The Many Of Me

I suppose I should have said from the start that this is really Abigael’s story to tell; but I am out so I am starting. She can change anything she wants to when she gets the opportunity. I’m sure I’m missing details that she will want to add; but many of us are familiar enough with the story to tell it.

So we left off with us being taken away in a police vehicle, not knowing where, why, or what would become of us.

It turned out to be about a 20-30 minute drive. When we exited the vehicle, we read on the side of the building that we were at a state mental hospital. We sat in a large room for quite a while. Part of the time we were alone. There was a large mirror in the center of one wall; and when the light shown just right you could see that there were two men sitting at a desk facing the room behind the mirror. I said and did nothing but try to compose myself and not let my imagination try to figure out what was going to happen to me now.

After a while one of the officers came in and was rude and obnoxious, insisting that I was intentionally being uncooperative and giving them grief. As if this was all my idea!? I refused to be bullied into loosing my temper or saying anything different. If I could have given them what they wanted, I surely would have long before I had been forced to go with them. The whole situation was too bazaar to even attempt to make sense out of it. After about 20 minutes or so the officer left the room; and a few minutes later a different officer came into the room. He sat close to me and spoke in soothing conciliatory tones. I finally said something along the lines that there was no point in continuing the “good cop/ bad cop” charades. I was no more able to tell this officer what he wanted to know than the other guy. He immediately got up and left. A bit later someone came in with a stack of papers and a pen. They were handed to me and I was told to sign them.

I looked at them and read. They were obviously legal papers saying I was volunteering to admit myself and accept treatment. At the bottom of the paper it said that I had read all the papers and understood them, and that all my questions had been answered. There were statements on those papers that only a truly crazy or desperate person would sign. When I took the time to attempt to read them, the person waiting for the signed papers got very obnoxious and insisted I just sign them. I countered with the fact that it was full of legal terms I didn’t understand and I wasn’t going to sign something I didn’t understand that clearly was forfeiting my legal rights.  The woman became upset and angry, trying to bully me into signing them. In response I started to cross out things I didn’t agree to, but before the pen could touch the paper she snatched them from me and emphatically said I was not permitted to  cross out or add anything – just sign them. I insisted I couldn’t sign them without reading and understanding them. At that point she grabbed them away from me and left making it abundantly clear she was not happy with me. She said something like, “Fine, then, we’ll just have to do it the hard way!”

Those were scary words to hear. There was nothing easy about anything that they had done or said so far. I was certain that what was happening to me could not be legal and I had every intention of recording every detail to replay in court when I got a chance.

Many of my things were taken away from me – some of them were ridiculous. Like, for example, my shoe laces, and toe nail clippers. I was put in a room close to the nurses station behind locked doors. They had insisted on calling me by a name I didn’t know (If they were so sure they knew who I was and where I lived, then what in the world was this all supposed to be about? None of it made any sense to me at all.) One thing I did learn from reading the papers I didn’t sign was that if I didn’t sign them I would be admitted against my will for 72 hours after which I would be seen by a judge who would evaluate whether or not I would have to continue to be hospitalized and for how long. I figured that meant I had 72 hours to endure at which point I needed to be able to convince the judge that I knew who I was and where I lived (at least that seemed to be the issue used to force me in here, though I couldn’t imagine what about that entitled me to the treatment I was receiving.) I would use the time to learn all I could about the person they all were convinced I was so I could parrot back to them what they wanted to hear. I was certain once I got out of this situation I would calm down and know who I really was and where I really lived. I would be moving out of that town as quick as possible, and then I would go about making formal charges against the state for unlawful arrest..or detainment or whatever it would be called.

Once I was settled in my room, I approached the nurses desk and asked when I would be permitted to speak with my lawyer. They were very snippy informing me that I hadn’t been arrested so therefore I had no right to speak with a lawyer. That was a bit hard to swallow – a criminal has a right to legal council but a person who hadn’t committed a crime yet was being detained against their will had no legal rights? Apparently this was and is the case. So I asked for access to a phone and phone book. They insisted I did not have the right to contact a lawyer, but I said I wanted to call a friend of the family. I just didn’t know the number.

The only phone I was permitted to use was a pay phone right in front of the nurses station. At that point I had little patience left so I didn’t try to hide the fact that I was looking at the yellow pages for a lawyer. I picked a name randomly and tried to speak softly but it was set up to prevent privacy of any kind. The lawyer I called interrupted me, told me he knew me (I found that rather astonishing since I wasn’t sure of that myself), and he would represent me and talk to me just before the judge saw us.

The next task I had for myself was to record in as much detail as possible everything that had happened that day. I asked the nurses for pen and paper. They gave me a tiny stub of a pencil and a legal pad. I had to chuckle at their passive-aggressive behavior. They referred to me as being uncooperative and were very snippy towards me.I kept asking them for a sharper pencil or to sharpen the one they gave me until they finally gave me a pen to get me out of their hair. That was fine by me.

At the time I was placed in my holding pen, I was given a stack of standard admission papers stating my “rights” and “responsibilities”. It included a list of things I would have to comply with, a schedule, etc. It stated that within 24 hours of admission I would be evaluated by a physician, and that if I didn’t want their physician to evaluate me I had the right to request that my own physician do the physical. I had no intention of letting any of their people tough me or give me medications, so when I was called to be seen by the physician, I stated I wanted to be evaluated by my own physician. The second I said that the doctor threw his hands in the air, turned his back to me, and said, “That’s it. I’m not doing another thing. ”

Next I needed to find out as much as I could about this person I was supposed to be. The police report and admission papers gave me some names and numbers to start with. I could get more from those. One of the names was the stranger in the van. He was supposed to be a very close personal friend (so why in the world didn’t he know I wasn’t who he was looking for?!); and another was a woman who the report said was my counselor, but when I talked to her she was emphatic that she was not my counselor (so why was she involved at all?) She had been at the scene for part of the episode – she must have arrived when the officer was demanding I tell him who I was and where I lived. These people should have known I wasn’t who they were saying I was. It was so confusing. I still wasn’t sure they weren’t going to try some experimental “treatment” or something on me. I was very afraid to eat or drink anything they gave me. The people I spoke to on the phone kept trying to explain to me this really strange diagnosis they said I had which caused me to not know who I really was. They were so certain they understood it all and it all made sense to them. Well, that’s not exactly what they were saying; but it was the impression they gave me. But I kept coming back to the core question: How can there be more than one personality sharing the same brain but not knowing about each other? It seemed so impossible to me.

By the time I got everything written down that had happened during that wild and crazy day, it was late and I was exhausted. Just as I was drifting off to sleep, I heard a very young child’s voice come out of my mouth saying, “Mommy”.

I KNOW it had not passed through my brain; and that wasn’t my voice. It struck like a bolt of lightening. What I had thought just moments before was some twisted plot to make me think I was crazy suddenly became a very real, terrifying possibility. I had a lot to learn in a very short amount of time….tomorrow.

Today we will begin to write the book here on the blog.  Of course we will not make the entire thing visible on line, but we will share the progress we are making.

If you especially like or dislike something you read here, please feel free to post a note to us sharing your views.

Our story begins on a beautiful bright day early in May in a small mid-western town. Hints of a warm summer ahead blew on a gentle breeze as I leisurely strolled along a dirt path that meandered  behind a church, through the edge of a small woods, and down a short drive through a cemetery out to the main road.

I was intrigued by the foliage around me. Leaves that had fallen from the trees the autumn  before had been transformed by the cruel winter weather. Most of the fleshy part of the leaves had been completely worn away leaving behind the veins with what appeared to be delicate lace in between.  There were Maple, Elm, and Oak leaves, among others I couldn’t identify. In addition there were small segments of bark that had come off the trees which formed perfectly into the shapes of letters – “W”s, “V”s, and “N”s. They seemed to call out to me to take them home and create a unique centerpiece for our dining room table. Just as the thought solidified in my mind I spotted the perfect piece of wood to use as a base for the creation that was beginning to form in my imagination. I cradled it in my arm and continued to gather pieces of leaves and bark, stacking the smaller pieces on top of the  larger ones

. I was about mid-way through the edge of the woods when I glanced up to see a very strange sight in deed. There was a man shoveling a very long deep hole in the ground a few yards inside the tree line. The hole was about the size of a grave, and I felt very uneasy as the man who was digging glanced up and caught my eye. I hurried my pace until I was well out of the woods and in sight of the road. At that point I had quite a large arm load and was thinking about what I would do to treat the different pieces of my collection and then assemble them. I wasn’t paying much attention to the path or road as I turned to start the walk back home along the edge of the road. Again an uneasy feeling overcame me as I realized there was a man driving a van who had slowed way down right beside me. He called out to me a name I didn’t recognize, obviously intending me to respond. I figured he would see he was mistaken in my identity when I looked fully at him, but instead he insisted I get in the van with him. I picked up my pace while explaining that I didn’t live far away and preferred to walk. I tried not to panic when he offered a stuffed animal to me if I would get into the van. I was very sure I didn’t know who he was and he didn’t know me, either. I moved as quickly as I could with my arms loaded down like they were, and headed for the nearest house which was just up the road a small piece. I planned to approach the house as if to enter, figuring he would assume it was my home and would take off; but instead he pulled in the driveway. I knocked on the door and prayed someone would come quickly; but the man got out of the van and strode quickly toward me. I couldn’t let him corner me on the porch, so I took off at a fast trot towards a golf shack that was located back from the road in a field next to the house and called over my shoulder that I would call the police if he didn’t leave me alone. Still he came after me, stuffed animal in his hands. I went into the shack and asked to use the phone. I called the police and reported to them what was happening and where I was. Of all the crazy things, the guy still hung around. I figured he couldn’t be right in his head.When he chose to stay in the shack, I left to wait for the officer outside. The stranger followed me outside but I kept a good distance between us. He chose to stay out near the road, so I stayed farther back closer to the shack.

When the officer arrived he spent a considerable amount of time talking to the stranger before he came back to talk to me. I found that to be extremely strange. The whole situation was senseless.  When the officer did approach me he left the stranger by the road alone, and insisted that I tell him my name and address. He would not let me tell him why I had called for him, or that the man he had been talking to was the stranger who had insisted I get into his van. I kept asking the officer to please secure the stranger so he would not escape while he talked to me. The more I tried to explain the whole situation, the more insistent he became that I  forget about the guy by the road and I tell him my name and address. Eventually he said he was the only person on duty and did not have back up available to him. Then I knew for sure he was lying to me; but why? Why would the policeman behave this way? Why would he lie to me? Why was he treating the stranger like an comrad and me like a criminal? What on earth could be going on here? I started to think of all kinds of very scary possibilities. I was truly terrified.

When I finally decided to tell him what he asked for, in hopes that he would then listen to me, I realized with horror that the trauma of this whole bizarre set of circumstances had caused me to forget my name and address. It was a total mental block. All I could do is try to explain to him the conclusion I had just come to. I was convinced that the only solution was for them to all leave me alone so I could just resume my walk. Surly I would remember if I could just get past the trauma; but the officer would not hear of it. I was really trying hard not to panic. It seemed to me that there must be some scheme to trap unsuspecting women for some horrific purposes; and the stranger and policeman were involved in it together. If I panicked and fled, the officer would say he had some reason to take me by force; so I very carefully and intentionally started moving toward the road. There was a man across the street mowing his lawn; and I figured if I could just get to him, he might be willing to let me call 911. Surly that would bypass the local police who were involved in this scheme to entrap women. When I got to the road I carefully looked both ways. There were semi trailers coming from both directions, but neither one was close at all, so I began to walk across the street.

I got about 1/2 way when all of a sudden police vehicles came from everywhere. Six vehicles in all, some of them containing two officers. My heart sank as I backed up into the field and the officers formed a wide circle around me. All I could do is shake my head and say, “Why are you doing this to me? I haven’t done anything wrong. I’m not running away. Why?”

The circle got tighter and tighter as I talked until in the last moment four officers grabbed me at once and my legs caved trembling underneath me. They shook me and told me to stand up but I was so terrified I wasn’t able to do it. They carried me to the nearest police car and strapped me in. As we drove away, the two officers in the front seat discussed what they were going to write in their report for a reason to take me into custody. They decided to say that I had endangered myself by crossing the road when the trucks were coming – an absurd lie, and we all knew it. I was stunned and terrified. I can’t remember a time I ever felt more helpless and hopeless in my life.

It’s been so very long since I was not sick and tired! No way I’m I just complaining about it either. It’s been a lot of days and weeks and maybe even months.  Just when I thought maybe I was starting to feel just a little bit better, I get a nasty ear infection. No fare!

And tomorrow is our very real anniversary that only comes once a YEAR, and now I am hurting so very, very much!

Well, I just had to tell someone who will listen. So now I’m done. Besides, my supper just got done cooking in the oven and I’m also hungry. Besides, Beloved says my ear looks like it just might be starting to get better. Even though the doctor said it would be much better by today, if it’s just better for tomorrow then that will be good enough, because even if it wasn’t good enough it wouldn’t make it feel any better any faster. I’ve tried that before, and it doesn’t work.

So now I really truly am done.