Living with an Addict - Part 3

 Living With An Addict - Part 1

Living With An Addict - Part 2

It was the Spring of 2002 we moved into the duplex.

It was nice to just be back on our feet again.

My ex-husband was working and the money was coming in regularly.  In fact, he was making quite a bit of money. I figured we could get out of debt with all the collection agencies and pay back our family within the next couple of years.

We started to attend church again and it seemed my ex was pulling himself out of the grip of drugs. His friends were coming around when I was there and awake, instead of sneaking around. I thought that maybe he was finding the strength to part from his addiction.

Sadly it was all a facade. I believe he was trying hard, but I know it was not long after we moved he was using again or using often enough for me to notice his behavior changes. It was small changes again, but they progressed a lot quicker this time.

He began disappearing again and crashing heavily almost every Sunday. Some times I could not even wake him up.

I was at a lose. I had thought he was doing so well and I had been encouraging him with everything I could give him. I wanted him to beat this. It was killing me to see it start all over again.

I remember a couple of distinct incidents during this time...

We went on a date!

It was nice to get a babysitter and get out together. It felt like when we were dating. I remember we went out to eat to Red Robin and then went to see the new Star Wars movie. After we got home I paid the babysitter and went upstairs to take out my contacts and put on my glasses. I came back downstairs to find my ex-husband. The bathroom door was closed.

I did not think anything of it until I smelled a strange odor. It was not strong, but when I walked by the bathroom door the smell was more powerful.

I did not even knock... I already knew what was going on.

When I walked into the bathroom my ex-husband was sitting on the toilet seat with the cat in his lap and his other hand behind his back. There was smoke rising up behind him... I walked over to him and asked him to hand it to me.

He said he did not have anything. I asked him why there was smoke rising up behind him and there was a strange smell coming from the smoke. He claimed he had burned the cat. I looked at the cat who was just sitting on the ground at this time. He was fine.

I asked my ex why the smoke was coming up from behind him and not from the cat. He called me crazy and told me I did not know what I was talking about.  During his rant I started to get sick from the smoke and I had to get out of there.

I moved out of the bathroom and after I walked out, my ex shut the door. I did see what looked like a small cigar, but I never got a good look at it.

I grabbed the cat and looked all over her. There were no burn marks, no scars, nothing. She seemed a little agitated, but I figure it was for the same reason I felt strange. We had both inhaled whatever he had been smoking.

A few minutes later he came out of the bathroom. I told him to leave. He argued with me and said I was crazy and that I should feel stupid for throwing him out just because he burned the cat.

He left after he said a few more very hurtful things.

The next day he came back. He continued to call me crazy. I asked him to show me on the cat where he had burned her. He grabbed the cat and moved her all around, actually searching for this so called burn mark.

He threw me a hateful glare and said I had fixed the burn mark to make it look as if she had not been burned. I could not believe it.

Why would I do such a thing?  I wanted it to be true.  I wanted this bad dream to disappear.  Why would I want to set him up?  But that was his story and he was sticking to it.  He told his parents the same thing.  I’m not sure if they believed him, but really it did not matter. 

I was still alone and he knew it.  He knew if he broke me down enough I would give in and let him come home.  Which I did.

My daughter had her first dance concert up in the city at the end of spring time. We got all ready to go. My dad was driving up to attend it and was meeting us at our house.

My ex came into the house and told me the car would not start. He said he had tried everything and he could not figure it out. My dad pulled up and looked at it as well. He could not find the problem either. I did not want to bother my dad by putting all the car seats in his car, so I told him not to worry about it.

I was devastated, but my daughter was okay with it. She was only three at the time and she did not seem to care. I let it go.

Later I found out what had really happened.

We wanted to go to counseling. I had finally told my parents what was going on. However, I only told them the bare minimum. They supported us in getting help.

On the first day I came home from work early to find my ex’s truck in the driveway, but I could not find him. I looked all over the house, but he was no where to be found. We had a small shed in the back yard, so I got the key and went to look inside.

I already knew he was in there. He held the door shut. I kept asking him what was going on, but he would not say anything to me. It was as if he really thought I would believe he was not in there even though he pulled the door shut on me.

I called my dad and asked him what to do. He told me to call the police. So I did.

After I called them, he came out of the shed and told me I was crazy, again.

A great start to counseling.

He had something bulging in his pocket and I could tell he was high. He would not let me see what was in there and told me to get lost. I went into the house and he followed me a few minutes later. The police arrived not long after that. I told them everything that had been happening and he told them I was out of my mind.

They asked us how long we had been married and I told them four years. They looked straight at my ex and said, I think she knows you well enough to know if you are doing drugs.

I wanted to cry.

Someone believed me.

I was beginning to think I really was crazy. I heard him call me crazy so many times in the last couple of years that I was literally wondering if he was right. The police asked if I had any evidence. I said it had been in his pocket, but now it was gone. They told me they could not do anything but recommended we head to our counseling meeting and get this mess fixed.

They left and so did we, in separate cars. The counseling meeting did not go well.

We moved into the duplex next door to us about 3 months after we had moved to this neighborhood. It was slightly larger, with 3 bedrooms and a bigger master bedroom. The family room and kitchen were larger as well.

I was happy to move to something bigger.

We got most of the stuff moved over in one day. I fell asleep that night while my ex was downstairs with his friends. I woke up to complete silence.  When I walked downstairs I found it deserted. I went outside to look for my ex and could not see him. His truck was not there but I knew his friend had asked to borrow it.  I was afraid he had gotten locked outside and had gone back to the other duplex.

Before I went over there I tried to call him from my cell phone. It would not turn on. I plugged it into charge and it still would not turn on. I was starting to panic.

What was going on? It really felt like a bad dream.

I walked over to the other duplex and went inside to use the landline. He would not answer his cell phone and he was not in the house. I walked around the yard and could not find him. I even looked inside the shed. He was no where to be found.

He had left again.

I went back into the new duplex and began pulling my phone apart. I happened to notice a white spot on the battery where the connectors were. I started scrapping at it and it came right off. I looked up on the counter and noticed a bottle of white out. He had put white out on the connectors so I could not call him.

I was devastated.

It was as if he hated me or at least the drugged up version of him did. My heart was breaking. I really felt so broken at that moment. It was a feeling I had become so familiar with over the past three years and it was heart wrenching.

It did not matter. He would come home and expect me to forgive him and life would continue on. He would call me crazy and I would believe him and he would get to continue on his destructive path.

He had worn me down and I felt it. I felt it through my entire being.

There were several other incidents over the next few months and one time was even very frightening to me. My ex came home and was behaving very strange. More strange then ever before.

It was during the day and my daughter immediately jumped in his arms. He looked like he was going to collapse. He sat down on the couch with my daughter on his lap. I asked him if he was okay and he told me to leave him alone. He kept closing his eyes and his head would fall to the side, then he would jerk it back up and look at me with these cold and almost unseeing eyes.

It was frightening.

I asked him again if he was okay.

He got jumpy and said he had to leave before “they” got to the house. I asked him who “they” was. He said something about the people who he had stolen the VCRs and stereos from. He was really in and out at this point. My daughter was even getting scared.

I told him he should go lay down.  He got edgy again and said he had to leave because “they” were coming after him.  I don’t think he knew who he was talking to.  I finally told him he was scaring his daughter and that he needed to go lay down.  He looked at her, like he was seeing her for the first time.  He stood up with her in his arms and walked upstairs (with me right behind him).

When he got to the bed he handed her to me and then laid down and was instantly asleep. He did not remember a thing when he woke up... Or so he said.

He never had hurt me. Until the day I surprised him. I came home one day, without the kids, and found him doing something in the bathroom. He was caught off guard and quickly slipped something bulky in his pocket. I followed him up to our bedroom. We were yelling at each other and I wanted to know what was in his pocket. He would not let me near it. He said he was tired and he wanted me to leave him alone. He laid on the bed and I leaned over him and attempted to pull whatever was in his pocket out of it.

This is when he kicked me in the stomach, hard.

I flew backwards and hit the wall behind me. I remember not being able to breath and I remember he was next to me before I hit the ground. He grabbed me. He was crying and saying sorry over and over and over again.

I pushed him away because I was trying to get a breath in. He thought I was being rude and got mad. He got mad at ME. I remember sitting on the ground gasping for that breath that finally came and looking at him with disbelief. 

He had not only hurt me, he was getting mad at ME.  I could not understand his mind.  It was hopeless.

The man I loved was gone.

Many other things happened during this period, but if I wrote them all down you would be reading forever!

The turning point to this situation happened one night when his drug friends called me and said they were worried about him. They said he was out of control and doing stupid and crazy things. They wanted me to help him.

I could not help him any more. I was done. I was broken.

I called my parents up after wards. My dad said they would be up there with my brothers and some trucks and they would move us immediately. I called a friend as well. She came as well with her truck.

I got boxes and garbage sacks and I packed as fast as I could. We fit what we could fit into three trucks and my car and we left.

It was over. I could not do it any more. My kids were too important to me to let this garbage into their lives any more. They deserved stability and a mom who did not cry every single day. I moved everything into my parents that night. I left my ex a note and told him I would be back for the rest over the next few days.

I spoke to my land lord the next day... he lived across the street and had been suspecting something was going on for the last couple of months.  He said it is not normal for someone to be outside in the middle of the night, pulling apart cars.  He said he had watched my ex many times playing around with his truck in the middle of the night.  He said he looked looney and strung up on something. He was never sure so he had never said anything, but after I told him I was moving out he knew that was the reason. 

He also told me when I would leave for work in the morning, as soon as I pulled out of the cul-de-sac, two or three cars would pull into my driveway.  He said there was always strange people hanging around when I was not there.  He also said he had dug up a few needles from the yard of the old duplex. 

He was putting everything together and I did not even have to say a word about my ex’s addictions.

My ex was not doing well the next day. He was very upset I had left with the kids. But he was also very strung out.

I picked up a lot of stuff that day and took it to my parents. My life with my ex-husband was not quite over at this time, but I was away from him now.  I was no longer living with an addict. 

I had a lot to do to protect myself and fix myself, but if you would like to hear the next part of my journey you will have to stay tuned.  I will also post my ex-husbands confessions.  Yes, he did eventually come clean with everything.  It might be a few days before I get it all down and I might have to do it in two or three parts.

Thanks for reading this and please make sure you share with others. I am hoping my story will be there to encourage others to stand up for themselves despite how broken and lost they feel. It can be done.

Until next time... Peace and light!