From Bliss To Chaos

Sometimes, fairytales don't have a happy ending. The fairytale that was Pat and I, was no exception. After five years of my life was devoted to, at the time I thought to be soul mate. Deception, lies and every imaginable mind game came into play. First, let's go back to where my previous story left off.

The first two years of our marriage was rather wonderful. We settled into married life like hands into a pair of favorite gloves. I was comfortable and happy. Pat, on the other hand, wasn't happy at all. His reasons remain a mystery to me, but his deeds were darker than any fairytale villain was and I was soon to experience their wrath.

As a part of the trust and love I held for my husband, he was added to my bank account, making it a joint venture. For a while, I continued to keep the account in balance, paying the bills and direct depositing my paycheck. It was a struggle to pay the bills now that there were two of us trying to live off one heavily taxed income.

After Pat got his Work Visa, allowing him the freedom to get a job in the US, he drug his heels about seeking employment. I finally had to push him out into the job market, reminding him that we wouldn't be able to continue our comfortable lifestyle with only my income. Within two days, he acquired a job as a baker and cashier at a local grocery store chain. It wasn't the highest paying job, but it helped supplement our total income. I was proud of Pat; he was hard working and proving to be a valuable asset to his employer. He diligently deposited his check into our joint account.

By this time, it was two years into our marriage, the required time by INS to establish that it was a solid union, and Pat received his approval letter for permanent residency. In other words, he was getting his Green Card! Woo Hoo! Pat worked until his Work Visa expired, figuring that it would be a waste of time and money to get another one since he would soon be seeing his Green Card.

Before that occurred, September 11th devastated the country. Together, Pat and I stood out on our balcony, watching black smoke bruise the sky over the area where the Pentagon was. I cried in his arms, seeing my worse fears come to past. As it became clear that this was a terrorist assault on our great nation, we came to the conclusion that there would most definitely be a delay in the acquisition of Pat’s Green Card. Almost a year had passed with no evidence of his Green Card being sent, beyond the assurance of INS that he would receive it within six months.

It was coming into the end of our second year of marriage when Pat changed, he became agitated and surly, finding fault with me, criticizing everything I did. He began spending a lot of time on line in various chat rooms, whiling away his time talking to all manner of people. When he wasn't on line, he was at a game shop a couple of times a week playing the card game "Magic: the Gathering", coming home each night with boxes upon boxes of cards, claiming he had won the bulk of them in gaming. He was also playing more and more "Advance Squad Leader" (ASL, a war recreation strategy game), buying the different sets to play different scenarios and going to large scale tournaments.

After a particularly frustrating time of sitting down to pay the growing amounts of debt, I took the final barb from Pat that I wasn't capable of meeting the juggling of payments due. I turned the handling of the bills to him. This would proved to be our downfall.

During my lunch break at work, I called home to see how Pat was doing. I got a recorded message that my home number had been disconnected! I quickly took action and called Verizon to find out what the problem was. It turned out that they hadn't been paid in three months! I immediately paid what was owed with my credit card and wondered where was the money going if it was not being used to pay bills.

Later, at home, after a long and drawn out argument with Pat, I discovered with shock that he hadn't been paying any of the bills. Our car insurance had been cancelled, not good. My child support payments had become in arrearages of thousands of dollars and was eventually being garnished from my wages. I was now also two months late on my car payment with repossession looming in the background. This was becoming a nightmare! I ended up having to borrow money from a friend to meet the ever-growing financial burden. (To date, I have yet to pay him back, but he is a good man and not pressing me for repayment, knowing the situation I'm in. I am eternally grateful to him.)

It is amazing what someone can get into when there is too much idle time available to them and Pat was getting deeper into some seedy activities. He had gotten involved with a married woman in Utah. Her unsatisfying, abusive marriage and four children had her insinuating herself into Pat's heart. They soon turned from the chat room to talking on the phone. I was stupid to believe Pat that it was only a friendship and that he was merely consoling her when she was upset with her home life. This woman was willing to give up her children to be with my husband! What kind of woman would do something like that?!?! But, she also proved to be fickle, returning to her husband every time he feigned his undying love for her. This soured Pat, he broke it off with her but not before receiving numerous letters from her bespeaking of her love for him. (I now have these letters in my possession and Pat's final letter to her.)

No grass grew under Pat's feet, as he became involved with yet another woman from the net. This one was also in an unsatisfying marriage with several children and lived in Southern California. Now I knew this woman and her reputation to meet men over the net have sex with them and blow them off. I figured Pat wouldn't fall for her, so thought it was safe to assume nothing would come of it. Once more it developed into phone conversations under the ploy that he was helping her. That came to over $400 in long distance calls and, I was left to foot the bill.

The worse was yet to come...Pat and I were at each other’s throats constantly now. Arguing over every little thing that annoyed him. He was on the internet for up to 18 hours a day, paying less and less attention to me. I slipped deeper and deeper into depression; I was losing my husband to his online fantasies. Then, one afternoon when I got home from work in June of 2002, it came to a head. I badgered him into telling me what was going on with him and this woman on the net. He looked at me with an expression I had never seen on his face before. He told me he was leaving me. I snapped...

I slapped him repeatedly, I had taken enough. I was soon punching him, taking out all the frustration and hurt I had endured as his wife. I was blind with my rage. He finally broke and returned blows, beating me badly. In another act of unadulterated hatred, he ripped the mouse out of the computer, resulting in the motherboard being fried. He took his car keys and left the apartment. I called the police, I couldn't let him take the car that I had been paying for and leaving me without a way to get to work.

Unfortunately, we were both arrested and charged with domestic abuse. We were released under our own recognizance by the night judge with the understanding that he and I would reconcile our differences and show up for our court date. Yet another snake in the grass ploy by him. He stated that he was going to go stay with a friend, packed his case and left Saturday morning. As I got to thinking, I realized with full clarity that he was on his way to Southern California. I jumped on line, using his account and waited. Sure enough, it didn't take long before one of the women on his contact list messaged, asking how could he be on line when he was suppose to be on his way to California. My fears were now confirmed. I messaged her back telling her that if she spoke to him, to tell him to turn around and get back to Virginia. Apparently, I was ignored, by the next day, he hadn't returned. I had found that he had removed over $400 from our account and now I was left short for rent money and no food in the place.

Again, I jumped into action. I called his credit card in as stolen and it was cancelled, closed our joint checking account and open a new one with my name only. I tried to get him off the apartment lease but couldn't. I got an advance on my paycheck and was able to meet the rent obligation with a little left over to buy bread. But, one cannot live on bread alone, the sixth day after he left; I fainted at work from lack of sustenance. My co-workers rallied to help me out, Friday afternoon; I found 12 bags of groceries left for me. I was driven to tears by the kindness of my co-workers.

Saturday morning, I decided to sleep in. The week had worn me out. Then the phone rang...it was a tearful and shaken Pat. He had tried to call me several times but must have misdialed the number and got a busy signal. He freaked, thinking something had happened to me. He was begging me to take him back, apologizing for his stupid move. At that moment, he was in Winchester Virginia, heading home as fast as he could. Too fast and had gotten two reckless speeding tickets as a result. One in Southern California and one in Bristol Virginia.

With no emotion in my voice, I told him to come home. I really didn't want him back; I only wanted to have my car back. It was too expensive to take a taxi to work every day ($10 one way) and I hated putting out my co-workers asking for a ride home, though I did walk the five miles home on a couple occasions.

When he finally barreled into the apartment, shaking and crying and looking worse for wear, he held me tightly, bespeaking his love for me and apologizing emphatically. I calmed him down and ran a bath for him, all along, keeping myself emotionless. I made him something to eat, he looked like he hadn't eaten the whole time he was gone, and his weight loss was noticeable. He was also very sunburned from driving through searing heat in Texas, Arizona and New Mexico.

Once he had bathed and eaten, we sat down on the couch and he told me about his adventure. He had indeed gone to Southern California to be with Jamie, although he claimed he never had sex with her during the three days he spent with her. Yes, he had made the trip there in two days, spending one day with a couple of guys he knew in LA (men of questionable means) before going on to her. When things obviously didn't work out for him, he ran home to me. This would prove to be his routine, trying to get me to take him back when his Mistresses dumped him. I was his safe haven between women. Only this time, I didn't trust him anymore and didn't think we would last much longer, but I was willing to try and work out our differences.

That was short lived, he immediately was back on the net and selecting his next woman. This time he picked one in South Africa. Another woman with a marriage on the rocks.

Charmaine turned out to be the most insidious of all his mistresses. She would go to great lengths to destroy the last remaining threads that bound Pat and I together.

At this point, I am going to stop and will make Charmaine the final part of this tale.