The History of Us: Part III

Read Part II First

I remember telling my best friend, a few weeks before I asked Carrie to marry me, "Carrie has no baggage. She's unlike any girl I've ever dated. She has absolutely no baggage that she drags with her everywhere we go."
How could I have been so blind?
While we were dating, and throughout our engagement, Carrie was very laid back. She was cool. There wasn't anything about her that I didn't like.
But on our honeymoon, things immediately changed. She suddenly showed a darker side to herself. And I remember thinking to myself, "This is not the woman that I married."
I chalked it up to stress from our marriage and the changes we both had to go through in the transition from engaged to married. Either she got better, or I bent my reality to think things got better. I now suspect it was the latter.
Soon Phoebe came along. Carrie did stop drinking for the pregnancy and didn't start back up after giving birth. However, she displayed some troubling signs: she wouldn't wake-up with Phoebe at night to nurse. I would always be the one to go to the bassinet or crib, take Phoebe, place her on Carrie's breast so the baby could nurse, and then take off her and burp her. It was bizarre. Right? But I tricked myself into thinking it was fine and moved on with my life.
And that sums up a lot of our marriage. Bizarre things. Me normalizing them, rationalizing them, and tricking myself into thinking I was happy.
We had a second child, Ellie, and Carrie was a much more caring mother this time. However, when Ellie was 3, Carrie started drinking again. It began with a bottle of wine a couple nights a week, and then went to every night, and then to at least 2 bottles a night. At the height of the drinking Carrie would go until she passed out - wherever she fell.
There was more than one night when I would be banging on the bathroom door at 3 or 4 am. Not knowing if my wife lay dead on the other side. There was also a night when I couldn't find her anywhere inside the house. So, I eventually flipped on the back door light, and there Carrie lay, spread out on the patio beside the picnic table.
My routine for the summer of 2009 was to go to bed, wake-up around 3 or 4, and find where Carrie passed out so I could get her into bed before our girls woke-up and found her. By the end of the summer, I was completely consumed with putting Carrie back together and trying to get her not to drink. I was powerless, but I still fought tooth and nail against a disease I didn't know much about back then.
Just after Labor Day, Carrie went to detox and then entered an outpatient rehab program. It her first of many attempts at getting well. None of them would work because she refused to do any real work.
And mixed in with the drinking were infidelities to our marriage that would eventually end our marriage. I tried to stick by her - to love her selflessly and eternally - but eventually I was forced out with my girls. When Carrie came home from her 2nd attempt at rehab and told me she had met a crack addict in rehab and was "seeing him," that's when I knew it was time to leave. And when she took a bus to go see him just a week after I brought her home from rehab, that's when the girls and I finally left.
And that's basically the quick, quick version of our history. It's an overview anyway. I will get more and more into detail throughout other posts. But first I thought it would be a good idea to have a reference point to start with, and now we all have that.

The History of Us: Part II

Read: Part I

There used to be a bar about 5 minutes away from where I grew-up. (It's still there but it's since changed owners and gone through a few name changes.) It was called the "Copy Cat" and the owner and operator was my old baseball coach. I used to go there a lot - back when drinking was fun and innocent, and getting drunk was a lot more fun and not quite so innocent.
When I would come home from college, that's usually the first place I'd head when I went out. And after college I liked to go there for Happy Hour after a week of work at the bank. Most times I would invite my friends from work to join me. Most of the time they would. And one Friday I asked Carrie to come out with all of us and she said she'd meet us after she went home to change.
And so, though I didn't know it at the time, we started down the path. A path that would lead to a great romance, a wedding, 2 children, and lots of laughs. A path that would also lead to a lot of drinking, passing out in the bathroom or on the patio or in the hall, throwing-up blood, and several trips to rehab.
How fitting that it all began with laughs in a bar where there was plenty of drinking. It's even more fitting that what was destined to turn sideways and spin out of control, actually began with a sideways kiss.
I remember Carrie and I were sitting beside each other in the crowded bar. The music and the yelling was so loud that we had to put our cheeks together so that our mouths were to each other's ears. And that's when we shared our first kiss - as the side of our mouths touched. A sideways kiss.
And that began our romance.
How I was in love. Head over heels.
This girl captivated me. Because there was something about her. She was beautiful with red hair and blue eyes and a smile that lit up the darkest corners of my being.
But there was something about her. Something that made me want to take her in my arms and hold her forever.  But this was something more too. Something I couldn't quite get a finger on.
But how this girl loved to have a good time. And man could she drink. More than most guys I knew.
And sure, she did a stint in rehab when she was 15 and another one when she was 17, but she was just a kid and her parents overreacted and all kids drank and she knew her limits and she loved me and wanted to be with me forever. And all that mattered was the present and the future. Who cared about the past?
Who cared? I certainly didn't. I was in love with a red-haired beauty who smiled for me when I needed her to, and that's all that mattered.
Or so I believed.

Read Part III Now 

The History of Us: Part I

Every relationship has a story. And so did mine and Carrie's. A story a lot like many other stories, but different in many ways too. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. And the beginning was about as happy a beginning can possibly be; while the ending is about as tragic as an ending can be.
Carrie and I worked together. We were both tellers at a local bank. I had just graduated from college and Carrie had been released from the Army on a medical discharge about 3 months earlier. I remember meeting Carrie but I don't remember much else. Because there really isn't anything else to remember. The day we met my car stereo had been stolen - ripped right out of the dashboard - overnight while my car sat in front of my house. So, I was more than a little preoccupied when I met her.
But it would be a few months before I found myself caring for her. I remember the exact moments when I knew I was attracted to her and when I knew I was more than attracted to her. The first was when I walked out to drive thru to grab a cash order from her. The heater was stuck on in that room so the temperature was nearly 100 degrees. When I opened the door Carrie turned around looking so annoyed with red cheeks and beads of sweat on her forehead. Not exactly the type of situation that lends itself to sexiness, yet something struck me and I suddenly saw her in a different light.
Not long after that, Carrie's car was stolen from the mall parking lot. She was telling me how the security guard kept telling her that she just forgot where she parked it. He didn't call the police for 3 hours. That made me so mad. I almost picked up the phone and called the security office. I felt such a need to help her. She seemed to be in need for the help. It was the first time we'd play those roles - roles that became all too familiar throughout our marriage. A couple weeks later I asked her out to Happy Hour. She said she'd stop by and the die was cast.
Looking back now, it seems so fitting that it all started with drinking and in a bar. Because that's pretty much how it ended too.

Read On: Part II