About 15 years ago, my husband was out of town, me and my son were alone, as it is usually the case, at home. We live in a neighborhood where hone are detached but very close to each other. I remember once when our fire alarm was beeping, three of our neighbors came running to to help us.

That particular night, at around 3 or 4 am, I heard a very loud alarm sound. It was so loud, it felt like it was in my bedroom. I got out of bed and ran downstairs and realized it was coming from our garage. One of our cars’ alarm was so loud, it probably woke up the whole neighborhood. I rushed to the garage, when I opened the door I could not tell which car was the one with the alarm off. I rushed trying to turn any of them off, I started with opening the doors, no change, I then went and got the key to my car and put in the door, again, no change. I looked for the keys of my husband’s car but couldn’t find it. I then went to my car again frantically and put the key in the ignition and the alarm turned off. OMG what an ordeal. I sat by the garage door for few minutes trying to recover from the shock. I was so embarrassed knowing that most of our neighbors woke up because of my car, and was shocked because it did happen and I had no idea why.

The next morning, I was still rattled, I called my husband before I took our son to school to tell him what happened. He was quiet when I was telling him the intimate details, and then when I started telling him how confused I was not knowing which car the alarm was from, he just said “It’s not my car, I unplugged the battery of my car”. That, there, effected me more that day than the whole ordeal I went through the night before.

My husband obviously does not want me to drive his car while he’s out of town. We’ve been married at that time about 17 years and I only drove his car once and it was for a specific reason; his car is an SUV, I was taking my friends to the airport and could not fit their luggage in my car. I have never needed his car, not did I ever wanted to drive his car. I always felt like I am stealing something if I ever thought about driving his car, which is why I never drove it. But to unplug the battery and not tell me about it at all made me very unhappy. I could not get angry because that never achieves anything with my husband. If I get angry, he’ll immediately raises his voice at me and won’t let me talk. I get shut down and all the anger and frustrations stay inside.

He did not want me to drive his car while he knew I did not drive it but did not want to take the slightest chance of me driving his car while he’s out of town. He didn’t have a problem whatsoever using my car, but he locks his car and won’t let me use it. He yelled and screamed at one once because I used the words “My Car”. He told me there is no such thing as “My” in this family, everything is “Our”. That rule, just as every other rule, applies to everyone else in the world except him.