Our days began early in the morning, around 4 am, typically, or a teeny bit later, if he didn't have to be at the ship until 6 am. I would roll out of bed, wake Paul up, get the baby ready, make a quick breakfast, and hurry to the car to make the drive to the ship. By the time we made it back home it was near 8 am, and I would get TJ out, feed him and he'd be back asleep for another hour while I got the house clean, laundry started and lunch made.
We had bought our first TV and I had not the first clue about all the different shows at the time. Everything was new to me and so I would flip through different channels. I began watching "The Bachelor" and "American Idol" almost right away. I was simply fascinated with it! Having TV was new and exciting for me, because in my 23 years of life, I hadn't watched anything except for a few Jeapordy shows and a few Monks with my Grandma Irvine. Even then, I had never watched a full show all the way through. While in my old church, we didn't watch TV. At times, I really miss those days! We actually lived life instead of staring at a screen that showed others either play acting life, or living life on a "reality" show. But during this time in my life, I think it helped me not go insane during the long nights when Paul had duty, and the hours during the day when I had nothing to do. A lot of people have asked me why I didn't get out and make friends. There was a lot of confusion for me during this time. I was trying to adjust to being a wife, a military wife, a new mom and living 1,400 miles away from anyone I knew. Adjusting to it all was massive and very difficult. Besides the fact that I still lived in my past and missed my friends. (I guess even to this day, I sometimes think I'll wake up and realize all of this has been a dream and I'm back with all my friends that I grew up with and thought I'd spend my life with!)
We had moved into military housing and it was so nice! It was two story; the bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs and the kitchen/living room/laundry room was downstairs. I don't want to seem superstitious or overly religious here, but there was a closet at the top of the stairs that had this feel about it, but I could never place my finger on what it was. While I can't say I know for sure what happened, Paul and I still feel like someone was hurt severely, or even murdered there. I know it's a heavy thing to say, but even while we lived at the housing complex, there was a murder one street over from us. I want to pause and say that the military has a lot more murders/suicides than anyone in the civilian world talks about. There is a lot of pressure being in the military and it's a mission field in itself. There are so many people who are depressed, hurting and burdened. It's a big job and comes with a lot of danger, instability and insecurity. Life in the military isn't for sissies and it comes with a lot of sacrifice!! A lot of people say, "You know what you signed up for when you joined." But in all reality, no, no, I didn't know what I was signing up for when I agree to sign my name on papers saying I knew my husband was joining the military and stuff like that. The recruiter told us a lot, but nothing could have prepared me for what was coming! I say all this to give a backdrop on experiences I had in this house, and stuff Paul went through too.
I think it was the 3rd duty night he had (every 10 days) and I was laying in bed after a night of watching American Idol. I had fallen asleep, and I began to dream. In the dream, I was being crushed to the point I couldn't breath. I could feel the heat of some devilish creature breathing on me and it's beady eyes staring into mine. As I felt my body go limp, I heard a Voice say, "Just whisper my name." I tried, but I had no breath left. So I screamed in my thoughts, "Jesus. Jesus! Jesus!!" and suddenly the weight of this thing was thrown off of me and I woke up gasping for breath. While this was scary, I knew what I was facing. I had read books on this before. I knew about spiritual warfare. So I turned on Christian music and prayed. I called Paul on the ship and told him about it. I was scared, but I knew Jesus was with me. This happened several times, over and over, every single time Paul was gone on duty night. I still don't understand why. It's even happened in more recent months. I have often woke up whispering the Name of Jesus. We are still praying over this and binding the devil in His Name. I think this is linked to the feeling we have about the closet in the upstairs hallway.
Paul began to have weird experiences too and we would pray together. His depression and PTSD started to spiral out of control and it continued to get worse and worse. Suicidal thoughts began to come and there were a few attempts as well. I didn't know how to handle the attempts, and kept it all to myself. The weight of the burden crushed me lower and lower, and I felt myself getting angrier and angrier at God and the world, including everyone around me. At one point, I remember my mom talking to me about going to church and I snapped at her, saying, "Don't ever talk to me about God, or church again. If God were real, He'd answer me and stop all of this!" All this time, while I don't believe God caused the demonic attacks, he allowed it to strengthen me and give me experience with the other world and to show me the power of His Name! One day, Paul was on the ship and I was not being the supportive wife I should've been. I was texting angry messages and telling him how upset at life I was. He wasn't able to respond to me, because he was working, but I knew he was reading the messages. I felt my life was out of control and we had no support from anyone. I remember sitting there, then the call came. It was Paul and he said he was on his way to the hospital, that he had fallen down a stairwell and was severely injured. He could hardly talk and was almost screaming in pain. I told him I would meet him there at the hospital, but he told me his superior didn't want me there. I totally ignored that and told him to let me talk to Dees, his superior. Dees came on the phone and "ordered" me to stay at home, at which I told him I wasn't military and he couldn't order me to do anything! I was so angry. So I packed my son into the car and drove the 15 minutes to the hospital. Paul was just getting there when I arrive and they pushed him into the ER. I asked to see him and they granted access, before Dees knew I was there! They checked him out and then made him wait in the ER room for a few minutes while they got the CT scan ready, along with a cast for his leg. Dees came out to the waiting room and saw me there. He walked up to me and put the tips of his steel toed boots over my feet and glared at me, asking me why I disobeyed his orders. My poor hubby sat, moaning in pain. Dees was trying to tell me how my country's welfare was more important than me being in the hospital, and that I needed to go home, if I knew what was good for me. I told him flat out that my family came before my country and that I was going to stay with my husband no matter what he said. I asked to speak to the Chaplin who I had spoken with once before. I was granted my request and he approved me staying with no problem! (Thank God for officers who outrank others). My husband got an MRI and a few other tests done. Then they got crutches and his leg all bandaged up with orders to not work out for at least 6 weeks. The bruise was massive and the lump was even more massive. I wondered if he'd ever be able to run again. As the weeks passed, we found out his leg would never be as strong as before, which ultimately led to us leaving the Navy. But we'd have to go through one more bad thing before that happened.
Paul returned to work in 2 weeks, even though he was still on crutches and he was extremely suicidal. I would get texts saying he wanted to throw himself off the side of the ship, and he would say he wanted to take a whole can of pills, etc. I still held all of this inside, but things at home were getting a little more heavy too. He wasn't violent, but his mental state didn't allow for much niceness either. Anger spurts would errupt and I would be scared someone was going to get hurt and I'd leave the house for a while. Please remember that I was a young newly wed, new mom and was scared of what would happen if I said anything to anyone! I know different now, but thankfully things aren't that way now.
But it would only be a matter of time before Paul acted out on his suicidal thoughts and a serious attempt was made. Ultimately, it led him to being in the hospital for a couple of days while being observed and diagnosed. But during that time, I went through living hell. I got calls from early morning until late night from his command, threatening me, saying I helped my husband go AWOL. I told them over and over he was in the hospital and it wasn't until nearly 5 pm the day after all this went down that I offered to meet his commanding officer at the hospital to show him. When I arrived at the hospital, I was called into a room with three male officers where they yelled and screamed at me for nearly 30 minutes in front of my young baby. I was terrified and it was then that I only wanted out of the Navy. I couldn't handle this anymore! They were surrounding me, looking down and spitting all over me as they accused me of hurting my husband and causing him to be suicidal, and all sorts of things. I don't know why I never reported them, but heaven knows I wish I would have! Worst 30 minutes of my early marriage, that's for sure. I don't think I've ever been scared speechless like I was that day. Finally I convinced them to just leave me alone and I was able to talk with the Chaplin, who was a bit nicer to me. I remember standing in the court yard of the military hospital in San Diego, getting a lecture by the Chaplin for not having informed him sooner (how was I supposed to know I was to call him? It's not like the spouses get a "this is what you're supposed to do" booklet when their loved ones join the military!) and this Marine walked up who had seen me crying earlier in the day and asked the Chaplin to "leave this poor woman alone." Thanks Marine! :)
Then my husband walked out of the hospital, released to me to care for, and a lot of instructions on when to return and what to do if something like this happened again. I told my husband right then and there that I wanted to get out of the military and not having anything to do with it again. He agreed, but told me he needed to stay in for his 4 years. It's illegal to go AWOL so keeping his commitment was important. Thankfully, he ended up meeting with his counselor and his counselor went over his options with him. The options were to stay for 6 months on shore duty while he got help and healed from his leg injury (he couldn't do PT anyways) or he could recommend a medical discharge and we could be done. We chose the medical discharge, since it was honorable. Getting a dishonorable discharge makes getting a job a lot harder and makes you look bad, so we wanted to make sure we went the honorable route. It took 2 weeks to get the discharge paperwork done and the new civilian life began for us.
.....hang on for more! It's 2:30 am and I need to get some rest.
