For the next several months I lived in that trailer. Made every excuse in the world why this friend or that one had to stay over. Truth is...I didn't want to be alone. I was tired of being alone. My brother in law saw what was going on and became a really good friend of mine. He would come by during the day to pick me up to ride with him while he checked on his traps. He trapped rabbit and raccoon for the pelt. It's how he made his living. I didn't agree with it, but didn't say anything. He did sell the meat also. Never knew someone would eat raccoon. Anyway, at least I wasn't alone anymore.

Then one day for no reason, or one I didn't know about at the time, my brother in law no longer came by unless my husband was there. And my husband told me we were moving into a house. I thought, fantastic, I would have neighbors! Wrong...AGAIN! He moved us out to the country and the closest neighbor was a mile away. At least he did let me have a phone. I was at least able to call mom and some of my friends every now and then. But shortly after the move out there his true self came out.

I got to thinking that if I had a baby maybe that would tie him to home more. Or at least take me with him when he would go out. So I tried to have a baby. I got pregnant quickly. Very quickly. But at 5 weeks, I miscarried. I was devastated. Guess that was something else I couldn't do right. My doctor told me that often young women miscarry the first time and not to let it get to me. So I took her advise and tried again...and again...and again...and 5 miscarriages later, I was absolutely positive that there was no way I was going to have a baby and my entire life was meaningless. I wanted a child so much. Wanted to give him the love I never got. Wanted to show him what a REAL parent is all about. Notice I keep saying "him". Funny thing, I never even considered my baby would be a girl. I was bound and determined that I was going to have a boy and that was that. I wanted a boy for two reasons. I wanted to raise a REAL man and I wanted to give my husband a junior. Someone he could really be proud of.

One day I woke up so sick. I thought I was going to die. I didn't know what was wrong. I called the doctor and she told me to come in. She took some blood and that afternoon she called me and told me I was pregnant. Yeah, ok, I'm pregnant. Big deal, I'll just loose this one too. I was put on bed rest. I told the doctor I didn't see a point in it because I would just end up loosing the baby, but she told me to "do it anyway". So I did. One day turned into one week. One week turned into one month. That made me two months along! I was 8 weeks pregnant! Never made it past the 6th week before. She told me to stay on bed rest for another two months. I didn't give her any argument and did just that. During this time, I hardly seen my husband. It was like he didn't even care. I made it through the first four months fine. I was determined now to deliver this baby. There wasn't anything or anyone that cause me to loose this baby. I needed him. He needed me. For once in my life I had something to live for. He was my bright star.

While in my sixth month of pregnancy I caught a cold that turned into the flu. A serious bout of the flu too. The doctor told me to go immediately to the hospital. By the time I got to the hospital I was starting to feel cramps. I was getting really scared. They got me in a private room and hooked up the IV. After a few hours I wasn't feeling any more cramping, which was good. But I was still very sick. I spent the next 4 days in the hospital. I saw my husband once. 

I made it through that little scare and when my due date came and went I was to the point of being so anxious I told the doctor to just reach in there and take the baby out. I finally went into labor 3 1/2 weeks late. I was ordered to stay with my mother for the last few weeks of my pregnancy because she lived only 5 minutes from the hospital. The doctor wanted me close. The day I went into labor I called my husband at work and told him I was in labor and was headed to the hospital. This was at 9 am in the morning. He finally showed up at 11 pm. By then I was in very hard labor and had no patience to listen to a story about where he was. So I told him to get the hell out of the room. My mom was there with me the entire time holding my hand. At 6:25 the next morning I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy. My bright star had finally entered the world to light mine. Nothing could bring me down. I had everything now.

For the next 6 weeks I would get up in the middle of the night just to look at my baby. I was so totally in love. He was the blood that pumped in my veins.  He was perfect in every way. Until one day while changing his diaper he stopped breathing. I got really scared. He turned red and went rigid. I didn't know what was wrong, or what to do. Then just as quick as it started, it stopped. I called the doctor and was told to come right in. She couldn't find anything wrong. She said that sometimes babies do things they can't explain. So, I headed back home. On the way home I had to stop at the clinic. While inside my husband was watching the baby. The next thing I knew I heard this commotion going on and I went to the waiting room when I heard my husbands voice. My son had done it again. They immediately told us to go to the hospital. They called ahead for us and when we got there the doctor was waiting. The doctor told me she wanted to do a spinal tap. I told her no way was she sticking a needle in my baby's back. I went nuts. My mom was there and tried to calm me down enough so the doctor could explain the process. They wanted to wrap him up in a papoose to keep him absolutely still so they could draw spinal fluid out of his back. They needed to check to see if there was a virus. What was causing this problem. My husband told her to go ahead and do it and I went nuts. There just had to be another way to check for a virus. I didn't know at the time but she was looking for meningitis. I was escorted out of the room and not allowed back in for 2 hours. No one would tell me anything. Mom went in to see what was going on and when she came back, she looked scared. I just knew something was seriously wrong with my baby. She told me to go back to see the doctor. She walked with me. At this point everything was in a fog. I couldn't deal with any of this. The doctor told me that they did the spinal tap, but my son proceeded to have 21 grand mal seizures in that 2 hour period. Just as soon as he would come out of one he would go into another one. By the time I got back there, they had doped him up heavily on Phenobarbital and he was sleeping peaceful in the arms of my doctor. She told me that she had called for an ambulance to come pick up my son and take him to the children's hospital in the city. He needed further testing that the hospital there was not set up to do. All I could do was stare at her. She said this ambulance would come complete with a doctor and a nurse. It was set up to do minor operations while in route if needed to. It was the best ambulance in the country and the hospital she was sending him to was one of the best in the country. I saw my bright star dimming. I was lost again.

He spent a week in that children's hospital. And all they could tell me after all the tests was that sometimes babies do things they can't explain. However, since my husband had epilepsy, and even though epilepsy wasn't usually genetically transferred, it could have happened. So for the next two years my son was on Phenobarbital. He didn't have any more grand mal seizures after that either. But he did have a few petit mal seizures. His last seizure was at 10 months.

This little boy became my best friend. With me 24-7. We played together, took walks together, and I talked to him about everything. Even though he couldn't talk back to me, he looked at me like he understood every word I was saying. My bright star was shinning even brighter than before.

I don't know if it was because of my closeness with my son, or if my husband just got tired of the situation, but he would come home drunk every night. And instead of just going to bed and passing out he would proceed to find things wrong with me that could only be corrected with punishment. The hits were harder than my fathers. The words stung more. And after each episode he would apologize the next morning. Bring me roses. Take me out. And I would believe the "I promise never to do it again." But this happened 3-4 times a week. And it increasingly got worse.....