Gut Flag

“The world breaks everyone and afterward many are stronger at the broken places.”

Ernest Hemingway

This will be the most difficult recollection that I pen. It was a period of my life that I had mentally felt the lowest and the time in my life that thoughts of hopelessness sang in my head daily. Times where I felt with every fiber of my being that I couldn’t go on …not one more day…but I did, over and over and over again. My perception of gratitude morphed into something I never saw coming and I am changed for the better because of this journey…and so are many others.

My son was probably about 2 or 3 years old and I had recently taken a job as an Administrative Assistant in a specialty hospital. I had enrolled in Respiratory Therapy School and my life on my own was blossoming into what I had imagined I wanted it to be – not what other people thought it should be…after my recent divorce. I was excited about where I was going in life. Seemed the world was my oyster, so to speak, and there were no limits for me or for our future.

I met him in the cafeteria of the hospital one morning while getting a snack, He seemed nice, clean cut with a sly smile. Polite, quiet and well groomed. Seemed ok. No red flags…initially.

Chatting at work often is how it went for a while. Working and going to school as a single mom did not allow for a lot of spare time for anything else. So the dating thing was slow, but moved forward. We began to run into each other in the break room and he became more inquisitive about me and my back story. Looking back, the first weird question that I blew off was “does your ex see your kid” and “do you get child support?” I guess in and of themselves, they aren’t really weird questions, but stand alone inquiries – they are weird. Why would any guy wanna know that? That answer would come later.

We began dating – not too often – as work and school and single mom stuff prohibited a larger social life. He was very respectful and seemed (overly) attentive. He must really like me, huh? After being verbally, mentally and physically battered for seven years, it was nice to have what appeared to be sweet attention from a man. .. My second gut flag that I ignored…attentive vs possessive. “I must be over reading it; Just because you’ve had a bad experience, doesn’t mean every guy is screwed up; I think it’s my past that is over reacting to someone who is just thoughtful and kind; He really must care about me.” Right…?

I had doubted my gut flags and intuition since I was a little girl when the sexual abuse had begun in and around my family. I learned to not listen to my own common sense fears and concerns early in life…much to my detriment.

He began, every so slightly, to question me about who I was with and where I was going. Nothing overt…always subtle…and when I asked “are you ok with it?”, the response was a slightly over reactive “of course, of course!! why do you ask? Do you not want me to know where you are?!” And, in usual fashion with a narcissist, I would respond with embarrassment and fear of having invoked doubt into my loyalty to our relationship…”No, no, no, of course not, you can always ask where I am – I’m not worried about that!!!!” And so the Gas Lighting began…

He was charming and ever so mannerly. My mom liked him (cuz he schmoozed her too) and my girl friends seemed to like him – or they never let on if they had any concerns. And so the obvious progression over time developed…he eventually asked me to marry him. He had a good job and he had a modest home. He seemed stable. He had family locally. He seemed like a great guy and I thought he would be faithful and I had no indication at all that he would ever raise a hand to me or my son. I had already had 7 years of that and knew, at least, that I didn’t want anymore of the physical abuse or lies and I thought it would be better for my son to have a stable, hard working man in his life. Eventually, my son and I moved into his home…but 24 hours later…it all changed.

My son was visiting his father, we had moved my things into his home, and I had a wedding shower/fashion show planned with some girlfriends at a local bar and restaurant. Nothing over the top. Didn’t drink alcohol because I had to drive and pick my son up afterwards before I returned to our new address with my fiance’. It all seemed so damn normal at the time…

I arrived at my new return address that night after the event to find it empty. Didn’t think anything of it really. Just placed my son, who had fallen asleep on the way there, into his bed. He never woke. I came out into the living room and into the kitchen to look for a note maybe left by him. Nothing. Went back into the bathroom and came back out and he silently stepped out from around the corner and pushed his face within 1 inch of mine and asked “did you have a good time?” with a sneer. It took me completely off guard and scared the hell out of me and I responded with a yelp. I asked him what the hell was wrong with him and why did he do that? I walked back into the bedroom to change into bed clothes. I figured he was a little jealous of me having fun without him and that it’d be ok tomorrow. So I kept quiet and went about my routine.

He sat down very close to me on the end of the bed and started growling questions into me ear about who I was with and did I flirt with anyone and if I had danced with anyone? I answered no to it all because I hadn’t and became more than annoyed at his accusational tone of questioning. What the hell is this shit?!? When he grabbed me by the arm and twisted it as I was trying to walk back into the bathroom, fear shot through me. His eyes were dark and jaw clinched. My heart started to pound. It was at that single moment I knew I was in grave danger – I could feel it – and I had to get out with my son and our lives.

I don’t know how I knew to do it, but I knew I had to get out from the back end of the house where I would be trapped with no exit. I slowed my speech and began to say things like “maybe we need just to cool off for the night” “I’m just gonna stay at mom’s tonight and we can talk about this in the morning” as I moved toward the kitchen where the phone was in case I had to call 911. As I reached into the refrigerator and pulled the juice pitcher out to get my son a sippy cup of juice for the ride, he swung and smashed the pitcher out of my hand and it hit my chest and spilled all over me and the kitchen. His level of rage had elevated and his eyes were black and his face beet red. I was in the corner of the kitchen, my son was a hallway away, I reached for the phone to dial 911 in one swift move and he ripped the phone off the wall. Some how I remained calm. Somehow I knew I had to keep my head straight in order to get out of this house alive.

I kept my eyes down and my voice quiet. I could feel my pulse pounding in my head and ears at this point. I saw that the front door was open out of the corner of my eye. I told him that I was just gonna sleep in the room with my son and let things cool off for the night. He briefly went to the back of the house, I scooped my son up, ran to the front door, ran to the car and slung the driver’s door open with him in my arms while he was still in the back in the house in the back room. I slid my son into the passenger side seat, jumped into the driver’s seat, jammed the key into the ignition and started the car. I thought he was still in the back of the house. As I began to quickly back out, I turned to see a microwave hurled toward my car. I jammed on the gas and the microwave smashed the front windshield and rolled off the hood of my brown Datsun Station Wagon and into the driveway. I jammed the car into drive and squealed away as fast as I could. Through tears, I cried out loud…”If you do it once, you’ll do it again. It’s over”.

Or so I thought…

From that day forward, I endured a hell that I would wish on no one. The word “Stalking” had not quite been utilized as yet, but it is the word I used when speaking to the innumerable police and deputy sheriff’s that I, or my family, called over the next four years.

Water pipes cut on my home; places of employment vandalized; and my name slandered with vile phrases across sidewalks; tires flattened; sugar in my gas tank; liquid styrofoam in my tail pipe; objects moved around in my home while I was away; my mother’s home was flooded when a rag was jammed down into the sink and the water was turned on; head lights smashed; well pump set on fire; calls all hours of the day and night telling me in detail where I had been and who I had been with; calls telling me that if he couldn’t have me, no one else would; broken windows; and the list could go on…ad nauseam.

As if the nightmare wasn’t bad enough, my girlfriend’s husbands would no longer allow me to ride with them for class or clinicals for fear of either they themselves, or their cars, being effected by this lunatic. In addition, friends outside, except my friend E, had backed away also. My life had become a prison. I certainly don’t blame any of them.

On the day I left, it was in fear that something would happen to my son. It had come to the point where I would start the car with my son on the porch because I feared he would rig my car to blow up. I remember the day I looked at my son as I sat in my car and hesitated to start it. I looked at that little fella up on the porch with his backpack on. I loved him so much…he was my world…my reason for breathing…but I was so tired. I really didn’t think I had anymore fight in me. As I grabbed the key, I had hoped that the car would blow because I couldn’t do this any longer. I was tired. I was hopeless. No one could help us. Nothing had worked. I knew this was never going to end. Then the car started… and nothing. I knew then with that thought that we had to leave. Life would never be the same here and never again be safe. That next night his brother called and said that he had been arrested and that if I was smart, I’d get out of town before he was released the next day from jail with bail money from his mother. I hid my son at a friend’s house that night and hid myself somewhere else. The next morning, Mother’s Day, I gathered my son and some belongings and we left. I stopped at the Winn Dixie at US1 and SR207 to get some snacks for the road. As I was coming out of the store, I saw his car leaving the parking lot. Fear shot through me. I looked over at my car and saw a fluid leaking out under it. I quietly had the service desk call the police and two female officers arrived. One city police officer and other a deputy sheriff. They knew who I was and who had been arrested the night before. All they said was “we’re aware of the situation”. I kept it as quiet as possible with my now 4 year old son. The city officer went to the auto parts store and got the manager to come out and fix my break lines and check the rest of the hoses and the engine. When the work was completed, the deputy sheriff said she would escort me and my son to the county line, but that we were on our own from there. She told me not to stop for several hours and only to pee and get gas and to just keep going til dark. I stopped in North Carolina somewhere just off I95. I couldn’t go anymore. I had bargained with the front desk clerk at the hotel and I think she felt sorry for me and she gave me a room for the night for less than 40 bucks. As I lay my head down on the pillow, I wondered how things got to this place? How could this all happen? What am I going to do? Where are we going and where will we live? It took a while with my hungry belly gnawing at me, but I fell asleep. I woke in the morning with a startle. I thought for a split second that it had all been a terrible dream, but the doom of reality soon crept in when surveying a hotel room and my little sleeping buddy next to me. Funny I thought, you never really think that that line in the movies is real, but I do get it for sure.

We stayed away for nearly 10 months then were summoned home for the trial for his arrest just before our escape for criminal mischief, trespassing, and damage to a dwelling. We were headed home. I thought it would be over with the trial. I thought he would go away forever and we could have out life back. Justice always prevails…right?! Not so much.

The police had no recourse because, you see, there was no such thing as a Stalking Law at that time in the State of Florida. They never caught him physically in any act. The best we had were shoe prints outside my home with one of the vandalism events. Circumstantial evidence had been gathered and we went to trial.

It was a judicial circus and, as usual, the victim was portrayed as “a hysterical woman upset over the break up of a relationship”. Yup, his Public Surrender said that out loud. When my lawyer even insinuated that the defendant had a checkered past, the judge slammed his gavel down in protest. When I actually objected from the stand and asked “what about my rights?”…Judge turned to me and said “I’m not concerned with your rights. I’m here to protect the rights of Mr. (Blank)”. WTF!?!?!

The trial was almost over. During the brief recess, I had gone to the bathroom down the hall. As I was returning to the courtroom, his two brothers came from a side hall and closed in behind me…one stating to the other in a near whisper…”there she is…we could shoot her now and no one would even be the wiser”. When I ran to the courtroom and told the bailiff, he blew me off with a flip of his his hand and turn of his head. And just like that…it was over. He walks and I return to my prison.

I remember running into his Public Surrender at Publix one day. I asked him if he slept well at night? With an arrogant flippant tone in his voice he said “I sure do”. I said to him, looking directly into his eyes and leaning in, “that’s great, because I don’t”. I left him standing there in front of the bakery with his mouth open.

Events were quiet for a short period, then they kicked back in again. The two detectives on the case had come to me one day to chat. First, they instructed me that if I was to every decide to date again, that I should come to them for an unofficial background check. OK, noted, but not really funny. Second, they described to me that if they had pulled my “rap sheet”, it would likely be about an 8 1/2 by 4 inches or so small sheet of paper. The one detective stepped back, held his hand straight up in the air with the rap sheet of endless folds of my stalker in his right hand. He held it over his head and let it go to unfold to the ground…and it never completely unfolded. More folds remained detailing his criminal history. So it had to be at least 7 feet in length. I felt my knees go weak and the nausea rose in my throat. I leaned back against my car. They unofficially told me that he may have killed someone “in prison” at one time also. (WTF, PRISON?!) They told me there was nothing more they could do for me or my son and that I needed to leave the county…quietly…and anonymously…as soon as possible. My life…our lives…as we knew it…would forever be changed. And come to find out, many other lives would be changed…for the better.

During those couple of years, we had pleaded with the law enforcement agencies, victims advocates, lawyers, judges, the state capital and even the Govenor for help. Other states had a “Stalking Law” in effect that would protect people like me, but no such law existed in Florida at the time…yet. We made calls after calls. We sent letter after letter. We contacted local and national news agencies for help. I did interviews and went on a nationally syndicated talk show. Anything to break the silence. Anything to bring awareness to this crime. A crime that placed the victim in prison and not the perpetrator. The late Govenor Lawton Chiles would eventually, after much a do and several years of begging and pleading, sign into law the first Stalking Law in the State of Florida in 1992. And for that, I am truly grateful.

Along this path, however, were many women who were killed by their stalker and some would commit suicide as a choice vs having to face living the rest of their lives in that “prison”. At times, they were my motivation to never, ever give up.

For the women who did not make it out of those prisons alive, one day I hope to dedicate my book to them. I will never forget their faces.

I have been blessed on occasion to have women approach me and thank me for my fight and for my part in the efforts to pass the Stalking Law in Florida for they have benefited from it’s existence. And if that is why I went through all that hell, my guess is that it was worth it.

With each hurdle and with each horrific event that I have been through…at each one of my broken places…I have healed with gratitude. Gratitude made me stay focused on the prize. Gratitude kept me humble. Gratitude gave me hope again for things better…down the road. I am stronger at my broken places.