POSSESSION - NO LAUGHING MATTER
By: Ann
During the last week of June, Charlie's son (Charlie and I live together, not married, but very much committed to one another) called me crying, saying he had just had a phone call from his half-brother in Texas that their mother had passed away. She also lived in Texas and her granddaughter found her in bed gone. She was only 62. Charlie's son was headed for Texas, along with his half-brothers, to bring her body back to this area because she had wanted to be buried beside her own mother.
I had never met Charlie's ex-wife, but had heard about her from Charlie. She and Charlie had only been married about one year forty-four years previous. She had, for the past several years, continued popping back into Charlie's life when, in his words, she had a falling out with the latest man in her life. Charlie's son had told Charlie, about a week before her death, that his mother had called him and said she was planning a trip to the area within a couple of weeks. Charlie's son told his mother she would not be able to stay with his dad this time because I was living with his dad now. She laughed and told her son, "Oh, I will chase her away in no time!"
She actually tried that with Charlie's second wife. Charlie is a truck driver, and while he was out on the road, his ex-wife came barging through the door of his house and demanded that his current wife leave, saying that she was the one who belonged there, not the current wife. Naturally, the current wife went nowhere and his ex-wife left, but not without words.
Charlie's ex-wife was what people would call a very loose woman whether she was married or not. That is why Charlie divorced her. But, whenever she would want to come back for awhile after he and his second wife divorced, he would let her do it. He said it wouldn't take long before she would decided she wanted to go back to Texas and would leave.
Charlie and I went to his ex-wife's funeral here in the city in which we live. We went out of respect for Charlie's son. After the funeral, there was a large gathering at his son's home in the country. His son had left the gathering for a short time, and when he returned home, I was sitting at the end of a long table which was set up in the garage. He walked up to me and said, "Ann, you just did a number on me. I looked at you and would swear I saw my mother sitting there." At the time, I thought it was only his mind playing tricks on him, refusing to accept the reality of her passing. Now, I am thinking he saw what he saw.
I noticed within a few days after her funeral, I began feeling differently, but nothing I could really put my finger on. Charlie was home for a week due to the passing of his own father shortly after his ex-wife. After he went back out on the road, that same night I had a horrible time going to sleep. I was awake until well after four in the morning. All night, two of my dogs lay in the living room growling and my third dog lay on my bed growling. I prayed to God that He would surround me with his light of love and protection to keep me safe. Then, the next day, all I wanted to do was sleep. I learned later that this was Charlie's ex-wife's pattern - to be up all night and sleep during the day.
The next night, my dogs again growled most of the night. After a week or so, I was beginning to wonder why I no longer felt happy or content being in Charlie's home. I no longer felt kindness and love toward my three little dogs. I had lost my enjoyment of Mother Nature and could no longer see beauty in the trees around our home. I no longer enjoyed puttering in my flower beds outside. I was no longer friendly with strangers when I went shopping. Even my eating habits were changing and I seemed to be losing the table manners I had been taught as a young girl by my parents. I found myself thinking about getting dressed up and going into town and hitting the bars to see if I could "find myself a man".
I knew when I started having thoughts of that kind that something was drastically wrong because I never have those kinds of thoughts. I won't repeat exactly what the words were that were beginning to fill my mind when I was having those thoughts, but one can well imagine on their own in what terms a woman might think who is accustomed to going out and picking up men. I had to fight with myself really hard to keep from doing what I was thinking.
When Charlie came home, I wasn't happy to see him as I had always been before, and I didn't feel the love in my heart for him as before. I looked upon him more as a "possession" than as the man I loved. When his son dropped by our home one evening, I didn't have the kind, caring feeling for him I had previously felt. I felt as if I just wanted him to finish talking and leave. I wondered, at the time, why I was feeling that way because he had done or said nothing to make me feel like that. I felt myself changing inside - in my thoughts and in my heart, and not knowing why. Then, I began having physical problems. I awoke one morning with my hips hurting so badly that I could barely walk. I told Charlie about it and he remarked that I had never complained about my hips before. I said it was because they had never hurt me before. Within a couple of days of that, I was beginning to have chest pains. Charlie's ex had passed from suffering a heart attack while sleeping, but I didn't connect anything that was happening to me with her.
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