Divorced Moms Marriage Hell Part 7:

From Divorced Moms.

Series Part 7 Marriage Hell: How Can a Grown Man Scream Like That?
By Lizzy Smith                    

June 16, 2014

How the heck did I end up married to a man I didn’t love and then allow him to abuse me? Good question. I write my story in an effort to try to understand it myself. Welcome to the series, “Marriage Hell.”

Rob and I returned from our honeymoon in Russia. It had turned out to be a fantastic trip. I was filled with hope that maybe the marriage wasn't a huge mistake and it would all work out. But that feeling was short-lived when I confronted my new reality. Here I was, in a new neighborhood, in a house too big, with too much work and unpacking that needed to be done. And yet I was the only one doing any of it. I was getting zero help from Rob and right away, I started resenting it. I was spending night after night staying up far too late trying to paint, unpack, clean, pay bills, and ignore the screaming matches between Rob and his 16 year old daughter, Nicky. It wasn’t fun. By early November, just three months after our wedding, Mean Rob showed up for the first time. Prior to then, Rob had always been happy and upbeat. He had not once been mean or disrespectful and raised his voice to me. But this time was different.

The fight started out over nothing. I had begged Rob to help me clear out the garage for weeks but he had never gotten around to it. When Rob left the house on a Saturday for a few hours, I started organizing. When Rob pulled up to the house and saw what I was doing, he exploded. “I just want to have a quiet day! I didn’t want to work on this and you are making me feel guilty!”

I was trying to be upbeat and funny. “I thought you’d be happy. I wanted this to be a surprise. Look, I can walk from one end of the garage to the other – whoohoo!” I demonstrated it for him by walking from one end to the other and doing a little happy dance at the end.

Rob wasn’t impressed. He started screaming in this horrific pitch that I have never heard a grown man do—and in the front yard. I was horrified and embarrassed. “Rob, the neighbors,” I said. He responded by screaming louder in this booming, explosive voice: “I don’t care about the fucking neighbors!” I looked at him closely. His eyes were glassy, his hands fidgety, and his scream a high falsetto/mezzo soprano wail. If I only had recorded it because there is no way to adequately describe it. I literally stood transfixed his behavior. I didn't know if I should laugh, run, or cry. I went silent and stopped talking to him the rest of the day while he tried to apologize. I just wanted him to get away from me.

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