Abused & Rising Above: Die Bitch Die!

Today was a really amazing day @gardenofeden. Awesome communication, and support, lead to a shift in perspective, and hopefully lasting transformation! I don't want to steal anyone's thunder, so I won't be telling that story. However, it did remind me of an event in my life that I have been thinking a lot about. I'm finally ready to work out the trauma from a near death experience.  

In April of 2015, I finally had my husband arrested for abuse, after he burnt my entire left arm with boiling hot soup. He had a restraining order that included a 1000 ft ankle bracelet and it was the first time in years I was able to breathe easy. However, that is not the incident I will be sharing right now. In July of that year, I was required to travel from Florida to Minnesota to fight my parents for custody of my oldest daughter. How she got there is a pretty long story in itself, but needless to say, I hadn't spoken to her since November of 2014 when my parents bought her a plane ticket and she flew out of Florida without my knowledge or consent. She was only 14 at the time.

 My ex and I had been separated since his arrest in April. He was occasionally allowed to see our two children, per DCFs (Department of Children and Family) request, when they came to investigate the incident since the police had been called. We were not on good terms at all but because I couldn't fly (do to my illness), and I couldn't drive (because of my illness) and a train would have cost thousands of dollars that I didn't have, my only option was to ask him to drive me and the kids up to Minnesota. I absolutely hated the idea of being in the car with him for days and days, but I wanted my daughter to come more than anything in the world and I had already asked the only other person I knew with a car, they said no.   

 So because he, and his mother, felt guilty for my daughter being with my parents in the first place, he agreed to drive me, and his mom agreed to pay for gas. In order to pay for the hotels and stuff along the way I sold everything I owned that I could. I had been a Princess House rep at one point in time and had over $10,000 in cookware. I was selling $250 cooking pans for $20 a piece to anyone who would buy them. I was desperate to get my daughter back, and without my ex living with us the past 4 months, I was struggling to even get all the bills paid. So I sold everything I could and then we set off to MN. 

The first two days in the car were awful. We fought about everything, as usual, and he wanted to talk about our past to try and BS his way back into my life (which he was usually really good at). I was sick of everything though, so I hung tough all the way there. As soon as he realized I wasn't folding he instantly switched to asshole mode and then the next two days in the car sucked even worse.

 By the time we had got to MN we reach somewhat of a truce. It was our youngest daughter's 4th birthday and we wanted her to have a good time since she wasn't actually having a party. We did cake and gave her the present that I bought and had packed for the trip. She was super happy to have her family together on that day. Then my ex announced he was going to go out. Which I knew meant he was going to hook up with someone from Tinder since that is always why he had his phone glued to his face for most hours during the day. I couldn't believe he was going to ditch his daughter on her birthday in a crappy motel room to go bang some Tinder hook up (pictured below), (ironically Duluth is a small town and I used to go to church with this girl, she is one of the pastors daughter) but that is exactly what he was up to. At the same time I was glad that he was moving on because I was hoping it would be easier to divorce him this time. I had tried to legally separate twice before this but he would never sign the papers. This time I got all the papers signed and filed before we left FL.

 I encouraged him to go, but was still disgusted by the fact he left his daughter on her birthday just for a piece of ass. So he left and of course didn't come back that night. Our daughter cried after he left and wanted to know why he wasn't having movie time with her on her special day. I broke my heart, but of course I didn't tell her it was because he would rather get laid. I woke up early to find a message from my lawyer from the previous night asking me to meet with her that day, before court the following day, so we could strategize. I called her back saying I would be there and I sent my ex a message telling him to call me. I must have messaged and called him 15 times within the three hours after that, and he ignored all of them claiming he didn't have service where he was (or just got service long enough to tell me he didn’t have service lol right….) and then continued to ignore my calls. He showed up later afternoon, after I had missed my meeting of course, and still stuck like alcohol from the night before. If you read my previous post( https://steemit.com/life/@kimberleighfl/abused-and-rising-above-the-first-time) then you know he and I had an agreement for him to not drink because of his abusive nature while consuming any amount of alcohol. 

I was lividly upset! I started tearing him apart, first of all for being an asshole and leaving his daughter on her birthday, then for being a dick and not calling me back so I missed the appointment with my lawyer, and one of the kids could have been hurt, but he was nowhere to be found. Lastly I torn into him for drinking,  he had agreed to never drink around me or the kids again. Showing up still stinking the next day qualified in my book, plus I could smell it on his breathe so it couldn't have been from that long ago. This of course started a huge fight. He was trying to justify all his selfish actions, and I was verbally ripping him a new one about what a piece of crap he has always been to me and the kids and how disgusting everything he does is to me. Now I'm sure most people are probably thinking I was just jealous that he slept with someone else, but I promise you that is not the case. Our relationship had been over in my mind the moment he put his hands on me two years before that. I even told him I was so glad he had sex with someone else, because now he wasn't mine anymore, and I hoped this would end his co-dependency on me. Or rather his need to abuse someone would be shifted off of me. The fight continued and eventually he said he was going to leave to go meet this girl again for the night. Then I truly lost it. 

I grabbed his cell phone, that I hated so much, and threw it against the wall. I had traveled all that way to try and save my daughter from those awful addicts I grew up with, and my ex was purposely going to fuck it all up for me by not showing up to take me to court the next day, or something, because that is how selfish he is. I said some of the most awful, but truthful, things I felt about him in regard to our "life" together. I was holding our daughter, and before I knew it he was in my face towering above me. I could smell just how strong his breath still stunk of liquor at that point, and instantly knew this was not going to turn out well.  

 I don't really remember the last thing that he said, or I said, before both of his hands were around my throat. He had grabbed my throat before, but this was very different. I could feel his hands crushing me, both of his thumbs were dug in right around my trachea like he was trying to squeeze it shut. I looked up to search his eyes for intent and all I could make out was black, nothing, no emotion, no feeling, no soul, just "Die bitch die!" Usually when something violent occurred he looked through me, as if I wasn't even there. This time his intention was clear. He was going to kill me. I was suddenly very terrified! One thought came screaming through my mind, "Don't you dare let this piece of shit murder you!" 

 Then I started to see spots and everything started going black. My arm went limp and our daughter slipped from my arms to the floor. I knew if I didn't do something NOW it was going to be over! So I mustered all the strength I could while starting to black out and I swung my leg forward to try and knee him in the balls. He is so much taller than me though he kept his body pretty far away, and I just barely grazed him. Good thing for me he has super sensitive testicles, and it was just enough contact to get his attention so one of his hands released my throat. I gasped for air and screamed at our daughter to run out in the hallway for help. She bolted for the door and he dropped me to stop her. I crumpled to the floor just like a deflated balloon. It was a long room so it took a second for him to catch up with her, but she had gotten the door open and was halfway out. I stumbled to my feet, and while trying to regain blood flow to my head I rushed the door that he was trying to close again. He was trying to pull our daughter back into the room to shut the door, but instead I pushed her through the door and got my head past him to start screaming for help down the hallway like the world was coming to an end. He started trying to quiet me, but as the hotel handyman came running our direction I yelled for him to call the police and my ex stopped trying to quiet me. Instead he ran into the room, grabbed my cell phone, and the keys then bolted past me and our daughter out the side door, jumped into his blazer, and fled like a coward. 

 I scooped our daughter up and brought her back into the room but left the door open. I couldn't stop coughing and crying. I realized how close to dead I had just become. I knew that had I not gotten out of his grasp I would not still be living. Unless you have ever been this close to death, by someone else's hand, you have no idea how scary it is to feel that sense of helplessness. The police came, and I cried the entire time I tried to tell them what happened. A medical team examined me and asked I go to the hospital so they could check and make sure no internal damage was done besides the marks on the outside of my neck. I agreed to go to the ER just to make sure. It was a good half hour later and I was still coughing and couldn't seem to catch my breathe for long. 

 While I was in the ER I called my lawyer to tell her what happened. She told me to come in early before court the next morning and we could talk then since I hadn't been able to meet with her that day. Now I had no cell phone, no car, no ability to drive, and very little money. I had no idea how I was going to get home to FL, let alone if my ex was going to show up to kill me in the night or not. I text the girl that used to be my best friend when I lived in MN before I moved to FL. I told her what had happened and I asked her for help. Asked if maybe I could stay with her a few day till I could figure out how to get home, or if she could at least give me a ride to court the next morning. She basically said that it was my own fault for having him drive me up there and she couldn't help me. My old BBF wasn't wrong, it was my fault for asking him to bring me since I had no one else, and it was my fault for picking a fight with him over what I still think is extremely shitty behavior, but the fact she had zero compassion to help someone who was once her best friend just floored me and broke my heart. All I could think of were the countless times I helped her by like driving her home when she was too drunk so nothing bad would happen and I couldn't even get a ride to the courthouse which was only a few miles for her to go. So I told her I understood, and I don’t think we have spoken since then.  

 I scheduled a taxi for the next morning to come and get me and the kids. Thank goodness I at least had their car seats for the taxi ride, since my ex had taken them out so as not to alarm the Tinder slut that he was still married with children. The taxi driver wouldn't let me store the seats so I had to carry two children and two car seats around the courthouse looking for my lawyer. Of course the first thing I see when I walk in is my parents sitting on a bench outside the courtroom looking so smug. I found a place to stash the seats and went with my kids to talk with my lawyer.     

 Basically, she laid out for me what was going happen. Because of the incident the day before, which there was a police record of, and somehow my parents had already gotten their hands on (probably had a private detective following me again), my lawyer told me there was no point in even trying to fight for custody of my oldest daughter. The lawyer said that the court will absolutely grant custody, probably permanently, to my parents on the basis of the fact that if I couldn't even protect myself from being choked by my soon to be ex-husband, than I couldn’t protect my children either. It didn't matter I had filed for divorce, it didn't matter that he had already given up legal custody of my oldest daughter, because he adopted her when we got married, it didn't matter that I had fought back to get away from him. None of it mattered in the court's eyes other than I had needed him to give me a ride all the way to MN from FL because the court insisted I be there in person. They knew I was sick, and I couldn't drive or fly, and that my illness had bankrupted my family once so funds were extremely low, but they didn't care. So my lawyer suggested I agree to the temporary custody and work with social service to complete a "family reunification plan" to get my daughter back home later. 

 

 After my near death experience I was beyond crushed that I had come all that way for nothing at all. Nothing good was going to come from this trip. In that moment, realizing my abusive addict parents had that smug look on their faces when I came in, I wished my ex had killed me the day before. It was just one more traumatic experience they had exposed me to instead of trying to help me in life. 

 They could have cared less that this man tried to kill me, just like they could have cared less that while I was dying of mercury poisoning they were scheming to take away one of the people I loved the most in life, my oldest daughter. So I went into court and conceded temporary custody to them. After court I went back into the hallway and decided to play nice so this entire trip had not been a waste. I asked my parents if my daughter was coming to the court house because her little sister really wanted to see her. Since they were satisfied seeing me defeated and broken the called her to come to the court house. The lawyers and whoever else was in charge there allowed us to use one of the court rooms to visit in since I refused to let my other children leave the property with my parents and my daughter. 

 I did this for our younger daughter because as much as I wanted to kill myself having to be cordial to my parents for that few hours, I knew it would help her to see her big sister that she missed so much. Right after my oldest daughter left, our younger girl started having nightmares. She would wake up screaming bloody murder in the middle of the night and I would go racing in there to comfort her. It wasn't like I was sleeping anyway, after my oldest disappeared I checked on my kids every few hours for the next few years. My baby girl would tell me that she was having dreams that I was there and then I would disappear just like her sister and never come back, that is why she would wake up screaming every night for months. It hurts so much to know your child is in pain and not be able to do anything to help them. I didn't want to tell her that her sister was coming back, in case she wasn't, so I would just tell her that I was trying to do everything I could to bring her home.

 Anyway, I let the kids spend the day together at the courthouse, and then we all went to the park. I told my oldest daughter at the part why I had conceded custody. She didn’t have much to say about it. They had a wonderful time together, but of course our younger daughter was sad to leave. My mother, the master manipulator herself, started saying right before we parted ways about how she couldn't wait for us to get together maybe around Christmas in FL since so many of the kids have birthdays at that time. I looked at her like she must have lost her mind and I said to her as nicely as I could, if she ever thought I would have anything to do with her after she tore my family apart then she better start therapy as soon as humanly possible. My mother was just under the impression she was going to take away my daughter, my love and my life for the last 14 years, and that I was just going to be totally OK with it and set up plans to have a family Christmas with them. Unbelievable how self absorbed and arrogant some people are. 

  What did I learn from this experience, and the amazing shifts here today at the Garden of Eden? For many years, recalling this moment brought nothing but tears, terror, and a very victim mentality. However, it takes two to tango. What my ex did was awful and way beyond acceptable, but I also put myself into that situation. Quite frankly, my energy was sitting in a place of knowing he was going to destroy my chances of getting my daughter back, because it would have meant my happiness which he never allowed to take place (that was my perspective at the time). I basically initiated the self fulfilling prophecy that came about knowing his shitty choices and my reaction to them were inevitable.

 So all that is left is for me to forgive myself for allowing it to happen. For not being more conscious at the time of how to properly deal with that type of situation, not only with my kidnapping parents, but also with my ex and how to interact with him when I disagree with his life choices and letting them affect me. Yes, I still struggle with this, but I am getting a little better each day. My ex won't be changed, so I am not even trying to change him, but I am changing myself a little each day to accommodate how I feel about myself. I will continue to work toward the best me. All these things keep synchronizing in life, and they help me know I'm finally on the right path!  Also thank you to @markwhittam for suggesting I tag #familyprotection to bring awareness to the corrupt court systems, and how they manipulate a situation to destroy families.

 As usual, @quinneaker was the driving force for the change that took place here today. Before I retired to my house for the night I thanked him for another enlightening evening. Truly the least I could do for all the blessing he brings to us each and every day.   Questions, comments, shared experiences are always welcome!