Heart Scars
Page 19
Was the note a lie? Or was Allison creating another story to explain her sexual promiscuity? Kerry Cohen is candid about teenage sexuality in Loose Girl: A Memoir of Promiscuity. Cohen challenges society’s labels that girls are either virgins or sluts, writing, “A loose girl is a girl who has been badly emotionally hurt and attempts to ease that hurt through male attention and sexual behavior. She yearns to feel worthwhile, which she usually defines as worth loving.”
Allison’s stories sometimes resembled television shows. How could I tell the difference between the truth and a story?
* * *
I wonder if I will ever get beyond my fantasies of revenge. While I’m not counting the days and hours of Nicholas’s incarceration the way some victims do, I have changed all of the telephone numbers and have requested an unlisted phone number for the house. We can’t change our address as easily, though. Is Nicholas going to try contacting Allison after he gets released from prison? I don’t know. It bothers me that he could, but I won’t live in fear like I did with Frank.
It bothers me that Gregory and his dad have more ties to the town than we do. If they choose to tell people their side of the story, and pretend to be the victims of Allison’s “overactive imagination,” will their friends harass us? I don’t know. The possibility is always there.
* * *
April 24, 2010
The kids and I got home from another trip to my mom’s house at about 7:00 p.m. Before I tucked myself into the house for the evening, I headed into the backyard to spread some lawn seed. On one of my passes back and forth with the seed-spreader, I noticed the absence of the bright-yellow chain hanging from the swing set.
“Allison, did you take your swing off the swing set?” I asked.
“No—why?”
“It’s gone.”
On the one hand, the missing swing could just be another random act of neighborhood vandalism. On the other hand, everyone who drives by our house or spends any time getting to know Allison would know that the swing set is her place to unwind, the way she unloads her stress. Since she was about two years old, Allison has had a swing set in the yard. She swings for hours, summer, winter, rain, or snow. We moved this swing set with us from Wyoming, and purchased the yellow-chained heavy-duty swing when the links on the regular swing broke in November 2009.
Was the missing swing a personal attack? The plastic lawn chairs on the back porch were still there, as was the metal firepit stand thirty yards to the east of the swing set. I never reported the missing swing to anyone other than my mother and a few friends. As I had replaced the broken window, I bought a new swing. A month later, I read an article in the newspaper about a number of broken mailboxes in our area of town. The police were asking for anyone with information to come forward.
* * *
In August of 2009, Mary said she was losing a client. While I agreed with her about Allison being more confident and less depressed than in April, I didn’t think that she was “cured” of the behavior that got her on the bus.
In my opinion, no one had spent enough time with Allison to get at the underlying issues. Since Wyoming, the talk was always focused on the acting-out behavior: cutting and running away. When Allison shared the news that she was diagnosed with ADHD as a child, counselors deferred treatment to a child psychiatrist. Visits with a child psychiatrist focused almost exclusively on medication options. I didn’t want to medicate Allison so that she could quietly function in the classroom—I wanted someone to get to the root of her behavior and explain why she made such self-destructive choices.
* * *
May 9, 2010
Allison sent me another text message. We had been arguing about boys again, and she didn’t like my concerns that she was paying more attention to pleasing them than to her own interests. At 11:08 p.m., she sent the following: “I’m always going to degrade myself. How would you like it done? Online, cutting, drinking. I could start dating terrible, abusive guys again. There is no amount of therapy that will help. Sending me off like Tara [an anorexic/bulimic classmate] won’t do much good either; it will just make it worse. I’m not threatening, but just explaining.”
I wish I knew why Allison wanted to hurt herself. I wish I knew what to do to help her through this stage of her life. Was it something more serious than just a teenager rebelling? As our marriage was falling apart, I told Frank we needed to go to counseling together. He didn’t like counseling because they always told him to stop using drugs, but he told me he went—twice. After the first visit, Frank said the counselor told him he had ADHD. After the second visit, Frank said, “She sounded just like you. I’m not going back.” When we were in Chicago with Frank that April, he mentioned being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Was it just another excuse? Another manipulative attempt to get me back? Frank tried everything after receiving the divorce papers. He even called one night to tell me he was sitting in the closed garage with the car running. The hospital’s admission paperwork revealed it was nothing more than a “manipulative act to get his wife’s attention.” I know that ADHD shows strong genetic links; does bipolar disorder? Would it explain Allison’s irrational behavior? I am afraid of the answer, so I don’t ask. Besides, I think Allison is a bit of a hypochondriac.
According to a news story I saw on July 30, 2010, hypochondria is caused by too much stress. One approach is to treat the underlying anxiety and depression. Unfortunately, Allison won’t stay on any prescribed medication for more than a few months. She says she doesn’t feel normal. But can she find a way to live stress-free? Or will she simply outgrow the anxiety after she graduates high school?
15. Letting Go
So many questions, so few answers. Some days, I feel like I’ve failed. First my marriage ended, then my daughter ran away from home. The way I see it, our home life had to be going terribly in order for Allison to want to run. In spite of all of her explanations, how running away had absolutely nothing to do with me, or the kind of parent I am, I still feel responsible.
At the same time, I feel the need to move on. I have been divorced from Frank longer than we were married, and Allison is approaching her seventeenth birthday. This is the time we should be looking at colleges and preparing for Allison’s moving out in a few more years.
Mentally, Allison is halfway out the door already. She has a new boyfriend, and they talk about their future together. Allison met Daniel through a girl at school. Daniel lives 150 miles south of us, but I’ve met him and have been to his house. Allison and Daniel began seeing each other in July 2010. They already talk about getting married after he finishes college, and living together when she finishes high school.
I don’t like Daniel much. Part of me thinks he’s not good enough for Allison. Part of me resents Daniel because he wants to take Allison away from me. But he’s only two years older than she is, and I’ve met him. Daniel is the first person, other than relatives, who has driven more than an hour to visit. My friends don’t even come to visit.
More importantly, Daniel is good for Allison. Since she met him, she hasn’t been talking to people on the Internet. Still wearing more revealing clothes than I like, Allison isn’t asking to go places where boys hang out. She’s content to be at home, on her swing, or hanging out with girls. Now that she knows Daniel is just a text or phone call away, Allison doesn’t need attention from random guys like before. Having Daniel seems to give Allison a sense of comfort. Does having Daniel free Allison from her fear of ending up like me? I don’t want to grow old and alone like my mother, but I’m forty-six, and my mother is seventy-four. I was married to Frank for twelve years before divorcing him at thirty-three; my mother was married to my father for twenty-one years before divorcing him at forty-six. Allison is only sixteen. She has no reason to be worrying about spending the rest of her life alone at sixteen.
Daniel may be a comfort, but he’s apparently far from a cure-all.
The day after Tommy’s fifteenth birthday, we were talking about how his friend from Wyoming still remembered when his birthday is, and sent a birthday text message. As she was getting into the car, Allison said, “I don’t remember when Daniel’s birthday is. Do you Mom?”
I remember his birthday because she made a big deal about needing to spend the day with him at his family’s cabin. I remember his birthday because I had to buy a gift for her to give. I remember that he turned eighteen. I don’t even like the boy, but I remember his July birthday better than Allison. She’s a narcissist, I’m a perfectionist. Which is worse?
I saw an interview on a news program in September 2010, and the closing message chilled me. The woman being interviewed had suffered severe physical pain and amputations resulting from a car accident. While she rehabilitated, her husband had an affair. Several years later, this couple was still married, and was being interviewed about their journey together. The wife closed with the comment, “Forgiveness is a process.”
Thanks to my faith, I’ve been able to forgive Frank for leaving me to raise the children alone. Thanks to my faith, I can forget about the child support money Frank owes, because taking him back to court won’t change anything. Thanks to my faith, I can find some good in Allison’s having run away. Her work with Officer Richards led to Nicholas’s capture, and perhaps justice for another family who he victimized. Thanks to my faith, I’m able to share our story. It may not be pretty, but it’s important.
Through Allison, I’ve met an astounding number of young women who have similar stories of victimization, or self-mutilation. One thing I think we all share: we were hurt—physically or emotionally, through overt acts or through neglect—by the people we trusted the most, our parents. My father is dead, so I am unable to confront him. Allison’s father is a dead-beat dad, and he runs away every time she tries to confront him. I don’t want to individually confront any of the boys or men who have scarred my heart with their selfish acts of sexual gratification, I just want to let go of the shame and guilt I’ve been carrying.
I want to move on.
I want to unconditionally love myself.
I want to show Allison how to do the same.
* * *
Healing is a process, too. We each carry the scars of our past, but we continue living, loving, and growing. In May 2012, Allison graduated from high school with her class. In August 2012, she began her first day of classes as a college freshman.
Acknowledgments
An endeavor like this is never accomplished alone.
To my mother and sister, who know when I need help without my having to ask. To Laura, my BFF, who bears witness. To Kelly, my sister-from-another-mother. To Wendi, who transformed the gamble with logic. To Jane, who helped me find my way from Medicine Wheel to Plainfield. To Susan, for too many reasons to list. To Mark, who shared his perspective. To Paul, who admitted me; to Kenny, who challenged me; to Nicky, who empowered me; to Rebecca, who polished the words; to Bhanu, who set the bar at seventy-six; to my community of writers, Alethea, Elisabeth, Heidi, Jill, Roselle, and Stacey. To Pr. Genelle, who let me practice. To Steven, Mary, and Donette, who heard parts of the story and didn’t judge me. To Maureen, who helped me feel like a professional.
Finally, to everyone at North Star Press of St. Cloud, who took a chance in bringing the story to you, my readers.
Thank you all.
“Yea God!”