Kevin and I bought a home in Fayetteville NC because there was no available housing on Fort Bragg. It was the first home we had ever owned in our 17 years of marriage. Because of the timeline that the owners needed to sell, Kevin decided to buy the home before his Staff College was finished and he would move the children and I first and then join us after his school was finished. I agreed. However, because of the short notice, Kevin thought we could save more money if we moved ourselves. He was always very controlling and tight with “HIS” money and now that we owned a home his obsession with money was more dramatic. Let me remind you that I followed our budget very closely for the most part and never asked for any extras. I am not materialistic and expensive items hold no value to me so it was easy for him to not feel the pressure of having to spend money on me. But Kevin had a motorcycle, all the tools a man could ask for, a new king cab pickup truck that only he drove. I drove our Dodge van with no air or heat because it was a good size for me and the children which is what Kevin would tell others. Kevin had control over all the money and what he spent money on was “none of my business.” Kevin also told me that he wanted to buy a boat once we got settled in NC. But I convinced him that we needed to save our money for our future. The reason why I am sharing this is to set up an image of what Kevin wanted to create. I see today that he wanted to hide his abuse on the inside of our home, and shower the outside of our home with “things” to make HIS image look better. This behavior is the same facade that Kevin’s parents and sister Kelly Baker Barnes still display in an effort to mislead people about how wonderful their “life” is. It is a very sick, damaging game that eventually affects the kids.
Almost every man wastes part of his life in attempts to display qualities which he does not possess, and to gain applause which he cannot keep. ~Samuel Johnson
Now, I want to return to our move-
The thought of moving ourselves was ok with me. I knew we would pocket a significant amount of money and I was physically strong with all my training. My mind was ready to move to Fort Bragg knowing Kevin would be deploying for 2 years. It was a good location to recoup my thoughts of leaving Kevin. So Kevin and I moved our ENTIRE home by ourselves. Except for heavy items like the washer and dryer-Kevin and I moved all of our furniture and belongings. We were on a time crunch so we had 3 days. We moved non-stop from early morning well into the nights and it was exhausting but I was stubborn and determined to show Kevin how lucky he was to have me. So many wives told me I was crazy for agreeing to help Kevin move. Some of the men in the neighborhood would tell Kevin that he was lucky because there was no way in hell that their wives would agree to that. That rejuvenated my determination even more to show Kevin what a good woman I was and that he had a lot to lose if I left him. Inside my mind, I felt strong, determined, and respected. But, on the outside, Kevin was short tempered and cranky when he was tired or pissed off because something would go wrong. Of course-he would yell at me. I would just look at him and then I would walk away and grab another box. I just kept moving because I was in a secret competition with him. I refused to quit when he did and it made me feel stronger. I would push myself when Kevin would tell me I could not lift or move an item. He would tell me to take a break because he was and I refused. I became a robot because in my mind I was stronger than him. He wimped out and I kept moving. I would laugh in my mind behind his back. I despised his weakness and I started to admire my strength and determination. But once we were on the road to North Carolina, it caught up with me. Looking back, I started to show signs of the epilepsy in my brain that was slowly growing and it was terrifying.
It was a 20 hour drive and because Kevin was driving the moving truck and I was hauling a trailer behind the pickup-it was going to be about a 22 hour drive. Kevin decided that we could only afford to stop once in a hotel so we were going to haul our move as long as we could for 2 days. Keep in mind that I slept all of 6 hours in two days and the physical output on my body was starting to take a toll. I was exhausted. We were on the road for about 6 hours and in traffic that going at a pretty steady speed. I had Justin and Amanda in the truck with me and I was feeling ok, but all the sudden my vision started to blur and my body shifted on the inside. I started to sweat and my hands started to clutch the wheel. I shook my head thinking I was just tired, but it did not work. All the sudden everything in front of me seemed to be slowly closing into a hole-I was going to faint, so without looking in my mirror, I swerved over on the embankment and turned off the truck. Kevin was well ahead of me at this point and I was not sure if he knew I was not behind him. I did not want to scare the kids, so I opened the door and grabbed some water and told them I was just tired. I knew that it was more than that. I knew something was wrong-
Posttraumatic seizures (PTE) may not appear for as long as 20 years after an accident. Laboratory studies suggest that this may be due to the long-term repair process after head injury. This repair process happens as new connections and circuits are formed in the brain over a period of years. While this aids recovery of strength, speech and memory, it may also form hyper-excitable circuits that are prone to seizures. Head trauma can cause many problems in addition to seizures. People often develop migraine headaches, memory and concentration problems, dizziness, mood swings and various other symptoms……only approximately 15% of adults are affected by this disorder
I got a hold of myself and then saw Kevin heading up behind me in the moving van. I thought maybe I would get some sympathy but all I saw was the look on his face heading towards me-that stride of anger that he had and his clenched lips and red face said it all. Here we are standing on the side of the road with cars zooming by with all of our belongings and he started screaming at me. “Is something wrong with the truck?” I said no. “What the hell are you doing then?” Kevin screamed. “We have a full day’s trip ahead of us and you are just fucking around?”
I started screaming at him. I did not care that cars were speeding by. Everything in the world was speeding past us. Our past was speeding by us, our future was speeding past us, our whole life of lies was speeding by and there Kevin and I were standing on a road to nowhere screaming at each other with the children watching. I screamed at him “I have busted my ass for two days with little sleep and have done beyond what any other woman would do for her man and you are screaming at me on the side of the highway?” I started crying hysterically and sunk to me knees onto the gravel. I could feel the wind of the cars speeding by and could hear the sound of the screech of tires and I lifted my head up to Kevin and said loud enough for him to hear-“I am just so tired Kevin. I can’t go on anymore. I need to rest.” I got no sympathy from him however. Just grunts and groans of the fact that we have a timeline to meet…that he has to get to school..that we need to get moving. Then something in me jolted. I got off my knees and looked at him and in a very stern, firm voice I said-“You can’t do this move without me, so I am taking the children to a hotel, sleep for 4 hours, and then we will continue.” He just stared at me confused. I could almost read his mind. He knew I had the upper hand on this one. He did not have a choice. Either he keeps going on without me and the kids or we go together the next day. I just stared at him with my arms crossed. And then he said these words-“You think you are tough stuff don’t you?” I just stared at him. He started to pace up and down the side of the road frustrated. “You manage to fuck everything up don’t you?” I walked away and got back into the truck and started the engine and out of the window I looked at Kevin and said “Follow me” He stood with a look of disbelief on his face and then he got into the moving van and followed me. I am not sure if he was just a tired as I was or he was just tired of fighting which is what I hoped. But, we did not fight the entire trip after that nor did we fight when we moved in. Jim and Becky(Kevin's parents) helped us unload our home and it was very pleasant. Kevin only stayed 3 days and then headed back to Fort Leavenworth. It was going to be me and the children for the next 8-10 weeks and we were relived with that.
So, here begins my journey to Kevin’s return to North Carolina. There is a lot of detail that needs to be shared about my mother’s diagnosis of cancer, John’s involvement, my family, Kevin’s family, Kevin’s lies, Kevin’s behavior and the night that was the beginning of a whole different battle with my abuser. I will say this-up to this point, Kevin still surfed porn, he still knocked me around, verbally degraded me, was short tempered with the children and became a man that I thought I could not despise or disrespect more than I did up to this point. I was in for a rude awakening and for a moment in time I wished my awakening was a nightmare that maybe I would eventually wake up from. I was wrong.
“I want to wake up kicking and screaming
I want to live like I know what I’m leaving
I want to know that my hearts’ still beating
It’s beating…its beatingI’m bleeding”Awakening by Switchfoot
REST...REGROUP...RETURN
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