Meet Marla: Like A Phoenix She Will Rise!

*Note From Owner* - As of today 7/17/18 Marla is in Cardiac ICU and she could use our prayers. Thank you to the Beautiful Disaster Tribe! xoxo

Nobody should ever have to look in the mirror and feel "less than".

I was a divorced single mom running away from abuse and straight into the arms of my knight in shining armor.... Little did I realize that I was jumping from the Skillet right into a bigger fire. I married my Knight after knowing him for 11 months. I stood behind him and helped him raise his children. We had different parenting styles he was wanting to be their best buddy so that they would like him and I was more structured. When he wanted to know where I was and who I was with and what I was doing  it was only because he was concerned about my welfare. As the years passed I saw him through several surgeries and health issues and nursed him back to health. I was a firefighter and advanced EMT for many years both professionally and volunteer. His drinking and anger issues only worsened with each year until 2014 when he finally went over the edge.

I left for one night and came back only because of promises to seek psychiatric help to quit drinking and be medication compliant. This was also about the same time that my health started to decline although at the time we had no idea what it was I was subsequently diagnosed with PTSD and fibromyalgia. I was on intermittent FMLA (medical leave) from my job and was able to take off 12 weeks a year as needed plus I used 6 weeks of disability. This was the time in our lives that should have been amazing. All of the children had grown and were all on their own and I had the idea that I wanted to buy a Harley Davidson motorcycle. I had wridden years ago before I had children and wanted to ride again. My husband agreed and we bought the bike and then the next thing I know he's wanting to join a motorcycle club. My health took a major turn in January of 2016 of which I was diagnosed with heart disease and lung disease. I had to resign from my job in April of 2016. My husband at this point was not being supportive at all however mid-april of 2016 I received a phone call at 5:30 in the morning from him saying that he crashed not far from our home and that it was very bad. I called dispatch to have a squad sent and route to the scene and I drove there in my own vehicle. I was the first one to reach him and the scene was horrific.  The bike was half the size of what it should have been and I saw him laying down in a ditch not moving. My professional instincts kicked in and I immediately began care. 

The squad was soon there we loaded him into it and started working on him waiting for Life Flight to land. Both lungs collapsed and we had to innovate him and breathe for him and decompress the chest, I ventilated him all the way to a Trauma Center in Life Flight and I never left the hospital until the day he came home even though I was very ill.

It was all downhill from there.

He would disappear for a weekend and say that he was going on Club business he was talking to other women on his cell phone and hiding it and leaving me alone when I was in the hospital in CCU which was about once per month for 3 or 4 days he berated me he told me I was worthless even my Dr. soon caught on to his antics. He would ignore me and tell people that I was crazy and not sick at all. He physically, emotionally, financially and sexually abused me to the point I rarely left my bedroom. The final straw was on our 13th wedding anniversary I was in Cleveland Clinic CCU and he brought a gun to the hospital and left it. I found it after he left. That is when I knew I could never go back. I got a temporary protection order and left with literally a few baskets of my personal items. My health will never go back to what it was but I am fighting every single day to get back what I can.

Like the Phoenix I will rise.

The pictures that I have enclosed shows you what abuse can do to you. Your slogan what doesn't kill you makes you stronger is 100% true.