Checking in

There hasn't been a tremendous amount of change in the situation. Thanks to our attorney's fight using the grievance and reminding DPS of not legally being allowed to use the first Fitness for Duty exam, done by the accusatory and downright lying CD, DPS allowed a repeat exam. We waited for it to be scheduled, glad that the 3rd one would be majority rules, since the 2nd one--done over multiple visits each a few hours long, as opposed to CD's 2 hour visit having never met him before--was passed with flying colors. Imagine the shock when the letter arrived saying DH was to travel back to Phoenix because he had to see CD again! First of all, because of the fuss we raised, CD lost her contract with DPS. So how did she get back on so quickly? Hmm, hired gun, methinks? It turns out it's actually written in the General Orders that if someone needs a repeat eval, it must be done by the same person, so we were screwed and SOL.

I can't even get into the BS she pulled, and I traveled with DH to Phoenix to keep him company, but I'll just say this woman must have cajones somewhere. To give a hint of what she is capable of, during this repeat eval, they discussed things such as DH's hearing, which is better than normal; that isn't any different than someone having better than 20/20 eyesight, such as my brother's 20/15 vision. Some have lousy hearing and wear an aid, and some have better hearing. Well, when we were first together I didn't think DH was listening to me and I had him get a hearing test, though he thought he was fine because ever since he was a kid he just had to focus in on one certain thing to pay attention to. He was right. He has astounding hearing, it going far below normal. It was explained that he hears so much more than usual, that likely what he trained himself to do growing up in order to hear his teachers and such was to tune everything else out and only hear the thing at hand, the rest be damned. So, if I (or whatever) am not what he was already focusing on, he won't hear me until I break his focus and redirect his attention. When I found this out it all made sense. I've actually had students with this when I was a middle school teacher before I got sick; one 7th grader of mine had such amazing hearing he had to have a 504 Plan (a type of Special Education plan that provides federal protection and funding for services) because he could not use a pen or pencil. The sound, especially of a pencil, making contact with paper caused his ears excruciating pain due to how well he could hear. (His 504 Plan provided the funding for us to give him an AlphaSmart, a portable word processor he did all of his work on at his desk for all of his classes.)

However, CD spent the whole repeat Fitness for Duty Eval appointment taking information such as that, and twisting it around. DH's good hearing was turned into "Officer * has been having auditory hallucinations since childhood," because she had never heard of anyone having good hearing before. No kidding.

Another CD twist was how if officers see suspicious movements in a vehicle they are approaching during a traffic stop, they can put their hand on their holster in case they end up needing to draw it. CD reported that he approaches cars with his gun DRAWN on people, as in out of holster and pointed directly at people.

Then she asked, "Have you and your wife spoken any more about how she confided in me over the phone a year ago during your first evaluation, about how she told you to hide your symptoms from your doctors?" He immediately knew she was full of it, because a year ago when they took a break during his original eval so she could go into another room to call me, that was when I tried getting her to understand my memory problems because at that point I'd had, let's see, 18 surgeries, mostly brain and spine, and I didn't want my short-term memory loss to effect her report so to make sure any specific information such as dates would need to be verified. I thought I was doing the right thing by disclosing that. As someone who practically lives at doctor offices, I know better than hide things from medical people who are there to help me. So, first of all, why would I ever tell someone to hide their symptoms from a doctor? What seems like a minor symptom could end up solving a medical mystery, so I would never advise somebody to do that. Anyone who knows me would know better than that, especially since I do advocacy! Second, even if I DID do something that stupid (in my wildest dreams), I certainly wouldn't share it with a doctor, since apparently that's the one I'm telling people to hide from! And most of all, and I do mean most of all, I wouldn't go blabbing deep stuff like that with a CD, the one whom I'm supposedly telling DH to hide his symptoms from! Hello, common sense! DH knew she was full of it, and said, "Um...I don't know what you're talking about because we've never talked about anything of the sort. But you know, she's in the waiting room if you want to bring her in and ask her?" CD apparently changed her mind real fast when she found out I was there, unlike a year prior, "Oh she is??? Ohwellwedon'tnonevermind, wedon'tneedtotalktoher." LMBO!

So, a few days ago, DH's local dr got a letter from CD, sharing all that made up BS. He gave us copies of it because he thought the whole thing was ridiculous. I don't think there is a way to avoid keeping out of court. How we will stay afloat, I'm not sure, but we've trusted in God thus far and he's kept a roof over our heads and food on the table. We definitely have had to walk by faith and hand the whole thing over to God, because there's nothing we can do on our own. There is still a long road ahead of us.