I had the shock of my life today...I went on a FB search for my former step-son and found out his father, the man I once thought I would spend the rest of my life with, passed away over a year ago...close to two years ago, actually.
February 14, 2019 he passed away. I have no idea what he died from, but after spending most of his life living hard I wouldn't be surprised if it was cirrhosis from heavy, long-term drinking. It could have been an OD - I left him because he'd started getting into hard drugs, something he'd helped me get clean from over a year before we'd bought a house together, before we had even coupled up.
I'd known him for a LOT of years, and he was one of the few men I trusted as I was growing up. He was a family friend first, and eventually dated and lived with a shirt-tail cousin of mine. They broke up but he still kept coming around to visit us, and eventually he and I ended up together.
It wasn't the easiest relationship, but it was the one where I learned the most about myself. It was also the relationship that helped me move out of my parents' house for the final time. Even when I left him I did not move back in with my parents - I got a small apartment for my kid and I as the thought of moving back in with my parents was not even on the table.
I knew that he drank. He drank a lot. He had been an alcoholic for a lot of years, and had gotten cleaned up at one point while he was still with my cousin. He started drinking again when she kicked him out. Looking back, him starting to drink again was no surprise because that was how he coped with things when it all went to shit. And then he couldn't stop, regardless, no matter how much I begged him to stop.
And then, after we got the house together, he continued drinking. He had told me that he drank to be able to ignore my mother - we were living in the basement suite of my parents' house at that time, and my mother was her usually needy, manipulative self, who made things tough on all of us. I stupidly figured that he'd stop drinking once we moved away from my mother.
Obviously, the drinking didn't stop and he added drug use to the mix. Sure, it started out with pot, but then he moved up to harder stuff. It was too the point where if he wasn't working, he was drunk and fried on the couch in our living room. And there was no way I could trust him to look after my kid, or pretty much anything else.
One of the final straws was when he drove my car into a ditch and lied about how he did it. He completely missed a turn on the way to our house, and I suspect that it was because he passed out behind the wheel. I called a tow truck to get the car out, and when got to where my car was I could tell that he hadn't even tried to turn, hence my suspicion.
I realized that I simply couldn't do it anymore - he was drunk and/or strung pretty much all of the time, and I knew that was not a healthy environment to raise a kid in. So I set plans in motion to move my kid and I out of there. I had originally planned to do it during one of his long day shifts, but I wasn't able to keep it secret from him so he ended up calling out of work sick and spent the entire time drunk on the couch, calling me everything but a decent human being.
I had hoped that maybe me moving out would cause him to get his head back on straight, but if anything he just got worse. Within six months of me moving out he started accusing me of stealing money from him, money that he had been putting into a large pickle jar, money that I wouldn't dream of touching - it was actually his son stealing from it, but my ex refused to hear it. He also threatened to steal my car, saying that he paid for it therefore it was actually his - I spoke to a lawyer about this and was told that it doesn't matter who paid for the car, that it mattered whose name it was registered under, and it certainly wasn't his.
He found out where I lived, and started leaving threatening messages on my voice mail. And that caused me to break my lease and move the hell out of that city entirely. I basically had to move to an area of a different city that wasn't on any of the main roads where he'd be able to find my new place. He still tried to threaten me, but that didn't work very well for him.
And about a year later I found out that he'd gotten fired from the job he'd held for over twenty years. Why? For major theft - computer equipment and lighting rigs, of all things. And showing up to work so drunk he could barely stand. His employer had even offered to pay for rehab instead of firing him, telling him that his job was still there if he went to rehab. But he told them to fuck off, blamed me for him being drunk all the time, that if I hadn't left him he wouldn't be in the shape he was in. Meanwhile, I know that him getting that bad had nothing to do with me leaving - it was the way he was headed even before I left.
A few years later I moved back to that city. I hadn't heard much out of him or his family, and I figured it we'd been apart long enough that he'd leave me alone. I don't think he even knew I'd moved back into the city for quite some time. I knew by then that he'd lost the house and pretty much everything he'd held dear, including the truck he'd been rebuilding, with nobody to blame but himself, regardless of his attempts to blame me.
A week or so after I'd bought myself an '86 Ford Ranger 4x4 truck I was sitting at a stoplight waiting to go, and when I looked over I saw my ex standing at the corner, staring at me. It was a bit unnerving, and I'm sure he realized that it was me driving the truck. I had half-way expected him to come over to the truck to try to talk to me, but the light turned green before he could even take a step. I'd seen him a few times after that as well, but he only ever stared at me as I pulled up to the lights. I just couldn't bring myself to speak to him either because by that point I no longer trusted him.
There had been only one incident of violence in our relationship, but that is all it took for me to lose all trust in him. He was incredibly drunk and decided he wanted to take my car without my permission, and when I tried to stop him he punched me in the face and took off. I reported my car as being stolen by my drunk boyfriend, he showed back up at home and I went to go get my car as he passed out. By that time I had one hell of a black eye, and no amount of makeup was going to cover that up so I went to work the next day with said black eye. If a coworker asked about it, I changed the subject.
And now I find out he's been gone for close to two years. Maybe somebody had messaged me about it way back then but I've forgotten. I hope that wherever he is now that his demons didn't follow him and he can finally be at peace. I never hated him, even when all was said and done. I just hated what he was turning into, I hated the constant drinking and I hated the drugs. I knew what sort of man he was without all of that going on in his life, and the man I knew and trusted would have been a good role model for my kid. Not whatever it was that he was transformed into.
RIP Percy. I wish I'd known sooner that you were gone, but it's also been at least twenty years since we were together so I wouldn't have expected to be told anything at the time.
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