. He was also playing with his gun, a Ruger P91 .45 caliber semi-automatic pistol. He always kept the gun loaded no matter what anyone said about it. I kept them out of the children's reach and taught my oldest daughter to never touch it. She didn't. I don't think she liked guns. Anyway, he was playing with the thing, the safety was off, and-I don't know why, but he put it to the back of the oldest daughter's head. She was playing with the baby in her little swing.

I told him to put the thing away and he grumbled, but put it up. Then he went to bed. While he slept, I stewed over that scene and got really angry. The Wrath of God is nothing compared to mine that night. I woke him and yelled at him, telling him to 'get out here' meaning out of the bedroom, to come into the living room. He misunderstood and believed I told him to get out. He dressed, threw money at me, and stormed out the door. I followed, yelling at him for being a drunken idiot and pointing a loaded gun at our daughter's head. It was quite the screaming match. He did drive off but soon returned and just sat in the truck for a while. I finally let him back in and we all went to bed.

Many will say, 'why didn't you leave then?" I really don't have an answer except the standards. I had no place to go, no means of support, and no help. And, even then I loved him. I wanted us to have chance to get back what we'd had before, but I couldn't do it. I thought I could eventually make him see reason, if he would just stop drinking long enough and we'd be a family again. I didn't consciously think it in so many words, but the feeling was there. Over Thanksgiving Holiday everything changed again, eroding hope even more.

It was November, 2001. My baby was six months old and I no longer had a job. The car had been repossessed, not because of a late payment but because I couldn't afford the comprehensive insurance required until it was paid off. Thus, I was primarily stuck at home. I didn't mind since I had been housewife and mother for many years. But I simply couldn't get back into the old routines. I'd had my tubes tied to prevent any further pregnancies, to avoid the nightmare of the last one. But Bill's drinking and abuse continued, every night. The screaming, the griping, the name calling-late into the nights, usually, and the only sleep I could manage were naps during the day. The arguments continued over who would do what-namely, I or my oldest daughter would do it all and he would do nothing but drink.

Money was tight and I still hadn't found another job yet. But the lack of income didn't stop the expense of his drinking. More than once, he would take the last twenty dollars before payday, a few days before, and spend it all on alcohol for himself. Nothing changed, no matter the situation. He drank and turned vicious, nightly. Tired of the tirades and rampages, I fought back to the best of my ability but the household chores were neglected. I tried to write but the situation affected any creativity I still possessed. It went on and on with no end in sight. Until my daughter woke me from a early afternoon nap. Someone at the door wanted to talk to me.

I pulled on the first clothes I could grab and went to the door. A Child Protective Services investigator asked several questions about the state of the house, which was really awful. Honestly, I had neglected housework for a while except the bare minimum. I resented Bill's stance on the issue and inadvertently went on strike. The CPS workers left but returned a short time later with the police. I won't detail the particulars of the case here, that is not my purpose. They took all three of my children into custody, charging me with 'contributing to the delinquency of a minor', the charge they use to take children from their homes. I couldn't stop them but I called Bill at work and told him. That night, I also got drunk, but he was far worse. He ranted and raged at the injustice of it all but I, deep down, realized that something was seriously wrong here and housework was only part of it. However, there was little I could do at that point.

We began dealing with CPS, following their outlined program in the hopes of getting our children back. As the next two years went by, I knew it was hopeless. I was basically cited for having a dirty house and went to court. Prosecution offered a plea bargain-guilty to misdemeanor, suspended 6 month sentence, suspended fine, but no probation since we already had to do the same type of procedures with CPS.

As we dealt with lawyers and caseworkers, I started cleaning up my act. I kept the house in order and we even moved into a three-bedroom trailer in the same mobile home park and set up bedrooms for the children when they returned. After a few honest conversations with my lawyer, who told me Bill was a jerk but I denied that at the time, I came to realize that his drinking and bizarre drunken behavior had cost us any chance of getting our children returned. He never stopped drinking, never even cut back on it. He blamed everyone but himself for the issues at hand, especially CPS, whom he referred to as jack-booted thugs. He claimed it was because he was white.

These days that kind of rationalization sounds ridiculous but at the time I paid no attention. He never once admitted any blame in the entire fiasco. For myself, I knew I held partial blame but I couldn't fix things alone. I needed his help but he adamantly refused to give up the alcohol. I think I knew then the booze was more important to him than the children, and even me-but I refused to face that. Instead, I did the best thing I could for my children. I made sure, through my own machinations and just letting him go on as he was, that my children were not returned to us, that they were taken in but not separated, that they would be safe. I let my sister and brother-in-law have custody of them. It was my best option for keeping them out of the line of fire, away from his abuse.

He also began to blame his own family, who wanted only to help. He got just as nasty with his mother over the years as he was to me. Name calling, insulting, drunk calls just to heap abuse on her. It got even worse after his father died and she finally began seeing another man, someone he knew and apparently didn't like. His favorites phrases included variations of the f-word. He was even more vicious in his tirades toward me.

During the last year, he was unemployed for a month, and money ran low. I had a job, but the situation affected my attendance and I lost the job. I'd miss days after late night temper tantrums with him, and the infrequent drinking binge. During that month we got behind on rent and were ultimately evicted. We moved into a kitchenette in a nearby motel. The situation worsened. He refused to quite drinking, even to try to get his children back. He often said he thought of them like characters in a book. You can close the book. One night, I got so angry at that sentiment, I just yelled at him-this was after another round of name calling and insults directed at me. He'd also started accusing me of being a whore.

I told him our children were not book characters but that it was obvious he didn't care for any of his children, even the four from his first marriage. I still kept in contact with my oldest daughter, but when drunk, he lumped her in with everyone he claimed to hate, blaming her for telling lies about him. She told the truth even though he wanted her to lie. I recall a comment after one supervised visit. He took her to the side and told her to watch what she told her therapist or she'd get him in trouble. Notice, as I gradually did, that with him, it was all "I"-as though the world revolved around him. More and more, the self-centered, egotistical part of him surfaced. He told my daughter not long ago, sometime after I left him, that he was the most important person in the world. She had told him she lived her own life now and it didn't revolve around him. "Yes it does," he replied. Now, she is twenty years old, in the Navy, and has her whole life ahead of her. Her life doesn't revolve around him and it shouldn't. He's a grown man and should be able to take care of himself but he still gets drunk and calls her, trying to drag her into the middle of things, scaring her with 'suicide' which I know from experience, he will never do. It's a ploy he uses to get attention and have people feel sorry for him. I know, I fell for it many times over the years. He plays the 'you don't care. I should just kill myself' card. The first time, she was so upset she called me several times until I was able to call her back. I told her that if he kept it up, to call the police on him, have him taken away for his own good and that he'd threatened similar things over the years but never once even attempted to carry it out. I'd do the 'feel sorry for him' thing, he'd get lots of attention, which meant agreeing with him and doing whatever he wanted, when he wanted it, and he wouldn't mention it again. Understanding his dramatic streak by now, and his ability to lie effectively, she no longer worries over it and refuses to speak to him when he's drunk.

But, I digress, hopping ahead of things. By now, not only was he getting drunk, but drinking all day long on weekends as well, even more so after the children finally went to live with my sister. I hoped, foolishly perhaps, that this might be what he needed to straighten up his act, to cut back on the boozing and begin to live again, just the two of us, getting back what we had in the early days. Again, I was wrong.

He had a good job, was now foremen journeyman electrician at a twenty year old company, doing commercial electrical construction. Raises over the years had put him back at seventeen dollar an hour range so even with the weekly motel bill and other living expenses, I no longer had to work. At his urging, I went back to writing, full time, and while I didn't have the financial success I hoped for, I did have several stories published.

The drunken tirades tapered off some but the heavy drinking continued even after the CPS case was officially closed. These temper tantrums took the form of heaping abuse on my head., as usual, only now he added that I was a worthless piece of shit and if I didn't' like the way he wanted things, I could leave. That escalated to 'get the f*** out' if I dared argue with him in any attempt to defend myself or retaliate in kind. He grew physically violent more often, throwing things at me, sometimes slapping or even punching. After twenty years of martial arts training, I dared to hit back, often. Of course, it enraged him that I would dare to hit him or throw something back at him. He is so self-centered that I am supposed to just let him do whatever he wants and get away with it. Almost like I deserved whatever he did to me. I avoided falling into that trap but still it was a few more years before I decided enough was enough.

One thing that began to really irk me was his more frequent claims on the mornings after that he didn't remember anything from the previous night. Now I have two options here, neither of which is pretty. He either had blackouts from drinking too much or he pretended not to remember so he could get away with it. Either way, it was all bad. I soon began to tire of his constant drinking when not working. These forgotten things included sexual advances toward other women, minor but trust shattering. A couple of years earlier, still in the mobile home park, we knew an African American woman. She had her own issues to deal with but Bill saw her outside one night and invited her in for a few beers. He was already drunk and only got more drunk during the short evening. At one point, he lowered his sweat shorts, exposing his penis, still flacid, to both of us, even wiggling it back and forth. He wasn't aroused and I have no idea what went through his drunken mind, but he did it anyway. I told him to "put that thing away" and he did. The woman left. The next morning, he claimed to have no memory of it.

We stayed in the motel, comfort with the arrangement of the kitchenette until I left him. To my knowledge, he is still living there. A few years after we moved in there, we became friendly with a couple living downstairs, Kevin and Vivien. One night, partying while the man worked on his bicycle, I drove him to the nearest convenience store for a can of fix-a-flat. When I got back, the woman told me Bill had exposed himself and put his penis on her face. As I walked in, leaving Kevin to fix his bike tire, Bill walked out, heading up the stairs. Hearing Vivien's declaration, I was very upset. Vivien and I stepped outside, talking about. She didn't want to tell Kevin, he would surely react with some violence. I told her she could tell him anything she felt comfortable admitting. Bill deserved anything he got in retaliation. Perhaps I wanted someone to take him to ask for something he did wrong. You see, he believed he never did anything wrong at all, that he could do anything he pleased and get away with it. It wasn't wrong if he did it and people are supposed to allow it, and even lie for him if necessary.

There were no acceptable lies this time. Even n apology wouldn't cut it now. Bill had dared to 'touch' another man's woman and would face the consequences. Vivien did admit to Kevin what Bill had done. Bill came down stairs, apparently realizing Vivien would tell Kevin. He started apologizing, "I'm sorry, man. I f***** up." Kevin, of course, was angry and punched him in the side. Bill caved. Only one hit and the so-called Navy SEAL caved. He went back upstairs and stayed there.

I stayed with them a little longer, talking mostly, before Bill came down shortly after sunrise, wanting me to go get him some more rum. I told him I couldn't as it was Sunday and only eight o'clock. In Arizona, you can't buy alcohol anywhere on Sunday until 10.00am. He asked if I was coming home. I told him I couldn't talk to him yet. I was still so upset about it, I didn't know what I'd say to him without a nasty fight, and couldn't face him yet. When I did go back upstairs, I found him on the floor. He had actually cleaned the kitchen, washing dishes and straightening up a little. I made coffee. When he got up, sat on the bed, he started trying to convince me Vivien had 'come on' to him, driven him to it. I knew better and flat out told him, "No she didn't." He got mad and took off, driving of to who knew where. I went back to Vivien, making sure she was okay. With their door open, she'd seen Bill leave. I couldn't very well stop him from driving drunk and part of me hoped he'd get stopped with a DUI, that maybe that would curb his drinking. It didn't happen. Not long after that, Kevin and Vivien left the motel and we never saw them again. But the pattern continued, in fact got even worse.

Now, it is just the two of us, Bill with his drinking and me with my hopes of slowing him down, even stopping him, and making our lives better. It never occurred to me that I couldn't do it, that he wouldn't listen to me at all; refused to even consider the things I said to him no matter how much lip service he paid to it when sober. When drunk, he was a different person but he drank so much that the line between sober and drunk began to blur.

I'm not quite sure where to start here, so please bear with me. I'll pick up where I left off, with the neighbors leaving the motel. We never saw them again. But the abusive patterns continued, and worsened over time. Allowed to stay home and write full time, I soon had several stories published but had not yet reached a livable income were I to live alone. He insisted that I use my time for writing. Sometimes I'd get so wrapped up in a project, household chores slipped by the wayside, but I would make it up by scrubbing the place spotless periodically. He really had no reason to complain but he always did, especially when drunk, which was every night and all day long on weekends. That pattern not only never changed, but worsened over time.

The nightly tirades were often personally aimed at me, not the world in general or things he didn't like on the job. It was not unusual for him, the one who insisted that I could now write full time as we could afford to be a one income household, to bet drunk and then yell at me that I was worthless, that it was his money and I did nothing to contribute to the household. Or course, I did all the housework, did everything he needed done, including his personal errands. I dealt with people while he did nothing but complain. If HBO, free at the motel we lived in with the cable service, didn't work, I was the one he demanded call the managers, or the cable company and gripe. I personally didn't care whether the service was out for a while but I was the one he screamed at to make these calls, or to talk to the motel managers-usually late at night when he was shit-faced drunk. If I refused I was a useless bitch, a waste of space, a worthless piece of shit. He attacked my writing, saying it didn't make him any money, that my books were garbage. Of course, he knew this as he'd never read anything I wrote. (Yes, this is very heavy on the sarcasm but I can't help myself here. I've had glowing 4 and 5 star reviews of my work.) He often said it was his money, that everything belonged to him as he earned the money that paid for it.

When I defended myself, I was told either at the top of his lungs or in such a cold voice it would freeze a volcano to get the f*** out, over and over again. I again warned him to be careful what he wished for, he just might get it. Accusations flew. It was not beneath him to accuse me of whoring around, of f***ing around. I don't know how his mind rationalized that since I rarely went outside my own home anymore. The days of going to the nearby bars were over.

Yes, I did, at one time, do just that. I, too, often got drunk. I didn't realize or acknowledge at the time that I was on my way being as much of an alcoholic as he. I used that crutch to banish the urge to protect myself by saying nothing during these attacks. It was, for a while, the alcohol that enabled me to shed fear and open my mouth to defend myself.

However, I consider myself a reasonably intelligent person and soon realized what I was doing to myself. I began to cut back. I rarely drank during the day, even on weekends. If I drank it was in the evenings or, when I had a job, after work no matter when my shift ended. During this period, however, I was unemployed, with his sanction. Only when drunk did he subject me to these tirades.

This continued, escalating to every night and even more often on weekends, a couple of times a day when he didn't work until the line between Bill drunk and Bill sober began to blur and drunken behavior spilled over into sober behavior. He was often obnoxious in public, doing and saying nasty, insulting things to perfect strangers wherever we went. Most people ignored him, but it was humiliating. I hated for him to embarrass me that way. At home, after an outing, he made the most ridiculous things; things I knew didn't happen because I was there. Most stories indicated that someone had done something to him first and he either yelled or threatened them. He soon began to lose sight of reality, I think, since he would even describe minor fights that didn't happen except in his own mind.

For instance, we went to a local bar, a lounge, that had live bands on Friday and Saturday nights. One night, he was already drunk when we arrived and he had it stuck in his head when we got home that he'd been in a fight with a Air Force soldier who'd come onto me. It never happened yet he would describe that so-called incident many times in the past several years. The fact is that he was so drunk, he stumbled often and when his fresh drink came, he didn't like how long it took and knocked the full glass over, making a mess. There was no soldier, no one coming on to me, and there certainly wasn't a fight.

This is when, subconsciously I began to question his Navy SEAL/combat background but never thought as much to myself and I didn't dare say it aloud. If he even suspected I didn't believe that story, the tirade was just horrible. Even without reason for suspicion, he occasionally questioned my belief in his lies. He sometimes told me to get out, that I could just go f*** myself for not believing him, lumping me in with his family, who never believed him but never confronted him over it. They simply let him brag and talk until he stopped.

His attitude was that everything bad was my fault, that he was the rescuing hero making everything right in my world. I was raped years ago, before I ever met him, and he claimed all these years every chance he got that he took care of those perpetrators, that they all paid for that crime. Sometimes, he even claimed to have ensure their deaths. I paid lip service to that claim, seldom mentioning it. He often brought up my divorce from David, making up stories about how he intervened on things to prevent him from hurting me again.. There were no confrontations, though to hear him tell it, he beat David and decided to let him live. The only thing he ever did was pay for the paperwork, the court filing fee, and accompany me on a few appointments. This he told, with more and more embellishments, often over years. Now, I didn't care to talk about my previous marriage, David, or the divorce itself, but he couldn't stop repeating these things no matter how many times I told him I didn't want to talk about it. Yet, if I, in retaliation, brought up his divorce, he got mad and refused to discuss it. He gave me the bare-bone particulars one time, though I'm not sure how true it is, but never talked of it again and wouldn't let me ask.

That's how hypocritical he was. He could do anything he wanted while I did as I was told. If I did something he didn't like, for instance going to a bar alone, when he was sober, he thought I should be able to do that if I chose, that I had every right to do so without being harassed. When drunk, however, if I went to a bar, I was looking for a man, planning to have sex outside our marriage. Now, the only one I might suspect of that is him, considering some of the earlier incidences I've already outlined. The good old double standard existed now yet our relationship had been founded on equality.

He even outlined the criteria for any job I might take. It had to match his work hours and days so I would be home when he was to wait on him hand and foot while he sat around getting drunk and doing nothing but belittling and insulting me. But he often accused me of doing that to him instead. At the risk of bragging and maybe sounding cocky, I am quite good at what I do, namely writing fiction. Good enough to be contracted as mentor/instructor at the Creative Writing Institute, an online writing school. I have done proofreading/line editing and evaluated submitted manuscripts for an e-publisher. So yes, I am good at it.

No, it wasn't him degrading and belittling me. I was doing that to him, making him feel he wasn't worthy, or good enough for him. How dare he turn that one around on me? The 'you don't care' accusations also continued, becoming worse. If I dared argue with him, defend myself, he'd sometimes grow violent and throw things at me. Naturally, for me anyway, I'd throw it back at him. Whether the item actually hit him or not, he'd attack. He's choked me, immobilized me. One night he had me so constrained I bit hard on his abdomen, just below the rib cage, and refused to let go. He had quite a set of bruises the next morning. To make me let go, his solution was to hit me as hard as he could on the side of the head with his elbow. So I had swollen black eye the next day. When asked by my cps caseworker how I had gotten the injury, I lied, saying I ran into a cabinet door.

Before the next court date, he made up a story about having sex on the couch and falling off. His lawyer voiced that in court and I overheard the CPS caseworker telling the department what I had told my therapist, the one contracted by CPS. He insisted lies be told for him, to save him from repercussions of his action, and had me doing it just like he wanted our daughter to do. She, however, was brave enough to tell the truth. I wish now that I had been that courageous. Perhaps I might have considered getting out then.

Violence increased, not only in frequency, but in intensity. One weekend I planned to make chicken fried steak for dinner. Having shopped the day before, payday, I had everything necessary for one of his favorite meals. Now, you'd think a man would be grateful someone would take the time, put in the effort to make him his favorite food. Not Bill. He took it as his due. That's how self-centered he was. But, I digress.

After the usual drunken tirade, he finally snarled at me one last time and passed out around 2 or 3 in the morning. With the event spinning in my mind, I turned to the computer to check emails and maybe write a little. I dared not use the computer while he was home and drinking. After all, when he was home, this was 'his time' and all attention is supposed to focus on him. Finally I was able to sleep a little, until he woke around 5:30 am and made that first drink. Disgusted, I remarked, "Drinking already? Sun isn't even up yet."

"Shut the f*** up and go back to sleep. Sleep the day away like you always do."

Unwilling to tangle with him so early, and with very little sleep, only an hour and a half or so, I rolled over but I didn't sleep. I lay there with my eyes closed, curled on my side with my back to him and faked it. He got back into bed and turned the tv volume up, which ended any thoughts of more sleep as he always played it too loud. Often he complained he had hearing loss, difficulty hearing things clearly, but he never went to a doctor and had it diagnosed, possibly treated. Instead, the affliction only seemed to manifest itself when he was drunk. I believe he woke up that morning still drunk.

Ignored him as he made a second drink. When he got up to make the third one-he makes them by filling the glass with ice, pouring rum almost to the top, and adding a splash of soda, strong enough to choke a horse-he started snarling, "Fine, you f****** b****. F*** you, you b****. Go f*** yourself."

Lovely morning sentiment, isn't it? I just love that greeting. I apologize for the sarcasm but this incident still pisses me off when I think about it. His need to make things up and treat it as real manifested itself again.

I rolled over and yelled back at him. "What's the matter with you? I just love waking up to being called a b****!" No, he wouldn't think or dare to say something like "Good morning, beautiful."

"Who is Black Robert?"

Coming out of the blue like that, it completely stunned me. Accusation rang in his tone and I only stared at him for a moment before replying, "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Black Robert, you called his name while sleeping."

Now, I know he lied. I wasn't sleeping just faking it so he would leave me alone. If I'd let him know I was awake, he would have continued the tirade of the previous night, or worse wanted sex that would have ended in another bout of painful anal intercourse, which he seemed to want every other time, or every time depending on whether it was a weekend. But that's another story and I'll address that issue later. It's al part of the abuse package with Bill.

At any rate, rather than confront him over the obvious lie, I wanted to see how far he would carry this charade. "I was asleep. You're going to hold against me something I muttered while sleeping."

"N***** lover," he shot back. "Who is he? Go f*** him instead."

Bewildered though I shouldn't have been, I was also furious. "Who's Heidi?" I shot back.

"At least she was white."

That is the closest he ever came to admitting having sex with any other woman. He probably did, but I don't care. I would much rather have dealt with affairs than the hell he put me through.

He came back to the bed and turned the TV volume up. A little while later, he had passed out again. Taking advantage of the silence, and his oblivion, I settled at the computer. You see, I didn't dare check emails or write while on 'his time'. I'd never hear the end of it. He'd threaten to throw the computer, my laptop, out the window or smash it or something: the same threats he'd make when he was too drunk to type and operate the thing right. When drunk he couldn't use it for anything and he'd blame the machine or the internet carrier, anything but the drunk and operator error.

To the matter at hand, I dealt with a bunch of emails, did some editing on a contracted manuscript, and then engrossed myself in a book. My favorite hobby, and escape, was reading. Sometime later, early afternoon, he woke again-and made another drink but this time, he acted like nothing had happened, as though it he had slept all that time. Amazing how his memory always slipped when he'd succeeded in royally pissing me off. Curious about how the day would go now, I said nothing about the previous night or the morning.

He talked, in pleasant tones, even friendly to me. That was so rare, I didn't want to disrupt it. He mentioned going out for lunch or something, but I absolutely was not letting him drive drunk, which he still was, nor did I want him embarrassing me in public yet again. I reminded him of my dinner plans.

"Get cooking," he ordered and I knew that it didn't matter how good the meal was, or that it was one of his favorites, it would be a long day and night of his drunken crap. But, to keep him off the roads and out of public, even though it was early afternoon, I started cooking. Chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn, and cornbread with butter and honey. One of his top five favorite meals. Now, you'd think a man would be grateful a woman would go to all the trouble, the effort, to cook a meal he really likes. Bill only took it as his due, being so self-centered.

Before I'd finished cooking, of course, he went to sleep again. So I finished the preparations and had everything ready to just heat up. No way would I wake him, I wanted as much peaceful, quiet time as I could get since it was rare at the time. I read some more of my book until he woke up.

"Dinner is ready if you want some," I told him.

He didn't say anything, so I didn't do anything. A little later he said, "Well, where's dinner? I guess I have to just starve."

Irritated, I said. "I did cook it but you fell asleep before it was finished, after you'd asked me to cook it early. I'll heat it up for you."

"I'm not eating any of that slop you cook."

That hurt, and it pissed me off. "Fine." I crossed my arms over my chest in defense and said nothing. He muttered under his breath for an hour but said nothing I could understand.

Finally, he grumbled, "I'm hungry."

Silent, I got up, filled a plate, heated it up, and took it to him. He jerked it from my hand and I sat down, to upset to eat though I'd made enough for both of us. He took a couple eof bites and then tossed the plate onto the bed. Oh, I was steamed. "What, you don't want it now?"

He slammed the plate back, catching me across the throat. Fury spiked, hot and fast. Swallowing hard, blinking back tears, I picked up the plate and threw it, not at him, but across the room. It hit the dresser and broke into four large pieces, food scattering everywhere. Temper spent, I started picking up pieces and food, throwing everything in the trash. This reminds me of one time he went into the kitchen and started shoving dishes and stuff out of the cabinets onto the floor, where things broke, of course, and again I cleaned up the mess. Again, he went to the kitchen, throwing things around and breaking dishes.

While picking things up in the kitchen, he yelled," I'm bleeding and you don't f****** care!"

Trying to at least sound calm when my heart was pounding, I said, "I'm cleaning this up so you don't step on it."

"I'm bleeding! You don't give a shit."

Sighing, I wet a cloth and grabbed a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and went to him. Blood trickled from long slice along his calf. I cleaned the wound and wrapped more dry cloth around it. The bleeding stopped right away but I never knew if a piece of the broken plate cut him or he cut himself on a nail sticking out of a make shift book shelf.

His penchant for violence finally got him arrested just before Thanksgiving in 2008. We were arguing, as usual on a week night. He raged at me about no job, leeching off his back, all that stuff, went towards the kitchen and suddenly stopped. Snatching up two large knives, he threatened to kill me! He even toward me, glaring at me. "I'll kill you just like that."

I cringed, froze in place and just gaped at him. Finally, for some reason, he stabbed the knives into the dish rack and stormed out the door. Not a second passed before I bolted from the bed and bolted the door again him. My heart pounded so fast and loud I just knew everyone in the building heard it. I called 911 and reported it. When the police appeared, he was no where to be seen, not in the dark of the night. I told the officer I didn't want him there, I didn't want him coming back, after I described the incident. The officer joined his colleagues outside and I stepped out the door, spotting Bill hunched down in my car. I pointed him out and stepped back inside, closing the door. A few minutes later, the officer returned and told me Bill had been told to go somewhere else for the night since I didn't want him there. If he showed up again, I should call 911.

About half an hour later, he returned, knocking on the door demanding I let him in. I refused and kept the door locked and bolted. I immediately called 911. When the police returned just seconds later, he was arrested and taken to jail.

This should have been the end of Bill and I, but the aftermath dragged on a bit longer since I'd hope he'd finally see the light. Instead, I was the one enlightened.

After being arrested in the middle of the night, having disobeyed police orders and returned, Bill spent the night in jail and was released the next day. Conditions of release were that he not contact me and that he obtain an alternate residence. He moved into another motel down the street, and called me.

Knowing he would be released the next day, I fled that night, driving to a motel on the connecting street. I didn't go far as I had been drinking as well. I paid for two nights but only stayed one. I woke the next morning, about ten o'clock, and called some shelter numbers provided by the police officer. All shelter were full. There were no vacancies anywhere. Bill called my cell phone after he got to the motel to pick up clothes and his company truck with all of his tools for work. At first I hesitated to answer. I just knew he would throw a fit and I'd get an earful for daring to call the police on him.

To my surprise, he thought someone else had heard him and called the police. I told him I did and why. He claimed not to remember threatening me with the knives and remarked that "that explains the domestic violence charge." He'd also been charged with disturbing the peace/drunk and disorderly. He went on to swear it would never happen again and he wanted to work things out, to return home after his next court date. We agreed that in the interim, he would stay at his motel and I would stay in our place, thus paying two weekly rents, and he would watch his drinking, cutting way down on it. I soon noticed, however, since he would call every night, sometimes more than once, that he was still drinking. If he called late, he would be just as drunk but very careful about what he said and I began to think that perhaps he was monitoring his own behavior. I should have realized he was only showing and saying what I wanted to see and hear.

I met him at city court on the appointed date. Given the choice, he opted for the diversion program, thus avoiding a trial and possible jail sentence. This included mandatory group counseling for alcoholism and domestic violence. Finally, I thought, he's getting the help he needs. Little did I know he would pay lip service to it and continue on exactly as he was, though that was gradual process, but I let him move back in with me. Actually, there was no discussion of much, though we did talk about the issues and what possibly made him do that. I tried to point out it was mostly alcohol but he maintained it was all stress, that he worried over the economy and how long he'd have his job as the work was really slow and the company had little to nothing coming up in the near future.

I went with him to the intake facility, where he did all the required paperwork, (with me writing in the answers for him and I know he lied a few times), and in the next few days set up appointments with a counselor for group sessions with others who also had domestic violence issues. It was all court mandated, with consequences for not finishing, right back to the potential jail sentence. Over the next few months, he forgot those consequences and started skipping meetings. But I'm skipping ahead.

After he returned home, he didn't immediately return to the same drinking pattern. In fact, we actually talked seriously about things for the first time in a long time. We'd long ago lost sight of our own communications and it had broken down. At least, that's what we agreed happened. What actually happened was that he stopped listening to me, stopped taking me seriously, and only took for granted that I was there to pander to his ego and see to his every need and whim. Basically, I was on the planet to be his personal slave and have no life of my own. What came out of those discussion, his thinly disguised rationalizations for his behavior, was that he quelled the worry over the economy and his job, letting the stress build. He acknowledged wanting my help with our finances. He expected to get laid off and we would need the second income, even after he got a new job if necessary. Perhaps he was planning to live off my job for a while, I don't know.

At any rate, the result was that I soon got a job in a call center, at ten dollars an hour. For a full time job, it was a decent income. In the back of my mind was the knowledge that I could now support myself if, and when, I ever needed to leave. My subconscious mind knew, whether I faced it or not, what I needed. Relieved to have the steady income regardless of my inner reasoning, I started my new job with high hopes and ignored the gradual return of the drunk abuser he once again became. To celebrate my first full paychecks, I let him talk me into getting a few new things, like the flat screen television he's so proud of, which I let him keep when I left him.

As the abuse started once more, he had gained more ammunition, using the fact that I called the police on him and charged him with domestic violence against me. If I reminded him that he brought that on me with the knives and threats, he either ignored his part in the whole affair, stated that he didn't remember doing it (hinting that I made it up), or he'd get really made and throw a temper tantrum like a little kid. Realizing over time the next few weeks that he would never change, I began to plan. I had a decent income and I could manage to move out, leaving him to face his life and the consequences of his decisions alone, something he never wanted to face as it made him less than perfect, a real loser.

I enjoyed this job, looking forward to work every day despite the shift hours I worked. My training shift was Mon. through Friday, from 1:30pm to 10:00pm. Since no busses ran late enough to get me home, Bill had to pick me up from work. He agreed that it wasn't a hardship, he'd be glad to pick me up. About a week into it, He started grumbling that picking me up from work was a real inconvenience, interrupting his sleep. He started showing up in such a state I knew he'd been drinking until he showed up a few times outright drunk.

After training for a home-worker position, my schedule moved to Mon. through Fri., from 8am to 4:30pm. I could take the bus to and from work, which was a relief, but Bill volunteered to pick me up after work every day rather than wait for me to get home much later, usually around 6pm on the bus. After a couple of weeks, he began griping about that, as well. I realized that it irritated to leave his work and drive across town to meet me before going home because it meant he couldn't start drinking yet. Well, the work from home concept fell through because in the motel we lived in, I couldn't get any kind of secured wireless or high speed internet as it was a commercial account. Other options for service were not available in my area. My choices were termination of employment or in house placement, which meant a schedule change.

The Human Resources department was very helpful accommodating the necessary bus schedule for a my transportation needs. The schedule change gave me Tuesday and Thursday off-perfect for my secret plans to leave, and required me to work the weekends, shorter shifts. I worked Saturday and Sunday 11:00am to 6:00pm. That changed resulted in gripes that my employer was encroaching on 'his time' and he complained bitterly about my schedule-of course, that enabled him to drink all day, which he was once again in the habit of doing, often drunk before I'd leave to catch the 9:30 am bus. Of course, the car was in my name and he didn't work weekends, but I wasn't allowed to use it since he might want to go somewhere.

Time crawled but opened a savings account at a local credit union where my check was direct deposited by my employer. I/we accessed that account only if we needed a few dollars but lived primarily on Bill's income. You see, he wanted a nest egg incase he was laid off, or if something happened. I didn't deny him but he couldn't access it himself. I kept it in my name only though in the end it didn't matter. I still ended up broke in an effort not to arouse his suspicion.

My savings gradually built over the next five months until a couple more paychecks would see me at the thousand dollar threshold I'd set for myself to move out. I had to pretend, to act as though nothing had changed. I didn't want him to know what I planned, didn't want him to know I was leaving until after I was gone. For five months, I went through the charade, never letting him see or know what I planned. It seemed to work and I started looking for rentals, apartments or small houses, near my work. Moving however, had to be done in one day, one of my days off (Monday and Tuesday).

With his drunken behavior back to its previous level before he was arrested, I looked forward to work and actually dreaded going home. During the week, I'd take the bus home, arriving around 11:00pm. By then he'd already be drunk. As soon as I walked in the day, invariably, I'd hear "I'm so pissed off," and he'd start yelling about whatever he chose to complain about that night.

It was during this time that I met Frank. Bill met him first, one night, when he insisted the trash go out instead of letting me wait till morning. He told me he'd met the man who fixed a car that had been broken into, its window smashed. A couple of weeks later, he talked Frank into coming over for a drink and of course, Bill was already drunk. Since his brain is pretty much pickled by alcohol, he thought the man's name was Rick.

Over the next few weeks, I talked to Frank a few times, also thinking his name was Rick since Bill had mentioned it. During this time, Bill overheated the car engine, managed to get it home, but in the process destroyed the engine. I don't recall the exact damage but it was an expensive repair. Frank is a mechanic, one of the best I've seen. I haven't seen anything he can't fix. He agreed to fix the car, if it wasn't too bad, for 600.00, far cheaper than a regular shop would have done. The car wasn't worth even that so we agreed-and took the first 300.00 out of my savings account. Thus, it would take longer, but not much, before I could leave.

Frank also had cars for sale, one a nice little, well running Kia. He agreed to sell me that car for 900.00. Excellent price as far as I was concerned, and, so as not to give myself away, and to have a car when I left, I agreed. Another three hundred left my savings but I counted on replacing it and the first withdrawal within a couple of paychecks as I still had my job. At the very worst, I could still leave with less money, knowing more would come. Only when I asked him who the man was whose name was on the title did I find out his name was Frank. I told him Bill thought his name was Rick and he stated, "he's so drunk he doesn't know anyone's name," or something like that. For the first time in my life I didn't get defensive over someone's opinion of Bill. Frank was right. Bill was, and still is, a drunk.

The screaming and yelling, the verbal and psychological abuse continued but knowing I had a plan and a means to carry it out enabled me to remain a little more calm though I still tried, unsuccessfully and sometimes with the false courage of alcohol to defend myself. But his late night abuse took its toll on my sleep hours and on occasion work suffered as I'd miss a day here and there. No one at work said anything so I thought nothing of my absences, counting on that job to facilitate my escape. Bill, however, continued his drinking and abuse pattern, and then threw in a rather bizarre twist.

Now, as I mentioned before, I do write some erotic fiction, a genre where anything legal is acceptable. Though I didn't care for anal sex, it was always painful, and I had actually figured out how to fake so he had not actually performed it in a couple years though he thought he did on a regular basis. It was as easy to fake as pleasure during sex and he never knew the difference. But then, alcohol had taken its toll and he grew increasingly incapable of performing on any level when he was drunk, which was more and more often. This, however, would irritate him so that he insisted I keep trying with oral sex techniques for him to get an erection. It failed more often then not unless had had slept and not had alcohol for ten to twelve hours. Needless to say, even sex was not satisfying, rather it became something I preferred to avoid if I could get away with it. If not, I faked it and endured it so he wouldn't get suspicious.

Perhaps my erotic fiction stemmed my own desire to enjoy sex, to actually be aroused after so many years of no interest that when Bill broached the idea, my own imagination filled in the blanks and I anticipated actually enjoying a simple biological human function once again. One Friday night, as he was getting drunk and, interestingly enough, not complaining and yelling abuse at me, Bill suggested asking Frank over for a drink or two.

Frank doesn't drink much at all, often goes weeks without drinking as he grew up with alcoholic parents and did the exact opposite. But he does like to socialize so he did come over for a while. As we talked a little, watching tv, talk turned to porn flicks for some reason, I'm not sure what started it. I mentioned that we had one that actually had a plot, albeit a thin one and before I knew it, Bill had the DVD playing. We watched, made comments, and generally poked fun at the show until Bill followed me into the bathroom. Now I'd had a few drinks myself, but no way was my judgment impaired. I had a buzz compared the being drunk. I knew exactly what I was agreeing to when Bill suggested that if Frank was interested, he would like a three some, too.

Surprised at first, I admit I thought about it for a while. Now I won't go into detail except to say Bill did limit the event to oral sex and straight sex, nothing more hardcore. Even before I started writing erotic fiction, I sometimes wondered about threesomes, so I did participate of my own free will. Bill did not force me. He didn't step over the line that way.

While that may surprise many readers, the rest of this is ironic, considering the man who suggested it couldn't get an erection no matter what I did to try to help him. And, quite honestly, that didn't really upset me and the only ones who managed to enjoy it were Frank and I. Bill was so drunk, he just kept falling down and never did manage to get even remotely aroused because he was too drunk for his body to function properly.

Now, I mention this episode because it truly was the beginning of the end of Bill and I. During a lull in the action, I went to the bathroom, hearing Bill say "Remember, she's mine." When I came out of the bathroom, Frank was leaving. Bill told me he'd said he needed to get some sleep. I found out later, from Frank, that he left because Bill kept repeating "she's mine" like a broken record. Rather than be in the middle of some drunken crap, Frank left. I didn't see him again except in passing for the rest of the weekend but I couldn't get the night out of my head. I had actually enjoyed sex again for the first time in many years. I also had Bill agree that he would never bring it up, never use this night against me. He would soon break that promise, as he had so many others.

Saturday morning, raining and horrible out, Frank knocked on the door, offering me a ride to work. I accepted as I didn't want to sit in the rain waiting for the bus. It was earlier, well before my shift began, so we found a place to stop and continued what we'd started the previous night and thus began a short affair. I took the bus home from work and for the rest of the weekend, didn't see Frank except in passing. Don't get me wrong, it didn't end, but the circumstances changed. This was May of 2009, just weeks before I left for good.

Monday morning after Bill left for work, I cemented this affair by knocking on Frank's door (he lived in the same motel). I couldn't help myself, I liked being with a man who didn't abuse me and treated me well. Bill thought the Friday night was it, but I carefully kept any hint of this affair from him. He'd go ballistic if he even suspected it.

I kept up my usual routine, except keeping my best friend updated on my situation. She was in on everything, knew it all and only admonished me to be careful, knowing to well what might happen if Bill ever found out.

Frank often picked me up from work, not always for sex, and we became friends, which was even more important to me than being lovers. He couldn't understand why I stayed with Bill. Only then did I tell him my real plans. He told me once that if I was his, he'd make sure I had a house and a car, and anything else I needed to be happy. Astounded, I realized he would do that for any woman he had a relationship with, beyond just sex. We were friends and we were having an affair. It didn't go beyond that for a while, but that is another story and has nothing to do with my abusive spouse and my flight from him.

The nightly heap of verbal abuse continued. I always came home to Bill drunk and abusive. No, I never once heard, "Hi honey, how was your day," with a glad to see me smile. No, I came home to, "I'm so pissed off!", all the time.

I'm not sure if it was a week or two weeks after that Friday, but we (or rather I at Bill's suggestion) invited Frank over again. We gave away no clue to our affair, but though Frank expected a repeat, nothing happened and he didn't stay long.

Bill kept me awake and I did drink, all night long. Consequently, I was in no condition to go to work, but didn't want to be at home either. So I walked to a nearby bar and nursed a beer and called Frank. We spent the day together with one of his customers, ending it so late we had no time for anything else before I had to be home. During the week, I was home in the morning and spent part of it with Frank. I'd described some of the crap Bill put me through, things he did to me, and Frank told me if I ever needed a place to go, just to knock on the door. He even gave me a key to his room since he didn't always hear me knock if he was sleeping. I had no idea that I would soon I'd have to take him up on that.

But I hadn't been seeing him long, or even that often as I did work full time. He did start giving me rides to and from work but there wasn't often time for much else. The third weekend, May 24, the night before labor day, Bill started the usual crap-heaping verbal abuse on me from the time I walked in the door (this was Sunday evening and Frank had just dropped me off). And he broke yet another promise. He told me to go "f*** Frank. Oh wait, you already did."

That was the last straw. He'd made a promise and it didn't take him long to break it, as usual. Furious, I glared at him and jumped off the bed. "You promised you'd never---."

He did back off on that issue but the tirade continued, building until he was throwing things everywhere-my breakables, of course. I ducked and dodged and threw things back at him. The place was wrecked but only ceramics, nic/nacs were broken. Electronics were intact. His eyelids drooped and when he staggered so much he couldn't' stay on his feet, he finally stayed on the bed with a kitchen knife he'd been waving around under his pillow, and passed out.

First, I gently and quietly moved the knife. Then I packed up my computer and some clothes into my backpack, grabbed my briefcase and my journal, and my cell phone and keys, and let myself out of the room. It would be hours, or the next day before he roused from his stupor and realized I was gone. This was not being pissed and going out for a walk or a beer to cool off. This time, I wasn't going back.

Two doors down from ours, I had just turned the key in the lock when Frank opened the door and let me in. He hadn't gone to sleep yet. I'd also brought the rest of my vodka bottle and the coke I usually drank with it. To my surprise, I only had one, really weak drink, while I told him what had happened to make me run.

"You don't have to go back if you don't want to. You wanted to leave anyway. Just stay here a bit and relax," he said, or something like that.

He let me stay and I haven't left yet. Our relationship has deepened over the past months as I've rediscovered myself, things about me long buried or forgotten over the years. I escaped, finally, and it was the best thing I ever did, giving myself a new life and a new love, and a happiness I've never known until now.Thinking that relocating to Tucson would help, that things might settle into a more acceptable state, I looked forward to the change. Bill had a job as an electrician, work he loves and is quite good at. Though we spent three months in a mini-apartment at a motel, I was comfortable, even while job hunting. Turned out, the cost of living in Tucson was much higher, especially with rent, than in Willcox. Still, I had high hopes. I thought we'd be happy. I was wrong, so wrong, and the cost of that nearly destroyed me. A few quiet years passed. Bill had enough raises in pay to bolster our finances. We bought a house, along with its requisite mortgage and other responsibilities, and I was able to stay home, be a full time wife and mother, and spend my time writing. My first published story, Always a Warrior, was electronically published in May 2000. I began working on other stories but this first one was my baby. I had based the hero on what I believed to be Bill's Navy SEAL/combat background but with a significant fictional twist. My created hero is a real SEAL and still active duty, a man of honor, when he meets the heroine. To my everlasting regret, my hero turned out to be the villain though it took me the next several years to realize and acknowledge that.