*I'm changing his name to save his identity, but anyone who knows me personally knows who he is.
Mark and I started dating in 1998, during my senior year of high school. He was a year older than me, and we'd met and become friends the year prior, during his senior year. Also, by the time we finally started dating, we had started a band together with me on bass, him on guitar and vocals, and another friend on drums. We practiced several times a week, played gigs on the weekends, and went out on dates nearly every night. I graduated high school and immediately went into college with him.
Mark and I started dating in 1998, during my senior year of high school. He was a year older than me, and we'd met and become friends the year prior, during his senior year. Also, by the time we finally started dating, we had started a band together with me on bass, him on guitar and vocals, and another friend on drums. We practiced several times a week, played gigs on the weekends, and went out on dates nearly every night. I graduated high school and immediately went into college with him.
The first couple of years were great. We were young and dumb because we were SUPPOSED to be young and dumb. But then, things started changing. Mark got fired from his job at the local farm and garden store. Then he quit college before he'd even finished a full 2 years. Meanwhile, I was still attending college full-time in the evenings, and had started teaching Head Start full-time during the day. And of course, on top of it all, I had to make time for band practice, for gigs, for dates that I was increasingly paying for.
It was a gradual thing, but signs of mental illness started popping up in him. He was predisposed anyway, as his mother had been OCD and borderline schizophrenic, but on top of it, he had literally watched both parents die in front of his eyes; his father when he was just 8 of a heart attack on the front lawn, and his mother in the hallway from a migraine-induced aneurysm when he was 15. From then on, he lived with his much older brother in the house they grew up in, his parents' bedroom door permanently locked, their mother's old makeup in the butter dish in the fridge, the Burger King cup from the day she died still on the back of the stove where she'd left it 4 years before.
Mark's OCD started manifesting in little ways -- wiping his nose all the time with this faraway, dead-eyed stare on his face, then zipping and unzipping his jeans because he didn't feel like he'd done it "right" the first time, then flipping light switches, then locking and unlocking his car door and starting and turning off and restarting the engine. Most people think of the compulsive handwashing when they think of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, but his was so bad that he was convinced water itself was "dirty." He still took showers, but he hated washing his hands. He would worry about "microbes" coming out of the tap. He was late EVERYWHERE. I don't just mean 10, 15 minutes late. I mean frequently HOURS late. He showed up 6 hours late to my house one time when we'd had a whole day at the mall planned. And then, I became part of his compulsions. He would kiss me, but it wouldn't "stick." So he'd insist on kissing me again. And again. And again. 10, 12, 15 kisses goodnight before I could go in my house. My face would be rashy from the kisses. My mother and sisters used to joke that I was allergic to his spit. I think that wore on me like nothing else. It was as if he stopped seeing me as a girlfriend, and instead saw me as a crutch to his mental illness.
I tried to get him to get help. Mark went to a behavioral therapist twice, then quit because he wasn't cured quick enough. Soon (and unbeknownst to me until after we split), he started buying prescription pills from his more "unsavory" friends. Also unbeknownst to me, he started drinking (we were both part of the straight-edge culture then), and then, when I stopped having sex with him regularly, he cheated on me with a friend of mine. He may have slept with more women, I don't know. She's just the only one that came forward and confessed to me.
After five years, I finally had enough. I'd wanted to leave for about a year, year and a half before then, but didn't want to be seen as an evil bitch that leaves when things get tough. I thought I was supposed to stick it out, be there for him, help him through his issues.
The real hell began after the split.
I tried staying in the band for a couple of months after we broke up -- we were in the middle of recording our 3rd album, and had been in talks over a label deal by a small Sony affiliate. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized it wasn't worth it if I still had to have Mark in my life. So I quit the band. Shit hit the fan. He turned nearly all our mutual friends against me. He spread rumors that I was a schizophrenic, a druggy, a drunken whore who slept with a hundred different men during our 5 years together, but also a lesbian who cheated on him with numerous women. Somehow, he actually got people to believe him. I got death threats in my inbox and voicemail from people I had never even met. I lost all but my most loyal of friends (and over the years, most of them have come back apologizing, saying they didn't realize at the time how off his rocker her was.)
He started calling me all hours of the day and night, screaming at me until I hung up on him, then calling back sobbing until I did the same again. He bargained with me to meet up with him somewhere so we could "talk about things." I don't know why, but I relented more times than I should have, agreeing to meet up at Denny's with a mutual friend to mediate, then explaining the same things I'd explained time and time again 'til I was blue in the face -- that I wasn't happy, that I didn't wanna play "mama" to him anymore, that I was sick of carrying all the weight by working and him doing nothing but playing Nintendo all day.
The final straw was when he showed up to my mother's house at 7:00 in the morning -- creepily early for Mark, who hadn't been out of bed before 9:00 in years -- demanding we talk things out again, and that I rehash again why I didn't want to be with him while he said "But I just don't understand! What did I do?!?" During this exchange, he decided to get physical. He backed me into my bedroom while I shoved and punched to get him out. My mom finally was able to pull him away, saying "She doesn't want you here! Get out of my house, now!"
After that, I stopped entertaining his requests to meet up and "talk about things," and then stopped answering the phone altogether. So, he started driving out to my house and parking his car at the end of my driveway. I lived in a rural area and had 7 acres to myself with a nearly quarter-mile driveway. I'd lock my gate, but he'd sit there with the lights off for hours at a time. I'd call the cops, they'd ask him to leave, but there was no legal action I could actually take. He would leave money in my mailbox. He once left a birthday card and $100 bill. I wasn't the only person he harassed. He'd call my sisters, my parents, my friends. Ask them about me. Beg them to have me call him. Sometimes, he'd just sit and breathe on the phone.
2 years went by. My husband and I got married. The morning after our wedding, we woke up to my plastic garden bench pushed up under our bedroom window, dusty size 10 Airwalk footprints in the seat, a handful of cigarette butts littering the ground. My husband's tires had also been slashed. A few weeks later, we ran into Mark at the mall. He followed us to the parking lot, yelling at Billy. We ignored him and walked to our car, rolling our eyes. I was afraid then to tell my new husband just how badly I'd been harassed...afraid he'd see it as baggage he wanted no part of, and that he might leave. In retrospect, I should have said something from the beginning.
The phone calls and emails and constant harassment lasted a total of 7 years, gradually petering out during the last 3. He was still harassing me when my daughter started preschool. I think the only reason he stopped was because he lost track of where I was. We moved a lot for a few years, before settling down here.
I stayed away from Shawnee for several years, knowing he was still there, and that if I was ever around, word would get back to him. I saw Mark a few months ago, walking down some slummy street, looking strung out and gross. It was sad. It confirmed for me that I no longer need to be scared of him.
It was a gradual thing, but signs of mental illness started popping up in him. He was predisposed anyway, as his mother had been OCD and borderline schizophrenic, but on top of it, he had literally watched both parents die in front of his eyes; his father when he was just 8 of a heart attack on the front lawn, and his mother in the hallway from a migraine-induced aneurysm when he was 15. From then on, he lived with his much older brother in the house they grew up in, his parents' bedroom door permanently locked, their mother's old makeup in the butter dish in the fridge, the Burger King cup from the day she died still on the back of the stove where she'd left it 4 years before.
Mark's OCD started manifesting in little ways -- wiping his nose all the time with this faraway, dead-eyed stare on his face, then zipping and unzipping his jeans because he didn't feel like he'd done it "right" the first time, then flipping light switches, then locking and unlocking his car door and starting and turning off and restarting the engine. Most people think of the compulsive handwashing when they think of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, but his was so bad that he was convinced water itself was "dirty." He still took showers, but he hated washing his hands. He would worry about "microbes" coming out of the tap. He was late EVERYWHERE. I don't just mean 10, 15 minutes late. I mean frequently HOURS late. He showed up 6 hours late to my house one time when we'd had a whole day at the mall planned. And then, I became part of his compulsions. He would kiss me, but it wouldn't "stick." So he'd insist on kissing me again. And again. And again. 10, 12, 15 kisses goodnight before I could go in my house. My face would be rashy from the kisses. My mother and sisters used to joke that I was allergic to his spit. I think that wore on me like nothing else. It was as if he stopped seeing me as a girlfriend, and instead saw me as a crutch to his mental illness.
I tried to get him to get help. Mark went to a behavioral therapist twice, then quit because he wasn't cured quick enough. Soon (and unbeknownst to me until after we split), he started buying prescription pills from his more "unsavory" friends. Also unbeknownst to me, he started drinking (we were both part of the straight-edge culture then), and then, when I stopped having sex with him regularly, he cheated on me with a friend of mine. He may have slept with more women, I don't know. She's just the only one that came forward and confessed to me.
After five years, I finally had enough. I'd wanted to leave for about a year, year and a half before then, but didn't want to be seen as an evil bitch that leaves when things get tough. I thought I was supposed to stick it out, be there for him, help him through his issues.
The real hell began after the split.
I tried staying in the band for a couple of months after we broke up -- we were in the middle of recording our 3rd album, and had been in talks over a label deal by a small Sony affiliate. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized it wasn't worth it if I still had to have Mark in my life. So I quit the band. Shit hit the fan. He turned nearly all our mutual friends against me. He spread rumors that I was a schizophrenic, a druggy, a drunken whore who slept with a hundred different men during our 5 years together, but also a lesbian who cheated on him with numerous women. Somehow, he actually got people to believe him. I got death threats in my inbox and voicemail from people I had never even met. I lost all but my most loyal of friends (and over the years, most of them have come back apologizing, saying they didn't realize at the time how off his rocker her was.)
He started calling me all hours of the day and night, screaming at me until I hung up on him, then calling back sobbing until I did the same again. He bargained with me to meet up with him somewhere so we could "talk about things." I don't know why, but I relented more times than I should have, agreeing to meet up at Denny's with a mutual friend to mediate, then explaining the same things I'd explained time and time again 'til I was blue in the face -- that I wasn't happy, that I didn't wanna play "mama" to him anymore, that I was sick of carrying all the weight by working and him doing nothing but playing Nintendo all day.
The final straw was when he showed up to my mother's house at 7:00 in the morning -- creepily early for Mark, who hadn't been out of bed before 9:00 in years -- demanding we talk things out again, and that I rehash again why I didn't want to be with him while he said "But I just don't understand! What did I do?!?" During this exchange, he decided to get physical. He backed me into my bedroom while I shoved and punched to get him out. My mom finally was able to pull him away, saying "She doesn't want you here! Get out of my house, now!"
After that, I stopped entertaining his requests to meet up and "talk about things," and then stopped answering the phone altogether. So, he started driving out to my house and parking his car at the end of my driveway. I lived in a rural area and had 7 acres to myself with a nearly quarter-mile driveway. I'd lock my gate, but he'd sit there with the lights off for hours at a time. I'd call the cops, they'd ask him to leave, but there was no legal action I could actually take. He would leave money in my mailbox. He once left a birthday card and $100 bill. I wasn't the only person he harassed. He'd call my sisters, my parents, my friends. Ask them about me. Beg them to have me call him. Sometimes, he'd just sit and breathe on the phone.
2 years went by. My husband and I got married. The morning after our wedding, we woke up to my plastic garden bench pushed up under our bedroom window, dusty size 10 Airwalk footprints in the seat, a handful of cigarette butts littering the ground. My husband's tires had also been slashed. A few weeks later, we ran into Mark at the mall. He followed us to the parking lot, yelling at Billy. We ignored him and walked to our car, rolling our eyes. I was afraid then to tell my new husband just how badly I'd been harassed...afraid he'd see it as baggage he wanted no part of, and that he might leave. In retrospect, I should have said something from the beginning.
The phone calls and emails and constant harassment lasted a total of 7 years, gradually petering out during the last 3. He was still harassing me when my daughter started preschool. I think the only reason he stopped was because he lost track of where I was. We moved a lot for a few years, before settling down here.
I stayed away from Shawnee for several years, knowing he was still there, and that if I was ever around, word would get back to him. I saw Mark a few months ago, walking down some slummy street, looking strung out and gross. It was sad. It confirmed for me that I no longer need to be scared of him.