Life Gave Me Lemons; I Added the Vodka
Story #1: May 9th…Just another day on my calendar. Finally.
Have you ever driven somewhere and when you arrive you wonder how you got there? You don’t remember red lights or green lights. You don’t even remember the turns you made. Same can be said when you were assigned chapters to read in school and you “read” it but had no idea what you read. You just go through the motions because you’ve done it a million times before. That is what May 9th has FINALLY become to me.
Growing up I think most little girls have the dream of falling in love with the perfect man, having the perfect wedding, and having perfect kids. Moving into a house in the suburbs and being a stay at home mom. That was my dream for the longest time. I wanted what everyone saw on T.V. I wanted to be the modern day Brady Bunch family.
I started college in September of 1990. While it didn’t appear to be so, I was looking for that perfect man from the minute I stepped foot on the campus of Southwest Texas State University. It took me 2 years, but in the summer of 1992, I met that man. Or so I thought.
Eric and I met over the phone when he called to talk to my roommate. He was calling to ask her a question and I had the privilege (please read that with a touch of sarcasm) of answering the phone and taking the message. He asked me what my name was and I told him Dodi. He laughed and said that he would appreciate me giving Cynthia the message. I thought nothing of it. I’ve always hated my name and for him to chuckle was nothing new to me. What was new to me was when he called back and left a message on our machine letting me know the top 3 reasons why my name was dumb. Hmmm…red flag #1 should have gone up, but I was so desperate for attention that I called him back and debated with him. It was love at first insult.
Flash forward 2 years. We got engaged on April 15, 1994 and were married 4 months later; even though I told my dad as we were walking down the aisle that I didn’t trust him. Red flag #2.
We had our first child, Mary, in September of 1996. We bought a house and both had great jobs. He was in the financial printing industry and I was a teacher. I had Madeleine, our second daughter in July 1999 and if things stayed on track, we would be financially secure in the near future and I became that stay at home mom in June 1999, right before she was born. I was living the dream. But then the internet was introduced in our home, along with emails and chat rooms. Eric worked 4 PM -midnight. When he got home from work, I’d be asleep and he would stay up on the internet in chat rooms, talking to other women and eventually cheating on me.
My life drastically changed in July 2000 just before Madeleine’s 1st birthday. Eric told me that he had “won” a golfing trip to Colorado. He was leaving for 10 days and wouldn’t tell me where he would be, wouldn’t give me a phone number and that I was to just let him do this. He “needed” this so he could regroup and refresh and come back a better man. The woman’s intuition in me was screaming BS and I set myself on a mission to find out who he was going to see.
The day he left on his trip, he had flowers delivered to the house along with a box. The box had diamond earrings inside and the card said, “Thanks for letting me do this. I love you, Eric.” Red flag # whatever. I had begun to lose count.
That afternoon I was loading stuff into the trunk of his car and noticed something sticking out of his golf bag. When I looked inside, it was another box from the same jewelry company and inside was a different set of earrings. I was hoping that they were going to be for me and that he would give them to me when I dropped him off at the airport. Sadly, I was wrong. The 10 days he was gone were nothing short of miserable. I didn’t talk to him at all and Madeleine ended up in the hospital from dehydration. It was pure hell. When Eric got home, he was a different man, but not in the way that he made it sound like he was going to be. You see, he had gone to see the woman that would eventually become his second wife.
When he returned from his trip, he informed me that he was going to go talk to his boss at work (ironically, my uncle) and see about getting a transfer to Colorado. He had met this woman and was so saddened by the life that she was living with her three kids that he felt called by God to move to Colorado and help her out. That was that. He was moving. I could go with him or I could stay, but his mind was made up. I didn’t want to lose my husband, but everything inside of me was screaming that something wasn’t right about any of this. I was too weak of a woman to stand up to him. We never fought, ever, because I didn’t like confrontation. So, I smiled through my pain and said that I would be happy to go. It would be exciting, even though I had never lived anywhere but Texas.
We moved into our house in Colorado on December 20, 2000. I had never been so miserable. I was miles away from my sisters who were my everything. I was watching my marriage crumble before my eyes and I wasn’t strong enough to do anything about it. I ached in silence and cried in private. When Eric wasn’t at work, he was on the phone with her. Her son was living with us so I could take him to school every morning. I was watching her 2 younger daughters when she needed extra help. “We” were giving her money to help her pay her bills and he was buying her gifts that he should have been giving to me. I was sinking, no I was spiraling, into a sea of depression and the best thing Eric ever said to me was, “I think you need to go see someone about your depression and see about getting some medicine.” He thought I was depressed because I wasn’t in Texas anymore. Because I wasn’t near my sisters. That was part of it, but 99.999999% of it was because my Brady Bunch dream wasn’t turning out like I had hoped. What he didn’t know was the medicine made me think more clearly and woke me up to face the nightmare I was living.
I submerged myself into our church and kept myself busy. I planned Easter egg hunts and ran the Lady’s Bible study. If someone needed a meal made, I made it. We went skiing every weekend, with her, and I skied alone. And…we started fighting. A lot. Our marriage was no longer he and I, but him. He had the job and made the money and he was going to do with it what he wanted. He started controlling what we ate, specifically me, and controlling me with his words and emotions. I would binge eat Little Debbie brownies during the day and cold Oreos at night when he was gone. That’s all I ate and I was still losing weight. I was, by all accounts, in an abusive marriage. While there were no physical scars to prove it, there were mental ones and I think, sometimes, those are worse.
The night that I left Eric and finally made the decision to go back to Texas, we had a huge fight. Thankfully the girls were already in bed, but he felt the need to get in my face and scream at me, telling me I was crazy because I couldn’t accept the life that he wanted us to live. His suggestion was for me to let him have the girls and for me to just move back to Texas and forget any of this ever happened. He said he would convince a judge I was crazy and I wouldn’t have a chance at ever seeing them again. No more red flags. These were hurricane warning signs and I needed to get out.
Eric went downstairs and started getting ready for work. He worked 11 PM to 7 AM in Denver and we lived in Colorado Springs. While he was getting ready, I called my sister Shelli in Austin. All I said was, “Get me a ticket” and hung up the phone. When Eric came back upstairs, I had his work backpack all set to go. Little did he know, but I had gotten the suitcase from downstairs and already had it in Mary’s room, waiting to be packed. He turned to me and said, “So what’s it going to be?” I told him I didn’t know. I didn’t want our marriage to end, but I could’t go on letting him cheat on me and doing nothing about it. A statement he vehemently denied and still does to this day. I stayed awake all night staring out the front window making sure he wasn’t going to come back home. I called my dad and told him what had been going on for the past 6 months of our marriage and he encouraged me and the girls to get as soon as we could.
The next morning, I left Eric. I told the girls, who were 2 and 4 at the the time, to be extra super quiet while we were loading the car so we didn’t wake up her son downstairs. I put the car in neutral and rolled out of the drive way. I drove a stick so I coasted down the street a little and then started the car. I arrived at the airport and had two Colorado Springs police officers standing near me because Shelli had called and let them know I was fleeing an abusive marriage and to protect me in case Eric showed up and tried to take the kids. She and I were both afraid the son would find out I was gone and tip Eric off. I sat facing the entrance to the terminal of the airport so I could see him in case he did show up. It was May 9th, 2001 and I had left my abusive marriage. Eric filed for divorce about 3 hours later.
I arrived in Austin later that morning. The girls and I lived with Shelli and her family for a few months so I could get my feet on the ground and begin a new life. I had a lot to think about. I had to decide if I was going to stay in Austin or move back to Houston. I had to come to grips with the fact that I was going to be a single mother and I was only 29 years old. I had to, for the first time in my life, decide what Dodi wanted and I didn’t even know who Dodi was.
Every year after that, Shelli would call me on May 9th and wish me happy independence day. Our theme song was “Independence Day” by Martina McBride. At first it was comforting. I had stood up to a man who was clearly narcissistic and abusive and I was winning. When Facebook came along it was our inside comment to each other that no one else understood, but always gave us plenty of likes for. Shelli was my everything and made it possible for me to start this new life with my girls. She was why I was able to buy a house and furnish it. Get a car and put food on the table. She was the reason why I was able to finally find out who I am and become the woman I am today. That someone is totally different than the woman who left Eric 16 years ago.
This year, May 9th was different though. I guess my heart and soul were ready because I didn’t even think about it. That’s how much I love the life I have today.
I met the absolute love of my life on March 11, 2007, although it took my guarded heart a little while to trust and love him completely. While Shelli is the reason why I was able to move forward after my divorce, Chris is the reason I can move forward everyday. Why I woke up on May 9th this year and didn’t think about Independence Day at all. He has become the part of my heart that taught me true love does exist. That two people can fall in love and know without a doubt they will be with each other until one of them lays the other in the arms of Jesus. Two people can be so madly in love with each other, that being away from each other for the day makes your heart ache to be with them. Having an argument doesn’t mean filing for divorce. Your partner can be your best friend and sometimes doing nothing together might just be what the doctor ordered. Chris and I can have fun running errands together or talking to each other at the end of the day. In fact, I’m pretty sure the end of the day, when we are laying in bed, is my favorite time of day. I am blessed to have found him and my girls are blessed to have a man in their lives that has gladly become a dad when he didn’t have to be. Chris is the reason why I woke up on May 10th and realized for the first time in 16 years I didn’t celebrate Independence Day on May 9th. I’ll never forget the hell I went through to get where I am today, but it’s not important for me to celebrate the conquest anymore. Chris made it possible for May 9th to be just another day on my calendar. Finally.
