I Forgot to Remember: A Memoir of Amnesia

by Su Meck

  From left: Benjamin, me, Jim, and Patrick. Hilton Head, South Carolina, summer 1990. I look completely out of it.

  With every passing day, there were new struggles, and Jim’s temper got shorter and shorter. On the drive back to Baltimore from Hilton Head, our bikes fell off the car and onto the highway. The straps holding them onto the bike rack had evidently worn down and weakened. They suddenly tore and our bikes went flying off the back of the car and bounced onto the middle of I-95. Jim let out a stream of obscenities and drove recklessly off the highway at the next exit, and then backtracked up the access road. When he got out of the car, he told the three of us to “sit there, and shut up!” He then hopped the fence and walked out onto I-95. He held up his hands to stop the traffic, picked up both bikes, carried them to the side of the road, and threw them over the fence. Our bikes were terribly bent and broken, but somehow Jim managed to attach them back onto the bike rack. For a long time afterward, he was really, really angry, so the boys and I just stayed quiet while he drove. I get a sick feeling in my stomach—it actually clenches—even now when I think back to that incident and Jim’s fury.

  The very next summer, I went with the boys to Florida to visit my sister Barb and her husband, Scott, in Gainesville. I don’t know why Jim didn’t join us. He may have come along as far as his parents’ house in Georgia, and then ended up wanting to spend time with them. During our stay, Barb, Scott, Benjamin, Patrick, and I all drove to Orlando to visit Disney World. It was probably a long, busy, hot, overstimulating day, and that night—ironically enough, during the Main Street Electrical Parade—the “lightning” went off in my head. Barb remembers me grabbing my head and saying, “I don’t feel good.” And then I checked out. She says I was just gone. I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed. I couldn’t walk. I was crying because my head hurt terribly. Barb continues, “And we were packed in with thousands of other people watching the parade.” Somehow, she found me a wheelchair and she and I headed for the car. But she soon discovered that she couldn’t take a wheelchair on the monorail—the quieter of the two options—to the parking lot. Instead, we had to go on the large ferryboat, which, Barb recalls, entertained passengers with loud music. She says I could barely talk and I was holding my head in my hands, and people kept coming up and asking if I needed any help. At the hotel the next morning, I was still a mess. Barb can remember checkout time coming and going. She describes me as being “really groggy and slow, almost in slow motion.” (There they are again—my trinity—“lightning,” “piercing headache,” and “foggy confusion.”)

  Perhaps as a result of that lightning episode, I have no memories of this vacation. In fact, when I was talking to Benjamin recently and he mentioned this trip, I was convinced that he was mistaken. I told him the only time I thought he had ever gone to Disney World was when he went with his high school choir.

  I have one final, albeit vague, recollection from our time in Baltimore. I can picture myself sitting on our yellowish easy chair next to the fireplace, crying. Then I can remember Jim forcefully loading me into the car, driving me somewhere, and leaving me there. The one clear memory I have regarding this episode is thinking, I can’t lose it anymore because Jim gets so pissed off when I do. I am going to have to try harder and do better. Did I take yet another trip to a psych ward? Am I confusing this time with the other time Jim took me to the psychiatric hospital right after we moved to Baltimore when we were staying at the Welcome Inn? I don’t know, and Jim doesn’t remember, either. But as he comments, “Just because I don’t remember, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

  11

  Ode to My Family

  —The Cranberries

  For many years, I was beyond clueless about the whole “marriage and family” concept. I never knew exactly how I was supposed to act around people in the first place, and I wasn’t sure where I fit into all the words that I heard being thrown around: mom, dad, husband, wife, spouse, son, daughter, brother, sister, son-in-law, daughter-in-law (for some reason I always thought of “in-law” as being like “in jail”), cousin, sibling; dating, engaged, married, pregnant; infant, toddler, teenager, grandma, grandpa, aunt, uncle, related by blood (. . . Ewwww! . . . Blood? . . . Really?!). The list seemed endless.

  There were way too many words in the English language to describe relationships among families. I was “Su Meck,” but Benjamin and Patrick called me “Mom” or “Mommy.” I also called the woman who lived in Houston “Mom,” but when I sent letters to her I wrote “Mom Miller” on the outside of the envelope, not “Mom Meck.” The little boys lived with me, but I didn’t live with the woman in Houston, and they called her “Grandma.” Benjamin and Patrick were called “brothers,” but I had “brothers,” too, and Rob and Mark were nothing like Benjamin and Patrick. And my brothers did not live together or with me. I had “sisters,” and I was sometimes called a “sister,” but Barb and Diane had different last names from me, too. If we were related, why did we all have different names? And where were Benjamin and Patrick’s sisters? Jim didn’t call me “Mom,” or “sister,” and most of the time he didn’t call me “Su.” Instead he called me “Subie,” or his “wife,” and showed me pictures of our “wedding.” But where were Benjamin and Patrick in those pictures? And who were all those others in the photos? (Thankfully, only about twenty people attended my wedding.) A big part of the problem was that I continued (for years) to have an incredibly literal mind. To a certain extent, I still do.

  So I just did what I always did. I sat back, listened, observed, and tried to make sense out of what people around me said and did. And then I attempted to act like everyone else and to fit in as best I could, or at least not stick out. If I was mostly quiet, and appeared happy and agreeable, then life was good. I learned to go along to get along, and nobody questioned my behavior. In fact, quite the opposite. Everyone who knew me from before, my family especially, kept telling me how much “nicer,” “quieter,” “more content,” “more pleasant,” “calmer,” and “more good-natured” I was now. My dad loved to say, jokingly (I think), “We should’ve hit her over the head with a two-by-four a long time ago!” All of those positive reactions were a good thing, right? I can remember that when I was around, friends and family seemed to smile and laugh a lot. Not that I understood why they did. Or why “quiet and content” was such a good thing. But smiles and laughter are good, right?

  But then I would often get even more confused because, depending on those in attendance, “nice, pleasant, and calm” did not always equal “right” or “correct.” There seemed at times to be different rules with Jim at home as opposed to at church, for instance. I tended to agree with nearly all of Jim’s opinions, ideas, and decisions, mostly because I didn’t understand what he was talking about the majority of the time and agreeing with him just made life easier. I would literally nod and smile, just like some sort of creepy Stepford wife. And more often than not, he was pleased. But occasionally, he would become infuriated with me for not arguing with him! Why? Why on earth would someone want to yell and argue? He would call me “a doormat,” “a scared rabbit,” “stupid,” and “totally ignorant.” And I suppose it was true. (I still am about a lot of things.) But that was because I didn’t understand why he wanted me to disagree with him. Wasn’t he the one who was supposed to know what was best? He would shout that he wanted me to “offer a fucking opinion for once in your life!” But I couldn’t because I honestly didn’t have an opinion. About much of anything.

  Sex was another thing that baffled me, because “nice” in our bedroom was definitely not “right”! Jim had long since explained the birds and the bees to me. Even so, I had no idea what the hell I was supposed to do, or why. I have vague memories, from when I don’t know, of Jim telling me very firmly that we were supposed to have sex because we were married, and that’s what married people do. He told me how much he loved me and just wanted to be able to show me. Except when we did eventually engage in sexual activity, I thought it was disgust
ing, gross, smelly, and sweaty, and it really hurt! Plus, Jim frightened me.

  Just like I did not comprehend most of what was going on during the day, nighttime really bewildered me. Jim is not, and has never been as long as I can remember, a quiet sleeper. And I don’t just mean that he snores, although he does that, too. No, Jim is “not quiet” in a disturbing, scary way. Certainly not every night, but often enough, he becomes talkative and very physical with me. Despite being asleep, he has shouted at me, and called me all manner of derogatory names, as well as many other women’s names. He has slapped and scratched me, held me down, kept a pillow over my face, and hit my head repeatedly against the wall or headboard. Yet what is even more upsetting to me than any of that stuff is the fact that I thought that this behavior was totally normal. And it is troubling that I put up with this craziness for so long thinking it was just part of what “marriage” was. I honestly did not know that I could say “No!” or defend myself in any way. When I finally figured out, after several years, that this conduct maybe wasn’t so normal, I asked Jim about it. I think we were living in the house on Beaver Ridge Road, in the Washington suburb of Montgomery Village, at the time. I have no idea what I actually asked him, but probably something like, “Why do you feel the need to occasionally hit me, scratch me, and shout at me during the night?” He probably looked at me as if I was insane. He says he honestly had no recollection of ever doing anything hurtful or hateful to me.

  Since then Jim has participated in a number of sleep studies, and has tried various medications, for “sleep drunkenness” and a variety of other diagnoses, but unfortunately “Nighttime Jim” has to this day never completely gone away. There seems to be no kind of pattern as to when the “bad nights” will occur, and sometimes up to six months will pass with blissful, uninterrupted sleep. And then those bad nights appear again out of the blue.

  Over the years, I have come to learn to love. And I understand the difference now between “loving” ice cream and the “love” I have for my kids. But what about Jim? That is a tricky and far more complicated question. If it makes any sense at all, I have always loved Jim, and I have never loved Jim. In a way, Jim was assigned to me. I never really had a say, which sounds incredibly cruel, but that’s essentially the way it is. Jim is all I know. I have only ever made love to one person. I have only ever shared a bedroom, a bathroom, and a bank account with one person. I have only ever slow-danced with one person. Before writing this book, I have only ever told one person my deepest secrets, my most hopeful dreams, and my darkest fears. And that person was always Jim. Jim is the only person who has ever made me feel truly beautiful, sexy, and desirable. Even during those times when I am feeling neither beautiful nor sexy, and those other times when I am clearly not desirable. There can be no stronger love anywhere than the love I feel from him at those times. Regrettably, Jim is also the one person who can with no more than a look, a word, or tone of voice make me feel small, scared, stupid, insignificant, embarrassed, and worthless. Bottom line: I have always been trying, and probably will continue to always try, to get Jim’s approval, because there is nothing on this earth better. However, there is a conflicting side to his personality, and when that side comes out there is without fail hell to pay! That being said, I am somewhat convinced that his behavior, both good and bad, over the years is directly linked to how much our lives were altered by a ceiling fan when we were both so young.

  Despite all of these circumstances, life goes on, and the Meck family continued to muddle through as best we could.

  Jim lost his job in Baltimore early in January of 1991, but thankfully he was able to find another job within a few months, working for a small software company based outside Boston but with offices in Greenbelt, Maryland. This job required him to travel most of the time, either to the company’s headquarters or around the country selling the company’s software. With this new job he was gone for about three weeks out of every month, and even when he was “home,” he spent most of his time driving to his office in Maryland, near Washington, D.C., sometimes a two-hour drive one way. Having him away so much was both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, I was nervous about being by myself with the boys. Jim, regardless of his behavior toward me, was my touchstone. He was familiar and I somehow understood myself better when he was around. On the other hand, I was guaranteed a good night’s sleep without Jim around, and Benjamin and Patrick’s behavior seemed to improve when he was gone. After several months of all this driving and traveling, it became clear that we couldn’t stay in Bel Air. Jim decided we would move to Montgomery County, relocating from suburban Baltimore to suburban Washington, to be closer to his office as well as National Airport.

  Montgomery Village is a planned community, and a great place to be a young family. There are swimming pools, recreation centers with all kinds of year-round activities and camps for kids, lakes with walking trails and bike paths, and shopping centers all close by. Our house was at the end of a court, and behind it was a little creek and woods to explore.

  Jim was away traveling the day the boys and I actually moved into the house on Beaver Ridge Road, and one specific episode from the day is extremely vivid in my mind. This house had a ridiculously dramatic, sweeping two-story foyer with a little balcony right off the master bedroom that looked down over that foyer. (Picture the Pope looking down from such a balcony and blessing thousands of devoted Catholic pilgrims inside my front hall.) It did not take long for my boys to come up with a magnificent plan to make this boring moving day into something a bit more exciting. They walked around the house gathering up all the bedding, blankets, towels, linens, sleeping bags, and pillows that they could find and proceeded to build a huge “nest” in that front hall. What was I doing while they were being so industrious? I honestly have no idea. What I do remember is coming upon my five-year-old, thrill-seeking son flying through the air from the balcony, landing (mostly) in the “nest” of bedding, immediately standing up, and beckoning to his three-year-old brother, who was himself perched on the edge ready to jump! I’m sure my shrieks were heard throughout the neighborhood, but fortunately they did not startle Patrick enough to cause him to fall. After that incident, I distinctly remember literally tying both boys to my physical person for the rest of that day.

  Regardless of that shaky start, we settled into our life in Montgomery County. Starting that September, Benjamin attended afternoon kindergarten at Goshen Elementary School, and Patrick was enrolled in the nearby afternoon preschool. At one point I remember Patrick’s teacher taking me aside and asking if everything was all right at home with Jim and me. I nodded and asked why she wanted to know. She said that Patrick told her that his daddy only ever came home to mow the lawn. About this same time, both boys had drawn pictures in their Sunday school classes at Gaithersburg Presbyterian Church that included a smiling mom and two smiling boys. No father anywhere in either picture. (Hmm.)

  I got another part-time job teaching aerobics classes at Athletic Express, a large gym not far from where we lived. From connections I made working there, I was invited to teach classes at two other gyms, Philbin’s and Fitness First. “Part-time” eventually swelled into teaching up to fifteen or sixteen classes a week, with many often back-to-back.

  I continued to keep a detailed calendar listing everything I needed to do, and I referred to it several dozen times a day. As long as I was teaching classes, getting Benjamin and Patrick to and from school, driving them to soccer, gymnastics, cherub choir, and dance classes, “helping” with homework and school projects, “volunteering” at the library at the elementary school, preparing meals, doing laundry, going grocery shopping, and cleaning the house, I never had to interact with people at anything more than a superficial level. I came in contact with a lot of people during my days, but didn’t, for the most part, know anybody’s name and often didn’t recognize people from one day to the next. I could play the part of the “Montgomery County Mother” at the kids’ schools, and I could turn on the c
harm to teach aerobics classes, but I was horribly insecure and nervous whenever I had to speak or socialize with anybody for any length of time. I actually was only playing the part of a mom. I didn’t do things because I knew they were the right things to do. I did things because I saw what other moms were doing, and I simply copied what they did. At the health clubs where I worked, it wasn’t much different. I initially just copied what other instructors were doing, and over time teaching certain classes became second nature. Surprisingly, after many years of teaching, I developed my own style and became a fairly popular instructor.

  Jim and I continued to play the part of a married couple, and eventually we even resumed a sort of sex life. But Jim thinks that sex, from this point on, was simply one of the many things that I just accepted, without question, as part of the marriage and family routine. Now I wash dishes. Now I cook dinner. Now we go to church. Now we have sex. Now I fold the laundry.

  He is probably right about that and about me to a certain extent, especially in the beginning. But I can also remember (eventually) countless special times that we shared over our years together, moments that included laughter, passion, intimacy, and a closeness that I have never experienced with anybody else. And I certainly can’t remember him ever complaining to me about our sexual escapades, particularly once I finally figured everything out.

  But I am jumping ahead.

  Early in the fall of 1991, Jim and I received an invitation to attend the wedding ceremony of Kathy VanSchaick and Randy Brown. Kathy was one of the few people that I had kept in touch with from high school and to this day is one of my very best friends. Jim remembers that she was a terrific help to me after my injury, especially after we moved east from Texas, patiently retelling me stories and showing me photos of our high school antics. Kathy and Randy’s wedding was to be held in November at Wayne Presbyterian Church, the church I had attended with my own family when we lived outside of Philadelphia. Kathy told me that she and I had been active in choir and youth group at Wayne Presbyterian when we were in high school, and my sister Diane and her husband, Paul, had been married there in 1985.