We bought a little house in the small nearby town. It was a beautiful house well-built and could last a lifetime. We did some of the finishing to pay for the down payment. We laid sod in the large back yard. Things like that. Unfortunately, by that time I was so broken I didn't function well. I tried. I even became a Brownie troop leader and room mother
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One year with our tax return, he bought me a used car, an automatic. I began making long drives to a university hospital, trying to get help. I knew something was wrong with me. They put me on a med. The med caused a sensation of the car moving when I had the brake pressed to the floor. They gave me another medicine to go with the first prescription. This started many long years of what I call later, as being a Guinea-pig.

I am going to condense here and skip ahead. I left him again. My mother had remarried to a good man, a bit on the strict side. The children and I moved into an apartment when he wouldn't leave the house. The children ended up at my mother's house. I tried suicide during this time more than once. I had no hope left and thought my kids would be better off without me. One doctor in a mental ward convinced me I was still needed. Even if the children aren't with you, you know them better than anyone and can see they get taken care of.

I have learned, right or wrong, it seems alcoholics want you when you are gone and don't want you when you are there. It is how my husband was. He came around again. This time our minister even talked with my mom, convinced, that it was better if we were all together. We signed the house over to my parents for all their help. I kept my promise. The kids were sent to us in that time frame. It was one of the worst mistakes I ever made.

We were living in San Diego. My husband wanted to leave the kids there, I guess indefinitely. His mom was an alkie and he wanted to have fun. It wasn't long after the kids got there, he decided he needed a vacation. He almost cleaned out our checking account but left $35.00 and turned off the phone. I had four children, no job, no car and was going to have surgery. I turned, for the first time to charity. I was twenty-eight years old. I needed and did have a vaginal hysterectomy because my uterus was falling out. He went to Mexico, then moved to the LA basin.

I enrolled into a nursing program in a small hospital. I was the only one with no marks against me. They told me I was going to be hired when my training was finished.

Some things at the hospital had me upset. An older female patient won my heart. She was diabetic and was going blind. She cussed like a sailor, and I could relate. Her roommate could not. Her insurance ran out and she was being transferred to a charity hospital. She begged me to go with her. It broke my heart.

I also found out I would need to bathe my patients who died and be in their morgue, nope. I also had a new patient. A handsome young man with a colostomy. That was difficult.

All in all, I was in a raw condition. My youngest daughter had a tonsillectomy. It was a hard surgery, as hers were so large. and I couldn't get off to be with her. That was when the monster again appeared. Have I mentioned, I was a runner? Not in miles, but from overwhelming situations. He was very convincing. We moved with him up north to the LA area.

His new boss was his best friend. His only friend. He owned a one-man steam cleaning business. He had two sons and was with his second wife. I learned later he was also bi-polar. I soon learned; my husband was having an affair with his wife. This pompous man who treated me like a whore.

That was before, they tricked me. I was a big city gal, but pretty naive. I had really lived a sheltered life. Not a protected one, but a sheltered one. I was looking for work to help out. In the past I had baby-sat. At one time eight children counting my own. Other than the elevator operator job I had no experience.

I Guess he had shared with her that I had done many massages on my mother in my youth. Like I said, I was naive so when she suggested I answer an ad in the paper, I didn't think anything about it. I answered the ad and got the job. There was a part of it I didn't like but I was desperate. I had to attend classes in biology. When I returned home after the first night of class, even before I started the job, he met me at the door. He told me to leave and not to come back or he would kill me.

I wanted to drive into the road divider. Instead, I drove back to work. I paid with my body for a motel room my boss rented for me.

Continued-