When I was a teen I had horrible allergies. So bad, in fact, that I went to the family physician for allergy shots once a week. One day after school, one of my siblings walked with me to the Doctor’s office to get the shots. My sister I think, fuzzy memory, shocker of a day.
My Mother, if I remember correctly, said she would pick us up outside. Sheryl and I were waiting for a half hour and no one came. I went inside called home no answer my father Left work and no one was answering at home. Hour and half, and 2 more calls nothing. I can't tell you how long we waited there. My father finally pulls up in his big black Chevy pickup and we get in.
I looked at him my sister playing with her book bag between us. His eyes were fixed on the windshield of the truck, red and swollen as if he had been crying. He was grinding his teeth, facial twitches I had seen before in him when angry. I could tell this wasn't anger. He spoke in a fractured but Stern voice.
"Well, your mother left me from another man"
I remember saying "You're playing a joke" and thinking, what a cruel joke, this isn't happening. In that instant every evil thing I remember my father saying or doing came to mind, As well as every good. That picture she had me draw animated in my head and the blood spatter stained my heart soul and mind. I looked at him again and realized he HAD been crying. Silence, pure, painful, and pungent.
The following few days is flashes of reactions in my family. I blink, I see her twin sister, Hannah, holding on to us so tight, as if making it hard for us to breathe stopped the hemorrhaging this family was suffering from, had been suffering from for years. I blink, I see The Elders on her Judicial Committee standing about both of them, or seated across from them as I peer through the banister of the staircase in that big old house we just HAD to have. I blink, I see her standing outside leaned up against a car. The glass of the window in the Dining Room of that house was not cold or warm, no snow on the ground. But the leaves were everywhere, early November.
They made us stay inside for this confrontation, as if not hearing what was said made this all easier. I saw my father step toward her though it barely closed the gap between them. I could tell he asked a question. Her stature simultaneously shrank and then it grew. I blink, I see through the same window the same scene only I see Hannah, supporting My father, my mother leaned up against a car facing all of them. Her against them, them against her. HER flesh and blood behind my father supporting him emotionally and each other physically. They looked as if she was terminal. In their minds, she was.
My mother took a moment to think again, rubbing her lips, which incidentally had no sores on it.
Amazing what a little stress relief will do.
When she spoke she did it with delivery, she used emphasis, she used body language and gestures. It was as if she kicked my father right in the balls, there was no mistaking what was shouted next. Who shouted it, I can’t tell you, a man’s voice.
“How could you sleep with him?” The questions rang through the naked trees and I went running outside, as the second question finished, “How could you do it to your children?”
“Your a whore!” I screamed and was rushed back inside.
She made many statements that said she would not make it to “The New Order” if she did not repent. At this point my mother still seemed resolved in her choice. She was empowered, on a mission, and feeling confident. There were two sides to this story. She had reason to feel empty in some ways as a woman. I do not in anyway, being where I am in life now, feel my mother was wrong to need what she did. Nor that she got it. How she got it is, however, up for debate.
Well maybe not, but I could debate it quite well.
I never saw the man who had stolen my mother from us during the whole time it was happening. They met at a job she took with a local factory. I don’t even know how long it went on. I know it wasn't the last. I also know there is part of me that is proud she went and got hers. The other is just sad she settled down so soon.
What a life mom. Really, sweet n sour candies for all!
My father breaking down like that I knew he was hurt as much as my mother had been hurt by him over the years. In that one moment she had visited on him the equal in Emotional pain he put on her. I watched the next few days as my father broke down. He kept himself calm as well as he could. Had to take sleeping pills to get any rest. I woke one morning and he was at the kitchen table. I had to get him to eat something. He was crying wrapped in his bathrobe,considering going to work. I made a bowl of cereal, his favorite, Frosted flakes. I told him if he was going to work he'd have to eat and put them in front of him. Trying to lighten things I put the bowl and spoon in front of him and growled,
"They're grrrrrreat"
He used to say this whenever he poured a bowl. For one moment he snorted on his sobs and then broke down even more. Crying, mumbling, trembling tears falling into his cereal as he spooned them back up with the milk and flakes into his mouth. He swallowed hard, and wiped his face on his sleeve.
"You kids don't deserve this..."
I wrapped my arms around my father's head and he leaned into my arms and cried, he cried so long that it gave me time to think grow angry. I ran out of the house, got on my bike and peddled. I rode it 3 miles to my Best friends house. When I finally stopped at her steps collapsed on the stairs and she popped out of the door. I looked up at her and her face stiffened.
"Oh my Lilith what happened?"
She sat on the stairs and lifted me to a sitting position. The first person to focus on me for a moment and what I was feeling. I broke down for the first time on her porch I told her what happened with my mother a couple days ago and I fell asleep on her couch. She said what she could to console me. But she also knew that just letting me cry and talk and scream was what was needed. I needed to deflate and she provided the bleed needle.
I spent hours there and as the sun began to dip I started home. I wanted to ride, and think before I got home. I realized at this moment I had to be the strong one. I had to help my brother and sister adjust and in my vent to Helen I realized i wanted my mother to STAY with this other man. She was unhappy with my father.
That’s right, that’s what I thought was best.
I don't know how long passed before my mother contacted daddy again. She wanted to talk. She wanted to come home, she had questions. She wanted to live in the house and take care of us kids. She wanted to still see the other man at the same time. My father told her he would talk to us, the kids, my father wanted to hear our voice. This made me feel very good. In the end my father told her that she couldn't not live here with us and be with him. And he was not going to divorce her. He loved her.
Now my parents were even in my mind. They both hurt and they both tried to forgive, Or so I thought. Later my mother told me that each year since my father rolled over on the 4th of November and said to her.. "its been to 1 year since I almost lost you," "its been to 2 years since I almost lost you" He did not say.. I am so glad I didn't lose you. Since this time she has, from what I heard, had 2 other affairs. She was never disfellowshipped, only publicly reproved. Meaning, A Elder gave a talk about Infidelity and adultery and the importance of wedding vows. Then another came to the front and gave an announcement, "We are aware of the situation with Sister Theroux, it is being Dealt With. Please Pray for the strength of this family and their hard times" or something to that effect.
I actively began my exit of The Organization and it was one bumpy ride.
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