My hands were shaking uncontrollably from my new Parkinson’s diagnosis when my husband pinned me against the kitchen island, choking me until my vision blurred. “Sign the damn power of attorney, you shaking vegetable,” he roared, smashing my head against the granite while his sister sat there drinking my expensive wine and recording it on her phone. I tasted blood, but I weakly picked up the pen and signed the paper, letting him snatch it away in triumph. He didn’t realize the quiet “notary public” sitting in the corner wasn’t from the bank—she was a senior undercover investigator from the Department of Justice. The cuffs were on his wrists before the ink even dried.
My husband tried to steal my life while my hands were too weak to hold a coffee cup.He forgot I had built that life with sharper tools than my fingers. The tremor started in my right hand three weeks after my Parkinson’s diagnosis. At first, it was almost delicate, a tiny flutter when I buttoned…