The Vow: The True Events That Inspired the Movie (18 page)

Lying in bed late one night with Krickitt asleep beside me, I came face-to-face once again with the fact that only God could heal our marriage. At that point Krickitt and I could hardly be in the same room together without fighting. And I knew the problem didn’t all lie at Krickitt’s feet. I needed help. God was going to have to break me down in order to build me back up into the husband I needed to be for her, and I finally realized that someone else was going to have to help me do it. Staring at the ceiling, hearing and feeling Krickitt’s steady breathing beside me, I rolled these and other thoughts around in my head.
God, what are you doing with my life? What are you doing with my vow?

I had stood before God and a church full of people and promised to provide for and protect Krisxan Pappas “through times of challenge and need.” I vowed to devote myself to her “every need and desire.” I declared I would be faithful. I had said those words with such joy and conviction. I had meant them then, and I would honor them now. I just didn’t know how.

But I knew somebody would know how, so I finally took Rob’s advice and called the state psychiatric hospital to make an appointment. It felt weird to think of going to a counselor by myself after having been to so many sessions with Krickitt. But I really had no choice. I had been sure I could hold myself together, help Krickitt recover, and get us back on track. I had worked at it for more than a year, and I had not succeeded. I had failed my wife, and it was devastating.

I went to my first appointment with counselor Mike Hill, whose wisdom and insight would soon have an incredible impact on me. He was not your typical therapist. He wasn’t stuffy or closed off. What you saw was what you got. He was friendly, open, and absolutely fearless.

I told Mike our whole story, ending with my decision that, while I would never divorce Krickitt, it would be difficult to live together happily, and my best shot might be getting her to the point where she could be self-sufficient and live on her own.

He thought for a minute before asking, “Why do you think Krickitt married you in the first place?”

“Because I’m funny, charming, clever, and handsome,” I joked. Mike smiled and didn’t respond. He waited patiently for my real answer.

“I guess it’s because of the way I treated her,” I finally replied. “I was interested in her as a person, not just as a woman I might have a relationship with, and I think she liked that. We were soul mates before we fell in love. There’s been a strong spiritual side to our relationship from the beginning. Krickitt has an awesome faith in Christ. In fact, the weekend we met we spent one whole evening reading the book of Job together.”

“How do you treat her now?”

“Like a father. Like a coach.”

“So she feels like she’s married to her father?”

It was my turn to smile. “You got me, Mike. I don’t know how she feels. I know she’s willing to accept that we’re married because everybody keeps telling her we are. And I honestly think she wants to love me as her husband. But deep down, I’m not really sure she knows who I am.”

After I had a few sessions with Mike and he had some time to understand our situation, he thought it would be a good idea for Krickitt to come with me to one of the sessions. She agreed, and her talk with Mike turned out to be an answer to prayer, the miraculous event we needed to start getting our lives back in sync.

So Krickitt came to my therapy session. She and Mike talked awhile, and then Mike said, “You know, Krickitt, I don’t think you have any memory of meeting, dating, and marrying Kim.” Incredible as it seems now, no one had ever said those simple words to her.

Krickitt’s face lit up after Mike’s revelation. “That’s it!” she said excitedly. “That’s it! No wonder this has been so weird.”

We all understood Krickitt had lost her memory. Her family, friends, and I all knew she didn’t remember meeting, dating, or marrying me. What we hadn’t realized was that, in spite of countless conversations throughout her rehab, Krickitt didn’t truly understand what had happened to her. People had told her over and over that she was married to me, that she really was the woman in our wedding videos, and that she had picked out the china in the cupboard. But nobody had ever explained it as concisely and neatly as Mike did that day in his office.

Krickitt knew her memory had been erased, but she had been in great turmoil because she thought she should know me, but she didn’t. What she finally realized was that it was all right not to know me or recognize our china. It didn’t mean she was crazy. She wasn’t in a dream. She simply couldn’t remember our life together because she had amnesia. With that in mind, she wasn’t
supposed
to know me. It was impossible. It was not her fault that she couldn’t remember any of it.

Does this seem extremely confusing? Imagine what it must have been like for Krickitt.

So Mike came up with a plan. We had already determined that our roles were mixed up. We were living as coach/athlete or parent/child, not as husband and wife. In essence, I had all the control and I expected her to follow my orders. There was little of the give-and-take that should characterize a healthy marriage. So Mike helped us see that we needed to re-establish the equality in our marriage that had been swept away by the events of the previous year and a half. We also had to rebuild a shared history.

“You and Krickitt need a fresh start,” Mike explained. “Krickitt doesn’t have any stockpile of shared memories with you. Shared memories leave a trail of emotional attachment that she could trace back to the time you met, reliving all the events, emotions, and growth that lead up to a happy marriage. It’s an emotional journey she doesn’t remember taking, so it’s no wonder she looks around and thinks,
How in the world did I get here?

“A new set of memories that she can remember will build new emotional ties between you. I think the old Krickitt is gone. It’s time you got to know the new Krickitt. And it’s time for her to get to know you.”

“So what do we do now?” I asked.

“How did you get to know the old Krickitt?” he came back.

“We went out on dates. We went to ball games, the movies, had dinner with friends . . .”

“Then get to know the new Krickitt the same way.”

“Start dating my own wife?” I wondered aloud.

“It’s a way to replace the memories Krickitt has lost,” he said. “To her, you don’t have a past together, nothing to build a marriage relationship on. It’s a second chance to get to know her.”

I was excited about the prospect of a second chance with Krickitt. For me, it was a second chance in two ways. First, I got another chance to make things work after the accident. I hadn’t done too well with my first opportunity. And second, I had another chance to simply get to know this amazing woman. I had enjoyed doing it the first time, and I was hoping to enjoy it just as much the second time.

So I took Mike’s advice and started dating my wife. Las Vegas, New Mexico, isn’t nearly as exciting as the more famous town with the same name, but I promised Krickitt that every week we would have date night. The point wasn’t to do something exciting, it was to do something together. We ate pizza. We went bowling. We went to ball games. We went to Walmart, where we would let an employee pick out a bag of candy and we would share it with them in the store; when we left, Krickitt would pay for the empty bag. Krickitt appreciated the break in routine, and I liked it too. And we actually got along pretty well on our little excursions. It seemed to be working out pretty well.

However, we did have our moments, and those moments often happened as we were playing golf. The first time we played, we didn’t make it through the second hole before Krickitt stomped off in one direction and I drove off in the golf cart in another. We were back in the world of sports, and guess what happened? The coach and father in me had come back out. Needless to say, Krickitt wasn’t happy.

When we came back together, Krickitt let me have it. She was tired of me not accepting who she was now. “I’m sorry,” I said. “But if you’d quit being such a whiner, you’d do a lot better, and all these people wouldn’t be staring at us.” That wasn’t the response she was looking for. With a withering glance, she stalked off to the parking lot.

As tough as that first golf outing was, we both decided to give it another try. It was a good testing ground for our new relationship. We were forced to figure out how to get along if we wanted to play. The second experience was pretty much a repeat of our first game. Still we tried it again, forging ahead bravely for two or three holes before one or both of us would lose our tempers. After a few tries we could make it all the way through the fourth hole before the shouting began.

Every couple has highs and lows in the dating game and we were no different. Everyone has issues to work through; it just happened that we had to go through it all twice, and the second time was much harder. The general trend during that time, though, was definitely positive. Our dates gave us something to talk about other the accident and its consequences. Since we had more in common now, we relaxed more. We laughed more. We kissed more. The momentum had definitely, miraculously, shifted from a downward spiral to an upward climb.

Krickitt, Mike, and I met regularly to talk about our progress. Mike’s plan seemed to be working. Krickitt and I were building a shared past as a foundation for a new future, and our day-to-day relationship was clearly improving, though we still fought way too much. I finally hoped the worst was behind us and could imagine us staying together after all, something that had seemed impossible only a few months before.

Mike’s plan didn’t end with us dating each other again. He wanted us to have a rededication ceremony. My immediate reaction to the idea of a “second wedding” was that it was out of the question.

I didn’t like Mike’s suggestion for several reasons. First of all, we were already married. Would a rededication service send a message to others that we thought our first round of dedication had worn out or dried up? I actually saw it as the opposite. It was because of that first dedication—those first vows—that we were still together today. Second, I didn’t see any point in going to so much trouble for a purely symbolic gesture. Third, it was yet another big expense at a time when our finances were in shambles.

Krickitt, however, latched onto the idea as soon as Mike suggested it. She explained her point of view to Mike and me. “I’ve gotten to know my lifetime buddy again,” she said, echoing my words when I proposed to her in California, which seemed like a million years ago. “We’ve had so much fun. How can you not care deeply for somebody who has stood by you like Kimmer has stood by me? I want to remember giving my hand to him in marriage. Another ceremony will give me the memories every wife should have.”