SUCH A WONDERFUL MOTHER-IN-LAW
When I got married to the daughter of Dan and Louise Shaw of Springfield, OR on September 9, 1989, I FULLY realized I was in LOVE with their daughter Karen and she was in love with me. Karen and I had been dating for 10 months and it was so beautiful and incredibly happy and both of us knew we were in love, deeply I might add. I got to the place; I could not imagine life without her. Right before we got married trouble surfaced with both of our crazy ex-spouses but did not think anything of it. We thought it would just fade away! It ONLY got worse and worse over time! Our Naval wedding was overall great and 650 of our friends and families came. I later learned none of my siblings were ANT [NO] GOOD and also very destructive. Thus, I made a "major mistake" inviting my family. I did not grow up with these family members and knew little about them. Unfortunately, my loving In-Laws got their first taste of my screwball nutty family, all of whom have/had NO social skills. By 1993, I realized I had to get rid of my family members and our screwball ex-spouses if I wanted to keep my loving marriage. Since Karen and I were both Naval Officers we were held hostage to a broken liberally charged legal system. To make a long story short, Louise ALWAYS knew Karen and I were in love and deep down she wanted us to be together. Louise knew our LOVE was genuine and REAL! In early January 2005, about 9 weeks before Louise died of cancer, I went to go visit Dan and Louise in Springfield, OR. We talked for two hours and Dan was not supportive of me being there and he told me that my family behavior was horrible. I agreed! He gave me some more specifics of my family behavior, I did not know of. I sincerely apologized for their crazy behaviors. I stated I had nothing to do with their crazy adverse behaviors and then thanked them for allowing me to come and politely left. Louise followed me outside and as I was walking to my car, all of a sudden she said, "Jim, My Daughter still loves you" and I said, "Louise, I am still very much in LOVE with Karen". She also thanked me for acting responsible and timely in the saving of her Grandson Brice, who was dying of advanced anorexia/Bulimia. It turns out they acted timely and decisively in early March of 1995 to save his life. I said "thank you, I'm extremely glad it worked out that way". The last thing Louise said to me was; "I have to follow my husband's lead, and you NO longer have any favor with him". I said, "I understand". I got in my car and left. 5 weeks later on February 14, 2005, I was on the Oregon coast on Hwy 101 near Brookings, OR, coming back from visiting a friend, and also 'wanting to relive the most romantic 4 days with Karen of my entire life in July 1989', which was on the Oregon coast. I never forgot it! At 4:30PM I was in stopped traffic; workman came by and said it would be over 30 mins, so turned off my car, looked out over the ocean listening to classic Rock N' Roll. At 4:57PM, there was this very strange positive energy and it kept growing stronger and stronger and at precisely 5PM, this voice told me to turn 90 degrees left and look up. There was Karen, sitting in Northbound traffic and we stared at each other for 30 seconds. I just smiled and she forced a smile. What was the odd of that happening when it did????? Then traffic moved both ways. It was exactly 10 years to the day, hour and minute when Karen frantically called me for help with Brice who had a cardiac arrest due to advanced anorexia/bulimia and nearly died. The next day, on 2/16/95 I called Naval Hospital Bremerton and inquired about Brice. He was not out of the woods yet and started to do some more research and gain more knowledge. I told Karen I was coming home on Friday. When I got to our house in Silverdale, WA, at high noon on Friday; it was a shambles, with dried vomit all over the place, dirty laundry, dirty dishes, etc. I started cleaning the house with laundry first, then dishes next, and scrubbed about 35 dried vomit spots and vacuumed. I finished just a few minutes before 5PM when Karen came home. She was NOT acting rationally nor responsibly and she had gone down and "filed false charges of DV" against me and got a temporary restraining order. Unable to reason with her, I left very politely left without incident. I had told Dan and Louise about this in JAN 2005, and Dan stated emphatically; "Mental illness does not exist in my family". ONLY Louise did the right thing for me! I acted responsibly out of LOVE and sure suffered greatly for it. To this day, I miss Louise greatly. I learned in 2009, Louise had died in mid-March 2005. That made me very SAD! Dan and Louise and Karen shall ALWAYS live in my heart. They were SPECIAL.