This Evil cow didnt help with my PTSD.

The breakdown of my marriage to Rebecca is a very difficult and extremely sad part of my life to write about, as it is still a very raw emotion but the story needs to be told. First lets go back four years to a wonderful time when my beautiful daughter Annabelle was borne. When I first met Bex it was not that long ago that my marriage to Julie had ended after she had committed adultery and my first family including my son Aiden was taken away from me, so you can imagine I was not too keen to get back in a relationship. First of all Bex was only 19 and I was 35, she pursued me for weeks even after I was extremely rude to her so she would stop hassling me, I even told her that it would never work out between us and she would probably end up cheating on me, as she would want to be out all the time partying and I would be at home with my slippers on watching the soccer. Even her brother Alan threatened to kill me if I did not leave his sister alone, which I don’t blame him as in his eyes he was trying to protect his little sister. But as you know from earlier in the book I fell in love with her and all logic goes out of the window. We had been together for a couple of years when Bex said she would love to start a family, I said I already had one child to a failed marriage and didn’t want another, but after we got married in October 1999 (Halloween) I agreed that I had made a commitment to her and agreed to try for a child. After sadly having a miscarriage in the early stages of pregnancy, Bex became pregnant again and we both had a very tense nine months to the birth on the 24th March 2001. After having a warm bath in the early evening Bex started to get labour pains and I made sure her bag was packed and we set off for the hospital in the car, which luckily is only a couple of miles from our house. We were soon in the reassuring surroundings of the maternity ward and Bex was checked over by the midwife who was going to deliver the baby, happily she seemed ok and not like some battleaxes that are stereotypical of midwives. They did all the usual stuff, blood pressure, monitoring the baby’s heart rate and everything seemed to be going along smoothly. A couple of hours had passed and it was time for Bex to start to push and bring baby in to the world, they never seem to want to come out and who can blame them? I felt totally helpless, I had been at the birth of my son Aiden but that does not make you an expert and I just held her hand and comforted her. Watching your wife give birth is very hard to put into words, the stress and anxiety was heightened by the fact we did not know if the baby was a boy or a girl by choice. I could see the crown of the babies head and Bex pushed and heaved for all her worth, but Belle must have thought it too warm in there and was digging her heals in. The midwife attached a monitor to Belles head with a needle and I remember thinking that’s great the first thing another human does is poke you with something sharp. There seemed to be a lot of activity around the bed now and all eyes were on the monitor and Belles heart rate, they were slightly worried as the heart rate was elevated. Bex was urged to give another big push but Belle wasn’t ready just yet, it was just after this push that one of the doctors said they were very concerned about the babies heart rate and told us that we needed to get down to theatre right away for an emergency C section, it seemed the cord was wrapped around Belles throat. Talk about stressful I was dripping in sweat and my own heart sounded like it was going to explode as Bex was hurriedly pushed down the corridor, amazingly as we were running down, I managed to take all of Bex`s earrings out and her necklace, as they taped her rings on her fingers, I think this is due to the heat from the lights in the operating room. The bed with Bex and Belle crashed through the big rubber doors to the operating theatre and that’s where I left them, as I was not allowed inside. Another nurse showed me the waiting room and asked if I wanted a cup of coffee, not being a smoker I said yes and she showed me some magazines on the table and told me not to worry, which is a funny thing we say to people who are very worried, I turned the pages in some DIY mag my head swimming, she said it wont take long and left, she was perfectly relaxed and probably did this routinely, well it was my first C section, Bex will have been in cloud cuckoo land by now and I was shocked to find myself actually reading and article on the merits of vinegar for cleaning your cooker to stopping you get constipated or something. It was probably only about half an hour but seemed a lot longer when a smiling nurse came back in to room, that’s always a good sign and asked me if I wanted to see my baby daughter? Wow! A daughter I remember thinking Ive got one of each now and how my Dad told me you had to have a boy and a girl to be a proper man. I followed the nurse into another room and asked if Bex was Ok, she assured me she was fine and said she needed some rest now and I could see her later, then she handed me a little bundle wrapped in a towel, I was once again amazed how small and helpless babies look. Looking down at her I felt enormous joy at having a daughter as for some reason I thought she would be a boy, I cradled her gently in my arms, this beautiful baby girl with RED RED hair, where did that come from? was my daughter. I felt my eyes fill with tears as I thought about my late Mother and how much she would have cared and loved her as a doting grandmother. I slowly moved my head closer to hers and whispered her name “Annabelle “ after whispering it three of four times she opened her little eyes and looked at me, she new her name, from that moment we had a bond of unconditional love. We named her Annabelle Kelly, Kelly being my Mothers maiden name.
I wrote this poem about her.

How fortunate a man I am to smell
The newborn scent of my baby Annabelle
She gives me unconditional love
Her proof life must go on
Heaven bound white dove
I pray thanks dear Lord I survived my war
In 1982 some never reached the shore
She has stopped me from taking the easy way out
That sweet smell of innocence
There is no doubt
How fortunate a man I am to tell
This is my daughter my Annabelle.

My happiness was short lived and very soon my whole world was to be torn apart.
I remembered how much hard work it is looking after a new borne baby after the birth of Aiden, I can assure you that even though you have experienced it in the past it doesn’t make it any easier. Because Bex was in full time work the responsibility to care for our daughter fell on my shoulders and rightly so, as I could not expect Bex to be up all night feeding Belle and then going to work all day, this was fine in principal but unfortunately for Belle I did not have any lactating breasts, but this was remedied when she started bottle feeding and I soon got in to a routine of caring for her, but must admit a crying baby is still a very stressful noise, even to someone without PTSD.
I am no expert on postnatal depression but Bex`s whole personality seemed to change and she became very cold towards me, I just assumed this would change as our daughter gave us such happiness. Belle was only a few months old when Bex started to go out drinking and buying loads of clothes, she always liked to look nice and was very attractive with a smashing figure, I would often catch blokes eying her up when we were out, which as a couple became less and less. Around about this time her best friend Lyn was seeing a multi millionaire business man Nigel and would turn up at our house in porches and other high performance sports cars and take Bex off on summer evenings to barbeques, which I never got an invite, but obviously now it all makes sense as she was cheating on me even then. She was even picked up from our house by men who worked for Lyns boyfriend that really pissed me off and caused arguments. The thought was always in the back of my mind that she might be cheating on me, but I just could not believe that the woman I loved could do this to Belle and me. I even noticed a change down at Bex`s parents, there was certainly an atmosphere. We had to have dinner at Bex`s Mam`s every Sunday and some weekdays. The conversation always got around to what shifts they were working and how tiring it is, and how they had to pay their hard earned taxes to give to layabouts on the dole, I always felt very uncomfortable even though I was not on the dole and received a war pension I new where their comments were aimed. What I believe was happening then was Bex was laying the foundations for her adultery by constantly complaining to her Mother about me and basically turning them against me, this wasn’t difficult as she was their flesh and blood and I had no family of my own. Basically Bex`s constant criticism of me behind my back to her family just reinforced particularly her Mothers, `The Queen Bee’s` initial thoughts that I was not good enough for her daughter. Even the next-door neighbours would totally blank me when they came in to Bex`s parents house, eventually I just gave up speaking to them, I suppose they where pig ignorant but at least they openly showed their feeling for me.
Bex would usually come home for her dinner, on one occasion I had made her a cup of tea and she went to get her sandwiches from the kitchen, I had the lunch time news on, there was a new report where a C130 Hercules was returning to the UK from overseas with dead UK serviceman, they were being carried from the aircraft draped in the Union flag, I sat in the chair watching the images and my eyes filled with tears, I started to quietly sob. Bex stood up, grabbed her sandwich, saying “For God sake” and went into the kitchen slamming the door. Even then I loved her and just put it down to her youth and not understanding my emotional condition, I truly believed that you only ever have one true love and she was it.
One night myself and Bex were invited to her friends engagement do at a hotel in Dalton, this was where Bex had planned the second decisive phase of her split from me. We were in company with friends of the family George and Andrea who owned a local printing firm. I really got on well with George; he was about my age, a very successful businessman and a good laugh to be with. He was even very candid with me from the start when he said that he did initially judge a book by the cover when he first saw me, you know skin head tattoos, must mean limited intelligence, until I engaged him in conversation and he got a feel of the real me. This was not part of Bex`s plan, she wanted to portray me as some sort of nutter a violent pisshead. I had had several slow dances with Bex and I even whispered that I loved her, she told me she loved me to, and even seemed sincere. After our dance I went back to my seat with George and his wife and Bex went over to her friend Lyn who she seemed to be with 24 7 these days, they were practically joined at the hip. If I went to her Mothers while she Bex was having her lunch, sure enough there was Lyn, she was even in Bex office one day at work when I popped in to see her. I do not blame Lyn for the split up of my marriage, for I was not married to her, and if Bex had genuinely loved me she would not have cheated on me, she was her best mate so went along with her deceit. Well I noticed Bex talking to Lyn and then looking over in my direction, Bex then went to the toilet, Lyn came over to our table and sat down, we exchanged pleasantries and then Lyn said out of the blue “Tony Bex is very unhappy with her marriage” I couldn’t believe she just came out with it and George and his wife were gob smacked, it’s not like we had been talking all night or something. I came out with something like “What’s our marriage got to do with you?” I could have possibly understood if we had been arguing, but we had had a good night up till then. The die cast Lyn slunk off and waited for Bex to return from the toilet, next minute Bex comes storming over to my table shouting the odds about me having a go at Lyn as she stood behind her grinning, I was calm at first and told her what had occurred, but she wasn’t having any of it, even George stuck up for me but to no avail. She took the house keys from her handbag and threw them at me. I then started to scream and shout, the 7 or so pints had kicked in and I was furious, I remember calling her slag and asked her who she was fucking, I did this once before after the Falklands war with Carole with no justification, but sadly this time I was right. One of her other female mates came up behind me and punched me in the back of the head. I spun round only to se that it was a girl and told her to fuck off, Bex was loving it, this was just what she had engineered, making me look like a loose cannon. I was told to leave and Lyn followed me to the door throwing insults at me, I gave as good as she gave. I told her she was only with Nigel for his money and she hit back with at least he’s not a lazy bastard like you sponging off the DSS. I went home and cried my eyes out all night while Bex lay in the arms of her lover.
She came back the next day and there was an uncomfortable atmosphere, but Annabelle was here and she was still her Mother. We got back in to somewhat of a routine again, Sunday dinners at her Mothers, where I felt even more pushed out, apart from Terry her Dad who I liked and still do to this day. The nights out with Lyn got more and more frequent and she was even popping out at night, but took Annabelle with her, to make it look less suspicious, but she was with him, I could tell, the effort she was putting in, the makeup, the false nails, the hair do`s the new clothes, all just to pop out for an hour after corro. Deep down I new she was cheating but I was in a state of denial, I loved her and I despised my own mind for torturing me with images of her with him whoever he was, I was literally sick with worry. I reasoned that after my first divorce I should be stronger in dealing with things like this, but I wasn’t. Don’t get me wrong I was far from the perfect husband, who is. But I never laid a finger on her, I didn’t smoke unlike her, but I cannot complain as she smoked when I met her and can you believe her parents did not know, there were a few things her parents did not know about her, but I am not going in to it as I do not want this to sound like sour grapes or revenge. I did not gamble, I cleaned the house, cooked the meals, and looked after our baby girl, and it must have been awful for her living with me. I think I had just become soft with her, I loved her to bits. Our sex life was never anything spectacular and near the end it just dried up to nothing and I stopped asking after she told me that she dreaded the thought of it, she literally looked at me as though I was smeared with excrement, but you guessed it I loved her, what a sad idiot. I even put up with her disliking my son Aiden from my previous marriage, she would buy him the odd present but I could tell and so could he that she resented him because he had Julies blood flowing through him, but he is my son and like Annabelle I will love them both without favour. The lovely thing is I firmly believe that being half-brother and sister they actually do love each other in their own way and always ask where the other one is.
Things were certainly not getting any better between us and I took the difficult decision that I would tap our house telephone line. I felt totally powerless do anything to help our marriage as she just would not talk to me about anything and just wanted to be out all the time. I realised that I might be upset about what I could hear, but I needed to take control of one aspect and thinking back to my days as a soldier, I decided to use surveillance methods, instead of worrying myself ill. One part of me wanted to hear her say she still loved me but that was just wishful thinking, one look into her eyes and I new our marriage was in serious trouble, but I bought the small recording device and set about uncovering my wife’s deceit. You don’t have to be James Bond to do this sort of thing, it is surprisingly simple, and in today’s age of promiscuity they sell loads of these devices. So I set about engineering my own little scenario. Bex had been out on the Saturday night shagging her boyfriend and on the Sunday morning we were supposed to be going to a local steam gathering and fate. We woke up and I said I would have to go and get Aiden, Bex said that she was taking Lyn surprise surprise, I moaned about this and got the response I wanted, after winding her up I left our house and went for Aiden, knowing that she would be straight on the phone to her friend Lyn, I wasn’t wrong. I had to suffer the day out with Bex and her family, but Aiden and me made the most of it, looking at the steamrollers and military vehicles that were there. At this point I did not know if the tape had anything but I would have to wait till Monday morning to check it while she was at work.
After a very restless nights sleep, Monday came and off she went to work, with trembling hands and a rapidly beating heart I set about playing the tape back. What I was to hear my wife say on the tape was to knock the emotional shit out of me. As I had thought Bex was straight on the phone to Lyn as I left the house. The conversation started out by Lyn asking “Is he there?” she replied that I had gone to get Aiden. They chatted about last night, Bex warned Lyn not to mention that they had been in Ulverston as she had told me that she had gone to Windermere, they then started to laugh about how Nigel couldn’t dance. Lyn then asked what time Bex had got home, Bex said about 3`Oclock, Lyn asked if I had suspected anything, Bex said she didn’t think so, but I had sent her a text while she was in the taxi with Paul and his mates, she went on to say that Paul had dropped her off at the bottom of the street and she walked up. Lyn asked what the text had said, she told her I had said that I loved her and Annabelle, Lyn said that I was just messing with her head, Bex agreed that I was nuts and was giggling about her night with Paul, she said she showed Paul and his mates the text. At this point my blood was boiling and I wanted to kill this fucking Paul who ever he was, I was shaking and nauseous with anger. But the worst comment came when she said in mocking sarcastic voice “I expected him to be hanging from a rope when I got in” This was the moment that nearly killed me inside forever. She went on to say “Fuck him anyway I had a great night, see you later and remember Mums the word.” Any lingering doubts that she didn’t love me were confirmed in that instant.
I felt totally numb for a second as the realisation hit home that she was definitely cheating on me, as tears streamed down my face I shakily picked up the telephone and dialled her place of work, she worked in admin and usually always answers the phone, as she did on this occasion, only this time it wasn’t a customer ringing about a missing couple of screws in a kitchen, it was her husband ringing to tell her as I did “I know everything”
I didn’t know everything but I knew enough. She was stuck for words and gave me the old cliché of “Its not what you think.” She then said she was on her way home. She arrived and actually crashed the car into the fence on the driveway, as she had realised that she had been rumbled. She came and went on the defensive, saying it was all in my mind, the usual I’m nuts and paranoid bull. I lied and told her that she was seen with a man leaving a pub in Ulverston, I told her that one of my mates had seen them and told me. I wasn’t going to tell her yet that I actually had her on tape admitting her adultery, so I let her lie as she had been doing for the last 12 months. She ran upstairs and said she was packing her stuff and she was going to her Mams. Annabelle was awake now because of the noise and I held her in my arms and gave her a bottle of milk. She came downstairs with bag and took Annabelle from me and said she was going to her Mams and she would ring me later. She put Belle in the car and drove of leaving a broken fence and a shattered heart behind.
I lay on the living room floor and cried my eyes out for hours, I cried till there were no more tears left. Bex was at home with all of her family around her and Annabelle. I lay alone with nobody, I sobbed for my Mother, I was completely and utterly devastated, my grief was such I would not have even been able to commit suicide if I wanted too. I howled like a wounded dog, my mind was starting to shut down and I felt almost isolated from the real world, I was a baby again I wanted my Mam. I must have lay there for several hours, but eventually your body takes over, you need to use the toilet, so you stand up, you move, your brain makes decisions. The world is once again never the same, like it changed after the Falkland War, only it is now compounded by this second failure of marriage, I look through these eyes, the same eyes that shot down two aircraft, the same eyes that have lost a wife and child. The world is even more tainted than before. I eventually ring Scouse and tell him the news, he’s my mate, I knew him before I met Julie or Bex, we have been to War together, we understand each other, he begins to try to piece my broken mind back together, I listen like I would listen as a soldier would listen to his sergeant Major before a battle. I know what he is saying is right, get a brew down your neck, get some scoff, “You are a fucking combat veteran mate, you have seen more of the world and done more than she ever will, you are a survivor.” He was right but how do you remove love like that, usually hate takes it’s place, I was to emotionally injured for even hate then. I would have done the same for him, that’s what you do. He was probably worried about me, when he said “Fuck it I’m coming to get you.” Like the time on the Norland when I was thinking of jumping in to the freezing South Atlantic, Scouse came to my rescue. He took me back to his house in Liverpool and his wife cooked me nice meals and we both watched movies together. I was with a familiar face and amazingly even managed the odd smile and a joke or two. Its like when you were in the army if you split up with a lass and you’re a bit depressed, as soon as you get back to camp, you are out with your mates on the lash and having a laugh, you don’t have time to dwell on things. Squaddies even put their letters `Dear Johns` from their girlfriends on the notice board for everyone to read, it’s a coping mechanism and it works.
My break-up from Bex took a heavy toll on me psychologically and psychically, I was not a well man anyway with my PTSD and I amazingly lost nearly three stone in weight, I might have looked good in a T shirt but I would not recommend it. I tried to get back in to some sort of a routine but it was very difficult, I would wake in the night and expect Bex to be next to me, I had a large lonely bed. I eventually started to go back to the gym where I train in Barrow `Flexapeal` with my civvies mate Bob who was around 20 stone and he had also been through a similar emotional break-up from a girlfriend. The gym to me was like the barracks, where you could have a laugh with the lads, it was my own type of therapy. One day I was doing a bench press, when I stood up and started to go dizzy, I just thought it would pass, I had been a little unsteady on my feet when I got up that morning. I then heard like a whooshing sound in my ears and blacked out. I came around and then got very worried and panicky, thinking I had had a stroke or a heart attack. One of the lads gave me a lift home and I went to bed, then it happened again, whooshing noise and dizziness, I stated to have a panic attack and rang an ambulance. The Para medics came and took me in to the ambulance, asking me questions and taking may blood pressure, I told them that I suffer from PTSD, but that this was different, I have never experienced this before. They said they thought I was having a panic attack as my blood pressure and blood sugar where ok, I disgreed, and they did a good job of reassuring me that I wasn’t having a stroke or a heart attack. They kept me in all night and ran tests; I had blood taken from both arms. I was put on ward with a lot of elderly patients who were suffering from senile dementia and didn’t get much sleep as they screamed all night. I must say that the nurses were very patient with them as they rang their bells all night. I recall the next morning when a doctor from South America examined me, I thought that it best to hide my Falklands tattoo, but he had my chart anyway. I overheard him say to the nurse in the corridor after they had pulled my screen around that I was a psychiatric case due to my PTSD and should really be on the mental health unit, I am deaf in one ear but not that deaf. I knew he was wrong this was different.
They discharged me that day and I went home. At the weekend I was driving back to Annabelle’s grandmothers at five in the afternoon. I stopped the car and got Belle out as she was asleep, after I had handed her over to granny, it happened again, the whooshing feeling and the dizziness and I stumbled, I felt my body tingling and going numb, I was very worried again, perhaps going there had triggered it off. I asked if she would ring me an ambulance, but she refused, she must have thought this was some kind of sympathy vote, but it was genuine. I also had Aiden in the car, so the granny rang his Mother Julie to come and pick him up, she rang Bob and he said that he would come and pick my car home and take it home for me. Julie arrived and took me back up the hospital for more tests. I was so worried that I had a brain tumour or something equally life threatening that I asked for an MRI scan, they told me that on the NHS it would take a long time on the waiting list and it was very expensive. I decided to pay for scan, what’s money if you are dead. I paid around £300 for a consultation with a specialist. He was great and asked me lots of questions about the army and the Falklands War and Rapier, he said that he would put me in for an MRI scan and he did it on the NHS so I did not have to pay for it, that saved me a few thousand pounds. Eventually I had the scan, which is a bit like being put inside a torpedo tube, very claustrophobic, not that I have ever been inside a torpedo tube. I had a week or so`s nervous wait until I got an appointment, to see the consultant. I went into his office and he had my scan, on the wall, but he was smiling, a good sign, unless he didn’t like me after all. He showed me the scan and told me it was all clear. He told me that he thought I was most likely suffering from Meneires disease that had also made my Tinnitus worse. He explained Meneires to me, which sounds a lot worse than it is. This was a massive relief to me, I shook his hand and thanked him, he said I was very welcome and he wished me the best. He said I would not be seeing him again as he was immigrating to Australia, I told him how lucky he was and I left with a massive weight off my shoulders.


© Mack (RG) The thoughts of a Falklands War Veteran.