Military Crime Journals

Dedicated to my father and my husband on Parental Alienation Awareness Day.

I struggle to express how I feel on this day, Parental Alienation Awareness Day. I not only live with the pain from my own childhood experiences with parental alienation but I watched what happened to my father happen to my husband right in front of my very own eyes. I didn’t put two and two together until I moved to California and finally broke the ties with my toxic family. We left because we were sick and tired of being in the middle of family drama amongst narcissists. My whole life I was expected to choose sides. First when I was a kid, it was expected that I would choose my custodial parent (and the new spouse) over my father. Then, as I got older and my mother’s toxic relationship deteriorated with her second husband, I was expected to again choose sides. But guess what? She never chose mine and now we know why.

I was a child support check and a pawn in her games to hurt my father.

I started looking into parental alienation after witnessing what my husband’s abusive ex-wife did to him over the course of our marriage simply because he wanted to spend time with his two sons. I knew my mother was guilty of the same thing but for some reason (most likely my body protecting me from trauma), I could not connect that she was no different than my husband’s ex-wife. Both men were kind. Both men were stable and made a good living. Both men loved their kids with all their hearts. Both men were accused of being something they were not. And both men wanted to die by suicide, one did. My father was accused of being “evil” because of mistakes he made as a young man and my husband was accused of being an “abuser” because everyone will believe the fake a$$ southern belle when she talks all sweet like she’s the victim.

I love my husband and with that comes automatic love for his two sons. I was nothing but good to them the entire time I knew them. I never harmed them. I never spoke down to them. I even put up with their crap using me as an emotional punching bag because I was too sick to fight back. I had my own problems but all of a sudden all of my husband’s problems became mine. What did that mean? Both of us were now the victims of his high conflict baby mama’s (HCBM) abuse. You see, my husband was forced to marry this woman because she became impregnated when he was 18 years old and she was in her early twenties. And in his toxic, abusive family who only cared about what the community thought, he was expected to marry this stranger because it was the “right thing to do” and was the “Christian thing to do.”

Nobody gave two f*cks about what my husband wanted or what was best for him.

When I met Lee, he was in the process of getting a divorce from the mother of his children. Of course because he was married, I was not interested in getting involved with him at this point despite feeling love for him like I had never felt before. I was dealing with my own issues. My father was dying of terminal bone cancer and he was my number one priority. I wish things had been different for me and Lee but even if we wanted to be together we could not because we were both stop lossed in the Air Force after 9/11. I was stop lossed in Massachusetts and Lee was stop lossed in Alaska. I’m telling you this piece of history so you can understand why his bitter ex-wife’s accusation of me being a home wrecker is so ridiculous. Lee and I kept in touch occasionally via e-mail and his ex-wife broke into his e-mail and e-mailed me to tell me I was a homewrecker and she was going to report me to my Commander. Nice to meet you too.

After this, I was pretty much done with Lee because I had accepted my fate being stop lossed during a declaration of war. I didn’t know how long the stop loss would last and there didn’t appear to be any end in sight. So despite being grief stricken after losing my dad and dealing with my own personal demons from childhood and my experiences as a lower enlisted service member, I buried myself in my job and made the military my life, just the way they like it. I didn’t have a choice. I lived and worked on the base due to the stop loss. I felt like I was in prison and as the years went on, I got sicker and sicker and I didn’t know why. Lee and I did still keep in touch occasionally as friends but I had moved beyond him given our geographical proximities and then after four long years the stop loss was finally lifted. I was ready to transfer back to the Maine Air National Guard and settle down in my late father’s home for a little while. Lee wanted out of the active duty Air Force so he could be with me.

We both transferred to the 101st Civil Engineer Squadron where things would go from bad to worse. My mental and physical health was deteriorating no matter how good I ate or how much exercise I did. And I was just a hot mess but hiding it from everyone. I was slowly cracking on the inside and so was Lee but he was always trying to be strong for me and his boys so I didn’t truly know where he was at. But after over a decade of service, we were both on the edge of breakdown considering how we were treated by our abusive commands. This squadron was no different than anywhere else we had worked. All they saw was two people go from being super troops to unrecognizable and they didn’t give two f*cks why. It didn’t happen on their watch so it wasn’t their responsibility to right the wrongs of the other abusive commands. They were equally as abusive and kicked us while we were downtrodden and in despair.

We had to contact a Senator to assist us with our medical retirement from the Air National Guard. It felt like our Commander was literally pushing us to suicide, sending us into financial ruins, and ending our careers with legal paperwork to f*ck us for the rest of our lives. We were debilitated mentally and physically while he abused us and forced to use the free food banks at the local churches (in another small town where no one knew us). Lee was forced to work to provide for the family while he was downward spiraling. We could no longer function as we waited patiently for the medical retirement process to work out. Once we started this process, we wanted to spend more time with Lee’s kids. He missed out on a lot of years when he was active duty and stop lossed. I supported his endeavors to spend more time with his kids. I was alienated from my late father and that was the last thing I wanted for Lee’s kids.

Lee and I immediately started the process of spending more time with his two boys but it would turn into a f*cking nightmare. Lee wanted his kids to have an opportunity to live with him if that’s what they wanted so he asked them if they wanted to live with him… and they did. They both moved to Maine and we all lived in the home I inherited from my father. I was psyched that Lee could be with his kids and I could be good to all of them. I had a new family. I was thirty-five and sick with an undiagnosed medical condition (lead poisoning) from the time Lee and I got married and there was no way I could have kids. But on my good days, I took his kids to all my favorite destinations in Maine. We could not afford to pay the ex-wife child support and take care of the kids so we filed for 50/50 custody. And this is when all hell broke loose. The ex-wife let the kids stay with us up until it would have impacted the child support.

Lee didn’t tell me the reasons why he was divorcing his ex and I guess I never asked why. But I would quickly observe and witness exactly why he wanted nothing to do with this abusive woman. We now know that she is a malignant narcissist. But at the time, we didn’t understand the behavior and all we knew was that she was unreasonable, aggressive, greedy, vindictive, and retaliatory. She didn’t give two f*cks about how her crazy behavior harmed two disabled veterans with post traumatic stress from military service. She purposefully used our vulnerabilities to hurt us on-line no less. I didn’t say anything and she had no problems going on line to a local forum and posting that I “faked a rape to get out of going to Iraq.” After hearing about it from someone in the community, I tried to stand up for myself and was met with “why don’t you go kill yourself, like your father did” (only the cops knew about this).

Abusive Ex-Wife: She faked a rape to get out of going to Iraq.

Me: You don’t know me or know anything about me. This is lies. Take this down.

Local Cop: Why don’t you go kill yourself like your father did.

Let me remind you that Lee and I were going through a medical retirement process. We were both considered permanently disabled and we were medically retired because of the disabilities, one of which included post traumatic stress. This raving lunatic was aggressively pursuing two disabled people who had not even begun the healing process yet. I had not processed either the rape or my father’s suicide because now I know I was sick with lead poisoning and this is why I was not functioning effectively. Chronic lead poisoning impacts your brain and central nervous system. I didn’t do anything to antagonize this woman. I was merely a bystander in this situation. But in the end, it feels like I paid the biggest price in the whole matter. We would later figure out that one of the kids overheard a private conversation and shared it with their toxic mother. Her public declaration and lies about my experiences sent me into a suicidal tailspin for a decade.

I shut down and wanted nothing to do with this abusive malignant narcissist whatsoever. I was too sick to deal with this level of toxicity. My husband was forced to deal with it if he wanted a relationship with his sons. Her actions and the lack of support in our lives would negatively impact our marriage. I felt resentful of Lee because had I not married him, I wouldn’t be going through this kind of abuse again. But I love Lee and I couldn’t handle watching what was happening to him either. This was a lose-lose situation and if we wanted to save our marriage and our health, we had to walk away. We just prayed the kids would figure it out someday and come back to us when they were ready. We were both too sick to deal with her toxic but she wasn’t done with us. She would make sure that both of us were charged with felonies… to make sure we could never get custody of the boys or touch her precious child support.

This was the beginning of the abuser narrative.

Malignant narcissists are experts at gaslighting and torturing people until they snap mentally and physically. They push people to the point of what is called reactive abuse (and then accuse the victim of being the abuser). In our situation all it took was her threatening to take Lee’s kids from him and never letting him see them again to push Lee over the edge mentally. I wasn’t there to witness what she said but I saw the aftermath. And what I witnessed was a man in pain, desperation, and unable to emotionally regulate himself but it looked kind of scary from an outsider’s perspective. Not because he is scary but because it’s something I didn’t have the skills to help him with. I tried to calm him down and love on him but nothing was going to stop his ex-wife from abusing him, keeping his kid’s from him, and making up narratives that he was the abuser. The ex-wife called the local police department after she gaslit Lee into a mental health crisis and Lee was charged with domestic violence after the incompetent police made the scenario fit a domestic violence narrative.

“If you want to see a sane person act insane, take their children away from them for no reason at all.” -Kelley Baker, PhD.

Lee was arrested for domestic violence, a restraining order was placed on him so he couldn’t be near me, and he was once again homeless because of his ex-wife. You see, this didn’t start here. It started in the military with false accusations. Lee’s military commander and leaders sold him out instead of helping him through a difficult situation with an abusive woman who was completely unreasonable. She was allowed to stay in base housing throughout the divorce and for 30-60 days after the divorce. Meanwhile, Lee was forced to live in someone’s basement until he could find a place with a roommate because that was the only way he could afford housing. She dragged out the divorce by being difficult, demanded more money even though she was living in free housing and had a good paying job, and threatened to tell lies to the military commander to control and hurt him, including accusing him of abusing her. Now I was watching her modus operandi unfold right in front of my very eyes. I had empathy for Lee.

The domestic violence charge went nowhere but my husband was humiliated in town, I was humiliated and made to feel like a spouse who was hiding abuse in my home, and the lawyer we hired to help us get shared custody of the boys told us it was over. We would never get custody with a domestic violence charge. The ex-wife and her gaslighting techniques worked perfectly. And now we wonder if she formed some sort of relationship with shared enemies (the local cops) to help turn a mental health scenario into a domestic violence scenario so it would f*ck up the child custody case. But she wasn’t done. She would make sure I was charged with a felony too. The oldest son had already left and went back home but the youngest son was her eyes and ears on the situation. We would eventually send him home so we could live in peace because he was on the phone with her all the time and we felt like she was living with us too. And then one night, they gaslit Lee into another mental health meltdown.

I don’t know what was said to cause Lee to go into emotional dysregulation but I was worried about his mental health again and didn’t know how to help him. This time I called 911 to get Lee mental health assistance and it would turn out to be the biggest mistake of my life. Instead of sending someone to assist with a crisis, the police department made the crisis worse. They didn’t give a flying f*ck about Lee’s mental health crisis. They gunned for me this time and charged me with furnishing a home for minors to consume. First of all, I didn’t buy the alcohol; Lee did. And it contributed negatively to his mental health state but he didn’t do anything wrong. He simply had an emotional meltdown and was unable to regulate his emotions. Secondly, both Lee and I owned the property (he was on the deed). Lastly, the person who was the minor was turning 21 in two weeks. Apparently, she grabbed a beer at some point in the evening of which I paid zero attention to because I wasn’t well that night, I drank some of the beer to cope as well, and all my attention was on Lee and what happened to cause the meltdown. We were in crisis.

The charge against me was so ludicrous it was thrown out without me even having to hire a lawyer. Because there was a child in the home, an advocate was assigned to us. We told her everything and she advocated for us in the court system. They see this kind of behavior from criminal exes all the time. This is common behavior these days. And I know for a fact, it’s been going on for years because my mother pulled the same shit on my father who was legit alienated from his children. Yes, we spent time with him off and on but I was not invested emotionally because I wasn’t sure if he was a good person or not and my toxic family would shame me for wanting a relationship with him when I was young. As a matter of fact, when I was in seventh grade, they wanted to adopt me and cut my father out of the scenario all together. Now I know it was a rotten attempt at hiding their abuse after he moved back to Maine. But because abuse was the norm in my home, I didn’t know it was wrong or parental alienation.

“Organized Stalking is a form of terrorism used against an individual in a malicious attempt to reduce the quality of a person’s life so they will: have a nervous breakdown, become incarcerated, institutionalized, experience constant mental, emotional, or physical pain, become homeless, and/or commit suicide. This is done using well orchestrated accusations, lies, rumors, bogus investigations, setups, framings, intimidation, overt or covert threats, vandalism, thefts, sabotage, torture, humiliation, emotional terror and general harassment. It is a ‘ganging up’ by members of the community who follow an organizer and participate in a systematic ‘terrorizing’ of an individual.” -Unknown

After this hack f*cked us up like this, we sent the youngest son home. We were done. I could not believe what I had witnessed. The level of depravity from Lee’s ex-wife and the small town cops was unimaginable. They were legit pissed at the courthouse because I pleaded not guilty and requested a jury trial. I was scared of them and as a result I hid out in my house for years while we lived in this crooked f*cking Stephen King wannabe town. Like one of my friends from Massachusetts shared with me: “Maine is the deep south of the North” and he ain’t kidding. I became an enemy to the cops because I volunteered on a finance committee and was part of the committee members who voted to cut two police officer positions from a town with less than 5000 people. They went from 14 to 12 police officers (and the positions were empty at the time so no one was hurt), all paid for with local tax dollars collected from the property owners. Most of these small Maine towns turned over their police services to the County but not these f*cks.

Lee’s kids left the home and never returned again. If we wanted to see them, we had to drive to Tennessee. The ex-wife abuser had successfully created an abuser narrative and used the felony charges against us to justify her behavior and to dehumanize us. We were criminals, therefore she was not going to let her children ever come to Maine again and stay with the abusers. Meanwhile, she gave us a hard time about seeing the kids, made other plans for them, wouldn’t lock down times for us to see them, and weird things happened in Tennessee when she knew we would be there. For example, she served us with child support paperwork at his parents who were in on everything with her and someone tried carjacking Lee at the edge of the road outside her home after dropping off one of the kids. Lee’s parents made us both feel like we were the biggest losers ever because they took her side for their own selfish reasons. They dehumanized us as well and didn’t give two f*cks about how were doing.

Then one day, while I was laying on the couch at Lee’s parent’s house because I wasn’t feeling well, Lee’s dad would say out of nowhere: “You’re a victim.” I think he was referring to me being a loser because I have post traumatic stress from being raped and abused while serving. Yes I do have PTSD but if I didn’t tell you, you would never know it. At the time, I was struggling big time with an undiagnosed medical condition that was slowly killing me. I was trying to get help but no one would help me. I had accepted my fate and was doing the best I could. This triggered me and made me feel unsafe. I told Lee I was leaving and I was never going back to Tennessee ever again after the way his ex-wife, kids, and family treated me. Their dehumanization of an innocent person was pushing me to suicide and not only did I want to kill myself while I was there and attempted to but I also bought a gun on one visit so I could do it. We packed up our belongings in less than 30 minutes and left and never went back. At this point, both of us were isolated and our families treated us like fakers while our health deteriorated.

Lee’s ex-wife destroyed our sanity. She destroyed our support system. She ripped our families away from us. She ripped the community away from us. She turned the cops against us and made us feel unsafe in our own community. She kept the kids from us. She used the kids to abuse us. She used Lee’s parents to abuse us. And we were so fucking beat down, we could not even cope. We did not understand how two good decent people could be legit destroyed by f*cking narcissists. They are winning this game folks. Ya’ll are letting good people go down because of lies. These people are text book. If you look up malignant narcissist, it will explain everything I have just shared with you. This is nothing new. When is the criminal justice system going to start holding these gaslighting lying abusers accountable? They all f*cked us up permanently, including Lee’s kids who lost out on an amazing relationship with a loving father. I love Lee with all my heart. He is the most kind man I have ever met and I would die for him.

My family accused Lee of choosing me over his two kids. And that was not the case at all. The same people who alienated me from my own father were now accusing my husband of not caring about his kids. We went through hell fighting for these kids. We put our lives in danger for these kids. We almost died because of these kids. Whether it was getting shot by the cops, harmed by the ex or killing ourselves, our lives were in danger in Maine & Tennessee because of this wretched hag. As soon as we saw the real estate market change in Maine after the pandemic, we fixed up our house while sick af and sold the bitch. It was a hard decision and an easy decision. I will miss living in my dad’s home because he told me before he died that these four walls would protect me and they did. But I couldn’t wait to leave what I felt was the most crooked, backwoods, abusive, oppressive state I ever had the misfortune of witnessing. Everyone turned on us in these small towns because of the lies that were printed in the newspaper. And eventually, these same lies would be used to ruin my reputation in my new role as a crime victim activist.