Heartbreak
6:32 PM
I remember feeling after our wedding and Sam moved to Northwest Arkansas with me that something had changed. He was mad all the time. Yelling, Hitting things, I found things that scared me. Whenever I tried to talk to him to figure out what was going on, he would tell me it was all in my head. I developed severe anxiety. I couldn't function in most circumstances. Something was wrong. I had no clue what. I just tried harder to be a better wife. Maybe he was right. It was all in my head. It was probably my fault.
One night he never came home. His cell phone was off. Finally around 1030 I got a call from an unknown number. It was his one phone call. I had to ask him where he was. I had to ask why. He didn't volunteer any information. All I could gather was he was stealing cash from his job because he lied to me about having one. We hung up. I was so confused.
I called his dad because I didn't know what to do. He drove 3.5 hours in the middle of the night to stay with me. (Again, best father in law ever) I remember just laying on the bathroom floor puking out my guts before my father in law arrived. It felt like my heart was trying to come out of my throat. I was crying so hard I couldn't breathe. Why? How? I was a newlywed, this was suppose to be the happiest year of my life. I was broken. There had been something wrong. It wasn't in my head. The truth was out, it wasn't me. My marriage was filled with lies. I didn't understand? How did he change this much in such a short time? This wasn't who I dated. Did I do something to cause this? It had to be my fault, I had to be doing something wrong.
We sat there waiting for them to release Sam the next afternoon. I felt like it was a dream. A few months before I had worn the prettiest princess dress and danced with my father in law to my favorite song. Now we sat in a jail waiting room after paying his bail. How do you react? I didn't know what to think. My whole body and heart was numb.
Sam walked through the doors. He smiles a smug smile. Looked at his dad and said, "Hey Dad!" I was instantly angry. I don't know what I wanted him to say. But that wasn't it. After an uncomfortably silent drive home, his dad said, "Sam you are my son and I love you. But if you don't get your act together and change you are going to lose everything. If you do it again and Christine doesn't leave you, I'm going to come take you away from her. She doesn't deserve this."
I was shocked. My mind hadn't even thought of leaving him. I don't know what I was thinking, but it wasn't leaving. His parents work for a mission that counsels couples to stay married through hard times. And here his Dad was saying he was going to take him away if he didn't change. I didn't know how to comprehend any of this.
I ended up telling him we were going to get the help we needed. We were going to work through it. And that if he ever got arrested again, not to bother calling me. I wasn't going to live like this my whole life. We were going to learn from it and become stronger because of it.
Fast Forward maybe 3 months. I had had ovarian cysts and was having surgery to have them removed. I was highly medicated and couldn't get around well much less drive. Sam went to do his community service. Several hours later his mom called and said she was on her way over. I thought it was odd since she lived 3.5 hours away. I asked what was wrong. Sam was in jail again. Apparently it was a misunderstanding, the police lost records of his community service. He had to finish his hours out in jail. His mom sorted it all out. He was only in for several days, all of which she stayed and took care of me.
Looking back now I can see that it wasn't a misunderstanding. Most things that seemed crazy or horrible luck that he had I look back now and see how blind and stupid I was. Did the rest of the world see what he was doing and how he was treating me? Or did he have them fooled too? When I think back I can't help by feel like an idiot for not seeing through his lies.
I feel everyone understands that no one is perfect. Everyone is going to fail and hurt even the one they love. Trying to hide that failure is no way to handle it. If he would have just told me the truth about what was going on with our finances. Yes, I would have been furious. But as his wife, how could I help or be apart of our marriage if I was clueless about what was going on? How could I encourage him without knowing what he was going through? I couldn't. I was set up to fail. He thought he was protecting me. But in actuality he was single handedly destroying me and us. I didn't have a clue.
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