Well, to continue, January 06, 2009 was "D day" for me. I had to be out of my house by then. So, the week before, I had everything packed up, rented a truck and started moving my things into a storage unit. Three storage units to be exact. After 7 years and 3 kids, we had a lot of stuff. I tried to take only the essentials and things that might be destroyed in the heat and cold with me. I moved into my parents house an hour away from Des Moines. My son had his own room and my daughters slept with me on the couch or in my mom's bedroom. I had to start getting up at four in the morning in order to get myself and 3 kids ready to go, drive an hour into the city and get the kids to daycare and myself to work. Needless to say, by the time I got home at night, I was exhausted. I tried to keep up with the kids, keeping their things picked up and making sure the dogs and the cats didn't make any messes.
My mother, for some reason decided to stop taking her Prozac and things became almost unbearable. She blamed me and the children and my father for everything that she felt was wrong with her life. She complained almost non-stop about the silliest, pettiest things. My father always buys all the food in the house. (While I was there, I helped because of course now there were four more mouths to feed.) One night he sat down with a bag of chips and a small container of dip and my mother had a complete meltdown. She began to rant and rave about what a pig my dad was, etc, etc. (my father is, by no means, overweight in any sense of the word) I could no longer hold my tongue. I let loose. I said, are you kidding me? The man buys all the food in the house, if he wants to sit down and have a snack, let the man eat his freaking chips, for crying out loud! In the mean time, my dad had gotten up, put the food away and went to his room and slammed the door. After my outburst, my mom went down the hall and started beating on the door and screaming at my dad about how he had now made her daughter mad at him. I thought, this woman is truly certifiable. Then she went to her own room and slammed the door. She would do this almost every night from that point on. Going into her room and locking the door, which was really inconvenient for me, because that's where all of my clothes were and some of the girls' things, such as diapers. So I would have to go to the door and knock, she would start screaming at me because I was "disturbing" her and I would have to explain that I needed a diaper.
One night I came home and my older cat was sick. She seemed to have a cold. After a couple of days of not getting better, I really didn't know what to do, I couldn't afford a vet and she was so very, very old. I was afraid they would tell me to just put her to sleep. One morning her breathing became very labored. I made her as comfortable as I could and I took the kids to school. I called my work and told them I couldn't come in. I went home and laid with her on the bathroom floor, petting her and talking to her, telling her it was okay to let go. After three hours, she finally did. I couldn't help myself. I wailed for her. After 19 years of being my loving companion, she was gone. I held her until I couldn't take it anymore. I made her a little coffin from a box and put her inside, curling her up the way she always liked to lay. My dad buried her in the little pet cemetery with her partner and my Jack Russell. The three of them together, forever. I miss them everyday but I truly believe that they are with my Grandma and my other two children who passed before me and someday I will see them all, again.
It wasn't long and I just knew I had to get the heck out of there. Someway, somehow. I started looking on a daily basis. I didn't know how I was going to get anyplace, since my husband had completely destroyed my credit. I started praying. ALL the time. I prayed the Lord would see fit to find me and the kids a Home. Not just a house. My prayers were answered. I was finally able to get a house on contract, even in the neighborhood that I had chosen. I was able to move in September 1st, 2009, after 8 months of displacement, living in constant turmoil. In the meantime, things were also changing with my job. Our department had moved from West Des Moines to the southside location. Which put me about 5 minutes away from work.
During all this time my husband had moved in with his mother and gotten himself "straight". He had seven months of work under his belt and had been giving me a little money on a regular basis since about April. So really, things were going quite well for all of us and I truly thought that my husband had left that old life behind and I agreed to let him move into the house with me and the kids under the condition, new house, new life, new start. He agreed to my terms, that should he try to go back to the old lifestyle, he would be booted out and he would leave without an any argument. Everything was great until the stuff between my mom and his dad started up. This really disturbed my husband and I could tell he was a train wreck waiting to happen. Old patterns started to pop up. We argued constantly. Finally, one day, I just knew and I accused him point blank of being on drugs. He finally admitted to it. I thought, well there's a first. At first, I just told him to get out. He wouldn't leave. Eventually we talked it out, he said he was sorry and would never do it again, but I told him I would be watching him very closely from here on in.
Things went as well as could be for the next two or three months. Except at work. Things were getting scary, people were being laid off left and right. Everyone was holding their breath and dreading that their office phones would ring with that dreaded voice on the other end, asking them to come down to Human Resources. I should mention that when they moved us to the southside location, we merged with my mother-in-law's department. I had to work with her on a daily basis. Most people would probably not like this but I didn't mind because she's pretty easy to get along with. Although, a co-worker of mine, whom I was very close to (she's my children's Godmother) didn't particularly care for her but then she didn't really care for my husband either. You can imagine why. One morning, while my co-worker was off work, my mother-in-law got the dreaded call. For some reason, I just knew I was next. I went outside to smoke and called my co-worker at home. I told her everything, including my fears. When I was done, I went back inside and wasn't in there five minutes and my phone rang. This was it. I took the long walk down the long hallway. When I got there, they offered me a box of tissues and a bottle of water. I took neither. I sat and listened to them drone on about how badly the company was hurting financially and how sorry they were that they would have to let me go. I really didn't hear anything they said. I just told them to hurry up and get it over with and just like that, after almost 18 years of LOYAL service, they let me go. It was pouring down raining when I was shown the door. I ran to my car. The drive home was just a blur. As I sat in the driveway listening to the rain pour down, my phone rang. It was my mother-in-law. She was bawling her eyes out but I was just angry at that point. After she let me go, I called my co-worker back. By this time I was the one crying. I asked her, what was I going to do? I had 3 children to care for..how was I going to provide for my family? She said someway, somehow, God would provide. I believed her. On Monday when she returned to work, they let her go as well. Our boss was demoted but given another position within the company. I would have taken that. I would have taken anything. The company was my home away from home. I knew so many people. They were my surrogate family. What would I do?
A month later my husband decided to switch jobs. I felt this was a bad idea but what could I say? You can't control where a person works as long as they are helping out. Although, since moving in with us, the money was coming less and less. He had been giving me $200 every two weeks until we moved. Then he started having excuses. I was lucky if I got a $100 a month and that's only if he didn't ask for it back. Again, the old patterns started popping back up and things with our parents (my mom, his dad) were getting more and more crazy. Accusations were flying everywhere. My brother-in-law was spending a lot of time at their apartment and so was one of my cousins. The next thing you know, they were dating too. So, it all went from bad to worse. Drugs were involved. My father-in-law's ex-girlfriend and his daughter were calling my mother on the phone and calling her every name in the book. I can't say she didn't deserve it. You don't take another woman's man and not expect a little payback. She didn't agree and seemed to think I should be defending her. Sadly, I just couldn't. She was ruining my life but she didn't see it that way. I tried to tell her that this was not the way a 60 year old woman should act. Partying all the time, moving in with another woman's man, doing drugs and drinking every night, hanging out with people half her age. It was embarrassing. I asked her, what would grandma think? She straight up told me that she didn't care what grandma would think, she had worried about that enough when grandma was alive and now that she was dead, she could do whatever she damn well pleased and if people didn't agree they could all go to hell. My cousin was stirring things up too. She would cuss out my father-in-law's ex and his daughter every time they called my mom's phone and she was even threatening my father-in-law, who was still seeing his ex behind my mom's back. The whole thing was so ridiculously Jerry Springer that I just wanted to find a rock to hide under.
One day, I texted my cousin and told her she needed to just stay out of the whole thing and that if my mom didn't straighten up her act, she wouldn't be seeing her daughter or her grandkids ever again. She forwarded the text to my mom. I knew she would and I didn't care at that point. I wanted my mom to know exactly how I felt. My husband kept getting more and more involved and our arguments were becoming more and more heated. I finally told him that we both just needed to separate ourselves as far as possible from the whole thing and just let this thing run it's course because it was just causing us more problems. By this time, his drug use was obvious and I was trying to ride that out as well. I thought maybe if we could just stay away from the crazies, he might be able to gain back control of himself. Then he lost his job. I gave him 30 days to get another one or he would be out. He knew he was already walking a thin line. Then he started staying out all night off and on, again. Things were quickly coming to a head. One morning, after he'd been out all night again, we had another argument that lead to yet another apology. I calmed down but I was still fed up. I decided to let it go for the moment. It was a Saturday. We decided to have steak for dinner as a peace offering. He took my food stamp card and my car and left. He was gone for a couple of hours when his mom stopped over to drop off a bunk bed for the girls. While she was there, my mom called and asked if I knew where my husband was. I told her he had went to the store. She said well I just got home and everything in the apartment is gone. I told her I would call her back. I was fuming. I told my mother-in-law that her son was doing drugs again and staying out all night and not even looking for a job and that I would be kicking him out. She said she didn't want to be there when it happened so she left. I immediately went upstairs and started throwing all of my husband things out into the driveway. He didn't have much, so it didn't take long. Then I called him and said, your things are outside, you better come and get them. You have 15 minutes to get my car back here or I'm calling the police and reporting it stolen. He started screaming at me incoherently and I hung up. I got my dogs and tied them up outside, sent the kids to the neighbor's house to play, went upstairs and got my son's BB gun and sat outside on the deck to wait. I knew this was going to be bad.
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