SHERI : BACKGROUND

 

Our daughter had a big heart that would get her into trouble at times. She was a good friend and confidant to many people. She tried to fulfill her dream of having a happy, loving home for herself and her children. She just looked for love in all of the wrong places, although there was one time she did come very close to that dream when she met Terry. That was the happiest I had ever seen her. They were a good couple. Very much in love and brought the best out of each other. Al and I both thought a lot of Terry. We were happy to hear that they wanted to get married. He wanted to make sure he could support Sheri and her two children plus the three children he was raising on his own. It was important for Terry to be able to further his education to provide for the large family he expected to have someday. So he went back to college. Before they were able to make any marriage plans, while driving to the college he was attending, he was killed in a head-on collision with a semi-truck. Killed instantly. As I think back on it, that was the beginning of the end for our daughter. She never really did get over his death.

 

Sheri had two children when she met and married Craig. Throughout the two-plus years of this marriage, she endured much physical and emotional pain. As I understand, Craig’s mother and father caused a lot of the emotional pain. They never accepted Sheri and kept insisting that Cameron was not Craig’s child. Sheri and Craig argued, “Since he had been married before and never had children, Cameron could not be his!” The frequent violence would start as soon as he would start talking about his family life. In Sheri’s diary, she wrote, “Oh no, God forbid, not another mother-in-law story!” Sheri told me that Craig lived in an abusive home himself. She told me that Craig’s mother was very controlling over him, his father, and his sister. Because of his feelings about his mother, this caused much anger in Craig, which in turn, I feel, caused the emotional and physical violence on Sheri. From reading her diary, it looked like this was the big problem of their marriage. She was so hurt to think that Craig and his parents would think that she would lie to her son about who his father was. After reading the entries from my daughter's diary I was very saddened to see that she had endured so much pain from this family. My heart cries every time that I read it. I wish she had confided in me earlier.

 

June 2003

 

Sheri called me from Germany. This is where Craig was stationed with the U.S. Army. She told me she decided to leave Craig; she could not endure his abuse any longer. She was afraid for herself and the children. In the three to four months that she was in Germany, Craig was arrested three times. He was ordered to stay away from Sheri and the children. He was also ordered to have anger-management counseling, alcohol-abuse counseling and marriage counseling. He refused to participate in any of the counseling that was ordered. Sheri gave up any hope of Craig changing. Sheri and the children arrived in town late June of 2003. She seemed happy, yet scared! She settled into her own apartment. It was a small two-bedroom apartment. That was all I could find for her at that time.

 

I did not know at the time that the apartment complex I found was full of domestic violence. Sheri had to move to another apartment in the complex because of the violence in the apartment above her. She and Cameron could not sleep many nights because of the arguing by the couple above her. Sheri told me that she was afraid the boyfriend was going to push the woman down the stairs and kill her. Sheri ended up calling the police department and reported the incident. She said that the police officers came about thirty minutes later and just got out of their car and yelled up at the man to settle down or leave the apartment! That was it! Sheri was so upset. The officers did not take the time to go into the apartment and investigate. They never checked on the woman or her children! Sheri was so upset; she finally asked the manager of the apartment complex to move her to a different apartment building. She did not want to hear all of the arguing; she and Cameron needed a quiet neighbor so they could sleep at night.

 

During the eleven months of her separation from Craig, he constantly called her, sent her flowers, and of course, promised to change! During this separation, Sheri was using alcohol as a crutch and realized that alcohol was getting the best of her. She started attending AA. Craig continued to call her, telling her that he would do anything to get her back. He wanted to move her to Billings, Montana, to start a new life. He of course did not want to have her living near her family. One truth about domestic violence is that it is all about control . He even finally admitted to Sheri that he had a problem with alcohol and that he knew this was one thing that caused him to become violent. He promised her that he would go to AA with her. He would change, all would be great, they would be the wonderful family that Sheri had always prayed for. Craig was good like most abusers are; he told her everything she wanted to hear. Sheri made the fatal mistake of believing him again. This time, the trust cost her to lose her life.

 

Meeting Craig

 

We first met Craig after they had already been married for about five months. Sheri was pregnant with Cameron. They really hadn’t known each other for very long. I believe that they were married in January of 2002 in the courthouse in Kansas.

 

The first thing that I noticed was he would not look at us when he spoke. He had dark hair and the army haircut. He had a mustache. Not that tall, maybe five foot seven, around one seventy pounds.

 

His eyes were deep set and dark, almost scary! His glasses seemed to ride on the end of his nose. He did not speak to us very much during their visit, but when he did, he would keep his head down and look up through the top of his glasses. It is strange how I don’t remember much about our first meeting, just these the small things. Maybe it is because it bothered me at the time. I have always felt that when a person is talking to you and cannot look you in the eyes, he or she is either very shy, lacks self-confidence, or just someone you can’t trust. I tried to say it was lack of self-confidence for Sheri’s sake. I tried to give him the benefit of being shy due to meeting his new wife’s parents. After all, this person is now our daughter’s husband and the father of her unborn child. All I could do was try to accept him, but I did not have any good feelings about him. I really cannot explain why. Maybe it was just a mother’s intuition.

 

Back to top