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  “Ethan, you don’t have to marry her because she is pregnant. That girl, what’s her name? Tracy? She got pregnant on purpose. She tryna trap you,” Naomi explained, “I know you want to do the right thing but think about what I said.”

  I didn’t feel good about what Naomi said so I prayed about it. I never got an answer, but I knew that God would want me to be a good dad to my unborn child and a good husband to the woman who carried it. So, I went for it.

  Tracy and I got married in the living room with only her kids there as witnesses.

  Just before our move, I went to the clinic and said good-bye to all my coworkers. I let them know that I had gotten married and we were expecting. Most were happy about the baby but, not so much about me marrying Tracy. More than one said, “Be careful. She’s got a messed-up past.”

  I wasn’t too bothered by their comments. Tracy and I had already talked about each other’s pasts. She had been married to Madeline and Malik’s father and he was a cheater. And, for revenge, she cheated on him too. I didn’t mind what she did in the past as long as it stayed in the past.

  Tracy was 40 when she got pregnant, so her pregnancy was considered high risk. And, as a result, she was very needy during her pregnancy. She could not do anything for herself. “Oh, Ethan, can you get me a glass of water. I’m too tired…Oh, Ethan, don’t go out tonight, what if I go into labor early…rub my back…rub my feet…make me a sandwich.” It was tiring for me; but she was carrying my son, so I always obliged.

  My family wasn’t so understanding, especially when Tracy expected them to wait on her hand and foot, as well.

  Naomi often commented with things like, “Geesh, what’s wrong with her? Pregnancy isn’t that bad. And she’s only three months pregnant. She can’t do anything for herself?” I just tried to work extra hard to please Tracy so Naomi wouldn’t have to help as much.

  I was deployed to Cuba halfway through the pregnancy. I called to check on Tracy every day. And, since we only lived about two hours from my family, I asked them to go and check on her as often as possible. Quentin, Naomi, and Naomi’s roommate, Caroline, visited Tracy frequently to help her out with whatever she needed while I was gone.

  Caroline and Tracy grew very close as a result and they’d talk on the phone often. Their friendship continued even after I got back from deployment. I thought it was great that Tracy gained a new friend as she did not have very many.

  When I got back from deployment, Tracy was well into her third trimester. I tried to get intimate with her, but she was not interested. It sucked because I had been faithful throughout the deployment so, for five months, the only action I got was with Rosie Palm and her five sisters—my right hand. However, I decided to be patient and understanding.

  On April first, Tracy gave birth to a beautiful baby boy she named Devin. He was healthy, big, and the perfect mix of me and Tracy. I could not be happier.

  Then a couple of months later, I got a call from Naomi, “Ethan, the doctor said it’s cancer.”

  “What?!” I was devastated. My mom was my heart. I didn’t understand why God would allow this to happen to her. I listened to her weep over the phone as she told me about her new breast cancer diagnosis and how she was unable to afford the recommended treatments.

  “Don’t worry, Mom, I’ll take care of it. You make sure you do all you can to stay healthy and I’ll do all I can to cover the expenses.”

  I started sending her two hundred dollars a week. But when Tracy got a hold of our bank statements and saw where that money was going, she flipped.

  “What were you thinking? We need that money. We have three kids to raise.”

  “My mom is sick. She needs help paying for her treatment.”

  “No, I need that money. I am your wife. Naomi has two other kids; why do you have to be the one to help every time? Why can’t Quentin and Ricky help?”

  I ignored her initially, but Tracy would not let it go. She brought it up every chance she got. If we were in the grocery store and the kids wanted candy then Tracy would say, “If you weren’t giving your mom all that money, we could afford it,” when I told them “no”.

  If we were going somewhere and someone pulled up next to us in a nicer car than ours, Tracy would say, “If you weren’t giving your mom all that money, we could have a new car instead of this old piece of junk.”

  I grew tired of Tracy’s complaints, so I talked to Naomi about it. She was understanding, “Don’t worry, baby,” she said. “I know you have a family you need to take care of. Most of my hospital bill is paid off. I just need help with the copay for my medicine. It’s only a hundred and fifty a month.”

  I agreed to pay that, and I tried my best to hide it from Tracy. Tracy kept a close eye on our bank statements, so I had to take extra money out when I went grocery shopping and I’d wire that to my mom.

  Over the next few years, me and Tracy’s marriage seemed to spiral down. Tracy’s insecurities didn’t change much. She always felt that I had women after me and that I had someone on the side. I remained faithful to Tracy in hopes that one day she would figure out that I was loyal and trustworthy.

  I started working with a new provider, Dr Elizabeth Smith. Tracy thought she and I were sleeping together and constantly accused me of doing just that, but Dr. Smith had a boyfriend, and they were serious. I thought it’d be a good idea for us all to meet up. I hoped it would ease some of Tracy’s suspicion, but Tracy made it awkward.

  There was a function at work, and I invited Tracy and the kids to come, knowing that Dr. Smith and her boyfriend would be there. When I introduced Tracy, instead of shaking hands, she looked her up and down. Then she turned to me with a scowl on her face and told me off right in front of them, “What, you fucking her? You introducing me to your mistress. And her boyfriend, you fucking him too? I see the way you looked at him. You gay? Bi?” I shook my head and walked away. I really felt like I had married a crazy woman. I knew Tracy had a nasty tongue, but to say that in front of my coworkers was a new all-time low.

  She had no filter and was always looking for a fight. She could pick a fight about anything. A walk in the mall could turn into an all-out shouting match. She fought dirty, too. She’d bring up stuff about how I performed in bed or how my ex-wife cheated and left. I did my best not to sink that low. I could have said all kinds of mean things in response; but I refrained because I knew how painful words could be. Once they’re out there, you can’t take them back.

  I wanted to leave Tracy, but I wanted to be there for Devin. I loved him so much. We were close and I knew Tracy would never let me have custody if we were to ever split. I didn’t want to live without him and didn’t want our bond to break. We went everywhere together and I made sure he never went without. Tracy took care of him during the day when I was at work, but I had him every evening, every weekend, every morning, and sometimes if he’d wake at night. She continued to breast feed him well after he turned two-years-old. Whenever I told Tracy I needed a break, she’d respond, “I have to breast feed him at night. I need the break.” I did recommend that she stop breastfeeding him, but she wanted to lose weight and had no intention of stopping.

  I retired from the military in 2016 and then things got even worse. She refused to work but she wanted an expensive car, expensive clothes, and expensive furniture. I had to stop giving money to my mom and, even with that intervention, the bills still piled up. We spent way more than what I made.

  I asked Tracy for help, but she made every excuse not to. She got child support from her ex-husband but she used that for whatever she wanted and not for our bills. We fought about money all the time. She felt like she could do better managing our finances and I decided to let her try, so I let her manage my entire check. Every Friday when I got paid, she waited at the door with her hand out. “Where’s the check?” she’d ask. No, “Hi!” No, “Happy to see you. How was your day?” Just, “Where’s the check?” And I’d give it to her, no questions asked. She’d
take the check and use it the way she saw fit. She knew we were living well beyond our means, but instead of helping she’d simply say, “You need to do better.”

  She suggested we take out a loan to help with the expenses, which I did. That helped for a little while. Then when that money was gone, she suggested that I cash out my thrift savings plan, which I did. That, too, soon ran out. I tried everything to make ends meet and to make her happy. It didn’t matter. It was never enough. The fights continued. I wasn’t making enough, and she wasn’t getting enough.

  We decided to go to counseling; but that didn’t help, either. Tracy heard what she wanted. She didn’t ‘hear’ what the counselor was saying. Our counselor asked, “Why do you think Ethan is cheating on you?” and Tracy heard, “I agree with you, Ethan is cheating on you.” The counselor said, “You guys need to work on communicating better and learn how to talk to each other instead of talking at each other.” And Tracy heard, “Ethan needs to be quiet and agree with everything you say.” Counseling just led to more arguments.

  Tracy tried to provoke violence during our arguments. She routinely got up in my face and urged me to “do something”. It didn’t matter if the kids were around. She cursed me out and called me names no matter who was around. I would tell her “I don’t fight over stupid stuff; I’d rather walk away before things turn violent.” It didn’t matter. She did her best to get a rise out of me.

  She blamed me for our fights. Madeline always took her side and Malik stayed away. But our fights upset Cierra. She felt responsible for our arguments because some were about her. She also felt bullied by Tracy’s kids. When Cierra was around, Madeline sat closer to me and sought more of my attention. Then she would make comments to Cierra like, “This is my dad and he lives with me.” I tried to speak with Tracy about it which led to several horrible fights. So, I decided to show Cierra that she was still my girl even though I had stepchildren. I made the effort to take Cierra for some daddy-daughter time, but Tracy hated that and never let me forget it.

  Each fight that Tracy picked, I would walk away or back down. But I knew I couldn’t keep doing that. I felt like I was nothing to Tracy. When we weren’t fighting, we weren’t talking to each other. We didn’t have fun anymore. We didn’t have sex anymore.

  Tracy wanted to move closer to her family and I obliged, figuring things would be better there as she would have more support and, I hoped, be happier. I served in the military for twenty years, so I was accustomed to not being around my family and it didn’t bother me. I could tell being away was bothering her and I was trying hard to get our marriage back on track. I prayed this would be a new beginning.

  I found a nice job in Richmond. It paid sixty thousand dollars a year with good benefits. That was more than I’d ever made. The job also had regular hours so I could finish my master’s degree in the evening and on weekends. Surely, that would get us back on track.

  Tracy wasn’t fond of living in Richmond, so we settled on a house that we rented an hour and a half north of Richmond. I commuted every day. The house was slightly more than what my budget allotted, but Tracy loved the house and she agreed to find a job to help with our expenses. We placed Devin in daycare to give her time to look for a job but she never made the effort. She just stayed home doing whatever she wanted while Devin was at daycare and I was at work.

  I wasn’t sure what she did at home. She never cooked dinner and refused to run errands. I worried that she was cheating on me, especially when she started to make me wear condoms during sex. But to avoid a fight, I avoided mentioning my concerns. I just continued to do what I could to keep us afloat.

  On weekends, we frequently visited her family. They were nice. Tracy’s sister and brother often mentioned that I was a good influence on her, and they could see the positive changes in her. I wasn’t sure what they meant by that. How crazy was she before me if this a change for the better?

  Tracy’s relationship with my family was not so wonderful. My aunts caught Tracy in several lies. She told them that she was a nurse, that she was taking care of all the bills, and that I was not working at all. I asked her why she lied. She responded, “If your family thinks you’re broke, they won’t try to get more money out of you.” I didn’t like the lying or her reasoning, but I didn’t blow her cover.

  Nevertheless, it didn’t work; my family was too smart for that. They caught her in that lie almost instantly. Several of my aunts were nurses and Tracy couldn’t follow their conversations when they tried to talk shop.

  She lied to my mom, too. Whenever my mom would try to invite us to visit her, Tracy told her, “Ethan doesn’t want to visit. He hates it down there. Besides, he’s too busy looking for a job.” My mom demanded to know why, and when I confronted Tracy, she had an excuse for that one, too. “I told them all you didn’t have a job. If they think you are looking for a job, they’ll believe me. Besides, your mom really doesn’t like me. She is always making little remarks to make me feel unwelcome.”

  My mom never did that to her. She was always welcoming and loving to Tracy and her children. I could see right through Tracy. She wanted to isolate me from my family. She wanted to be the only one who received time, service, and most of all, money from me. She didn’t want to share me with anyone.

  It wasn’t just my family she kept me away from; she kept me away from my friends, too. I was not allowed to go anywhere with anyone. If my old Navy buddies were in town and wanted to hang out, she always made an excuse as to why I couldn’t go. “Oh, I have to go help my sister so you have to watch Devin,” she’d say. Or, “I planned a family movie night. You don’t want to miss that, right?”

  Sometimes she’d flat out say, “No. I don’t trust you, so you can’t go.”

  She wouldn’t even let me talk to my friends on the phone. If someone called, she’d start an argument. She’d accuse me of cheating with whoever was on the phone. She was so loud and embarrassing that I’d have to end the call. I eventually fell out of touch with all my friends and family.

  Several months after our move to Virginia, Tracy had still not found a job. She started making excuses again. “I’ll start working in the spring. I don’t think I can drive in the snow. There are too many hills around here.”

  “Tracy, you are from this area and your car is all-wheel-drive. I have a front-wheel drive and I manage.” That only led to bigger arguments. Tracy often switched topics when we fought. It started off about her not working and change to my credit, my family, or false accusations of me cheating with men and women. She accused me of cheating so often that it stopped fazing me. When she saw that no longer ruffled my feathers her accusations became more absurd. “Why are you looking at my son like that?” she’d ask. “What are you, a pervert? Are you molesting him?”

  That pissed me off and was where I had to draw the line. When she saw that those comments hit a nerve, she continued to press the point. After a while, accusations of me being gay or me being a child molester were a frequent topic in our arguments.

  “Your mind is messed up! The military made you crazy! You stare at the kids and other men lustfully! I think you are bisexual!” She would yell at me.

  “Look, you are the crazy one to think any of that. I think you live in some fantasy world. You think you can sit on your ass all day while I’m at work and the kids are at school!” I’d yell back. “Hell, you barely cook. I’m up at four o’clock every morning getting everyone ready. I work all day and then when I come home, I have to cook! What do you do all day?”

  “See how clean this house is. I did that. I’m tired because I deal with Devin all night.”

  “Bullshit. You stay up all night watching your ratchet reality TV shows. I’m getting tired of all this. I can’t do this alone. Something is going to have to give, and soon.” I yelled.

  As time went on, Tracy’s comments got more and more nasty. Words hurt just as much as physical abuse. I did my best not to respond to her remarks but she was doing her best to
push my buttons. Tracy knew I hated fussing in front of the kids, but she’d make it a point argue where they could hear. She talked to the kids and our families about me in an effort to make me look like the culprit.

  One day I took Devin and Malik to get a haircut. On the way, back I stopped to get food because, of course, she hadn’t cooked that day, either. Devin didn’t want his usual chicken nuggets and fries, so I got him a hamburger instead. I wanted him to try something new. When I let her know what I got him, she went off on me. I hung up the phone. I didn’t want the boys to hear. I just smiled and tried to pretend like everything was okay. But I was hurt.

  “Ethan, I get why you are frustrated.” Malik said.

  “Why you say that?’ I asked.

  “She was like that with my dad. She started a lot of fights and I know she is doing the same with you. I guess you put up with it because you love her.”

  I nodded, “Sometimes you endure things hoping your wife will see you are not the enemy.”

  I tried my best to answer Malik without sounding negative, but something told me he saw right through me. I was in so much pain. I tried to hide it, but I’m sure he knew.

  Tracy continued to try to isolate me though Naomi was not easily moved. She still called me regularly and she’d try and include me in planned events, even though she knew that Tracy would try to sabotage them.

  Naomi was retiring after thirty years of being a nurse. She wanted to throw a retirement party and she wanted all her grandkids to be there. So, not only did she invite us, she also invited Deidra and Cierra. Tracy was furious that my mom had the audacity to invite my ex-wife and daughter. Naomi and I, and even Deidra, tried to talk to Tracy and make her feel comfortable; but Tracy was not having it. She told me she’d divorce me and take the kids if I went to the party. I felt lost. I had never been in a situation like that and I had no idea what to do. I thought wives were supposed to be supportive. I had hoped that Tracy would be mature enough to respectfully deal with my ex-wife and daughter. I was wrong. She made me choose.