Part 5: My Wife Tried To Kill Me

I’ve sat processing for quite some time, this part feels harder to write than the previous posts. Even now, sitting down, feeling ready to let my fingers flow as the letters on the page reveal what I want to say, forming the next part of my story….all I can do is tear up and shake my head, slowly gazing toward the floor as salt streams out of my eyes, down my cheeks and meet the floor where my eyes have locked. My hands tremble as they return to the keyboard. How the fuck did I get here? How is this my reality? My mind swirling with the same gut wrenching thought over and over….

My wife tried to kill me.

My wife tried to kill me.

My WIFE tried to FUCKING KILL ME.

I sprinted quickly to the front door, ensuring the bolt was secured into place. My sister ran to the garage door to do the same. We both stood for a second, perplexed, as Danielle did not present herself at either of them. I started to walk across my home toward my sister, I KNEW we had heard the sound, but where was my wife? I made it to the kitchen table when all of a sudden the cover to the dog door went flying off its hinges. The cracked plastic covering now lying broken on my floor. Within the blink of an eye there was a person crawling through the space, creating a gaping hole into my home. A mimicking hollowness forming in my gut. My sense of security instantly crumbling…my home no longer offering the sense of safety it had just minutes before. The four walls surrounding me were no longer stable, someone could in fact get it. The mere thought violating every piece of me. Did Danielle know she would be able to fit through the dog door? Had she planned this to bypass my alarm system, which she was acutely aware of the dog door not being connected to? Did my wife actually fucking plan this?

There was quite literally no time to process these inundating thoughts, I have never seen a human contort itself through such a small space in such a short amount of time. The memory still haunts me today. Straight out of a nightmare, except it was not a dream. Another blink and Danielle was standing, lunging straight toward me. I unfortunately was positioned only a few feet away from where she had just broken into my home. One long stride and her face was now within inches of mine. Her arms had been outstretched. Her hands finding their way to my neck, wrapping around my throat. Air constricting, I stood there frozen in horrifying disbelief. I had been safe seconds before, now I was not. My concussed brain trying to remember the strategies…fight, flight, freeze – but I had already tried them all that night, not long ago in the hotel room. I had tried every way I knew how to survive and each had failed me. In that moment, my body didn’t try anything. My wife’s fingers were gripping harder against my throat. I couldn’t do this again. I wouldn’t have to play dead this time, I was sure she was going to kill me.

My sister suddenly stepped in...thank fucking god my sister was still there!!! I wasn't alone. Somehow beneath the grip of my wife's hands, I had forgotten someone else was in my home. Stefani saved my life for the second time that night, as she grabbed Danielle and pulled her off of me, throwing her to the floor. I blinked again and I was sitting on the couch in my living room, curled into the tiniest ball of a human I could manage, willing myself to disappear or wake up from this nightmare. My sister was standing in front of me. I took a breath. I wasn’t safely out of my abuser’s presence anymore, but I did know she’d have to kill my sister if she planned on getting her hands back around my throat.

Danielle’s eyes were wild, violent, murderous. I have seen many forms of my wife before, but I had never seen her like this. She was flailing around in a way that could only be described as possessed. She was screaming profanities and saying things that didn’t make sense. My sister interrupted her demonic episode by telling her to leave my home. She had hurt me, I did not want her there and she needed to get out, now! With the sound of those words, reality I assume weighing heavy on Danielle that her plan had failed…she lost all rationale. The screaming got louder, the threats more detailed and intense. Not just toward me now, but toward my sister as well. She tried to literally leap and crawl over Stefani to get to me. In fact, days later I found the hat she had been wearing that night, tucked deeply under the Christmas tree. It had flown off of her head in her desperate attempt to get near me. Danielle wasn’t acting human, but my sister never stopped standing her ground. She never budged an inch from in front of me. She wasn’t going to let me die.

Danielle, realizing her futile attempt to lunge on top of me had failed, took to pacing the living room area in front of the kitchen table. She now stood in the same spot I had when she had attempted to strangle me just moments before. She started telling my sister that she didn’t hit me, that she would never hurt me. That I had made it up. Acting as if the mere accusation was wildly insane. Like she was trying to reason and plead my sister into leaving my side. She started claiming that actually I was the one that hit her. She told Stefani that she would show her the bruises that I had left on her body. With false confidence, she started taking off her jacket to show my sister the marks. But when it came to rolling up her sleeves for the big reveal that I was actually the abuser, she stopped. She had no markings on her body to show. She was testing the limits my sister would go in defending my safety. Attempting to implant just enough doubt that my sister would question the truth and abandoned her post. When that didn’t work, she shifted gears. Swiftly and scarily, she abandoned the façade of me hitting her completely. Within moments she had dropped to her hands and knees and started crawling toward my sister and me. Her body animal like, rabid. The words she was spewing run together in my memory of these moments. I don’t recall what she was saying or even if I was listening – what I do remember is the overwhelm of being utterly and completely consumed by fear. 

I am still not sure if my wife was inside the body that contorted itself through my dog door and was now on the ground making its way toward me. Danielle and I had our very large share of fights, conversations, disagreements, yelling, screaming and crying. I have never claimed or pretended to be innocent in our story. But I had never before looked at my wife and not known who was staring back at me. I had never been petrified by her presence, questioning whether she was going to take my life or not. My wife’s body was present, but the eyes looking back into mine were not those of the woman I married. They had turned black, consumed with darkness, demon-like. While I do not believe Danielle is a natural born killer, in that state, she was undoubtedly capable of taking a life.

End of Part 5.