Trapped In Between. Marilyn Elaine Lundberg Lundberg
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towards anyone, just got to go and then slip away. I put this idea in my back pocket so it would be there if and when I couldn’t take the suffering any longer.
The nightmares and night terrors stepped up a lot that summer. The bears continued to chase and devour me, and there was also an assortment of other nasty dreams. There was a reoccurring dream in which intruders would break down the doors and windows of my house, torturing and then killing me. Other dreams would be me in a vehicle and the brakes failed, so I was killed. I was killed in an assortment of ways every night, and they all left me upset and weeping when I awoke.
Along with the depression there was anxiety. I had persistent and excessive worry about everyday things. I was always thinking the worst was going to happen in any given moment. Every day was like that, I never gave myself a break. Most of the time my stomach was sick and I was fatigued from not having a good nights’ sleep. I needed a safe zone in my life, but no matter where I went, I didn’t feel protected. I used to feel secure in the schoolyard and the alone time with my kitty, but that was gone now. I hated feeling vulnerable all the time.
When the first day of school arrived it was as difficult as I had imagined. There were so many different teachers, all with their different quirks and personalities, lots of new kids that I didn’t know, and so many expectations that were heaped on me. I carried on as I had in grade school by getting through each day to Friday night when I could finally take a deep breath and relax, and then by Sunday all the apprehensions began in earnest.
At school I had acquaintances, but I never allowed anyone to get too close to me, because my walls were high and thick. I also didn’t want anyone to know my secrets, because remember Mom said, “Don’t trust anyone.”
I remember sitting in the school auditorium one day waiting for the program to start, and a boy leaned over to me and said that I appeared to be such a calm person. I heard that many times and I thought, if they only knew what was going on inside of my head. I guess it was my way of fitting in. I could wear my serenity mask and no one ever knew all my hindrances.
Around the middle of the seventh grade, when I was thirteen years old, something unusual began happening in my mind, and I hesitate to even write about it, because it brings up so much shame, but it may help someone so I will continue on. My mind began to have very strange thoughts; these were desires to put myself into dangerous situations. This is a time in my life when two other personalities emerged. One personality was that of a prostitute, the other was a nun and of course me, Marilyn.
As the sun was setting and dusk was appearing, a strange new thought would enter my mind, and a strange new feeling entered my body. The thought was to leave the safety of my home, and take a walk along a busy road or highway. As I was walking I was supposed to look into the eyes of the men in the cars speeding past me, as a prostitute would do.
So at the young age of thirteen, I felt like prostitution was calling my name and trying to drag me into this dark unhealthy lifestyle; me a sweet young girl that went to church every week. How could that be happening to me?
I can’t even find the words to explain the tremendous pull that I felt to put myself into this dangerous sexual situation, and I didn’t feel like I could say no. The really odd thing was that I knew nothing about sex except for the explanation that I had received after the circus fiasco. All that information went in one ear and out the other, because Mom had been so mad. I had never seen pictures or read any books about sex, and didn’t know how it was done. I was as naive as a young girl could be.
Something in that night air would call to me as the sun was setting. It was a dark, ugly, drawing that would consume me at times, for what I thought, was no apparent reason. When the thoughts were whispered to walk at night, it was virtually impossible to put it out of my mind. The purpose of walking at night was to have some strange man pull his car over and drag me off into the bushes, and sexually abuse me. Better yet, many men hopefully would emerge, over power me and do what they wanted with me.
If a man in a car did slow down, I became terrified and ran like the wind in the opposite direction for my safety. This was the nun personality taking over and getting me out of the danger that the prostitute had put me into. The nun would be appalled at the idea of walking the streets at night in the first place, and would be very disgusted and upset with me. She would scold me for leaving the comfort and safety of my home, and putting my life in danger.
Then there was me, Marilyn, who was very confused as to why I was thinking about any of this stuff in the first place. My mind was not acting as it had in the past. It had this new agenda and I had no idea why or what was going on. These weekly walks were terrifying for me, but I felt I was being forced and again had no control over the situation. The prostitute personality was the strongest, the nun was second in command and I was the powerless one.
The rest of seventh, eighth and ninth grade are obscure. There may have been speeches; I just don’t have substantial memories of these three years. That period of my life is all very black. Drag myself out of bed, get to school, get through five scary classes, and then go to my wonderful gym class, and then home to angry Mom and naked Dad. That was my life.
The only solid memories that I recall are of me in gym class. During sports I was able to block out all the anxiety and focus on the goal of each sport. In the ninth grade I won the schools’ badminton championship, this was a very exciting achievement for me. I loved this accomplishment, but it only lasted for a few short moments and then all the blackness engulfed me again.
Besides loving gym class, I also excelled at sewing. My mother had taught me how to sew as a kid. I made most of my outfits because I enjoyed creating clothes that nobody else owned. At home I could sit at the sewing machine for hours and get lost in the creativity of the project I was working on. My three passions in life were animals, sports and sewing. I am very thankful that I had those three passions in my life to get me through the difficult days.
I was fifteen years old at the end of ninth grade and the problems just kept piling on. On top of all the problems of the past I was now contemplating suicide because I needed peace at any price. I was shutting down emotionally when I needed to, and was experiencing severe depression. I felt crazy different from other people, and so I would withdraw and isolate myself. At times I felt confused, numb and separate from myself, which scared me to pieces. To make matters worse there was now three of me, a prostitute a nun and me, what in the world is going on with my head I wondered. There was a general sense of hopelessness that surrounded me, and I envied all the other people around me who were laughing and appeared to be enjoying life.
Chapter Four – DON’T FORGET YOUR PENCIL
Attending high school was similar to junior high school; the only difference was that I was now a few years older. Patrick Henry High school was a mile in the opposite direction, and again no buses. Most mornings I got a ride from my dad, and I would walk home alone after school.
I clearly remember the first day going to my tenth grade history class. My history teacher was also the coach of the schools’ football team. On the first day of class he grinned and said for us to not think of his class as a history class, but more of a speech class. He announced that we all would be giving lots of speeches, and the big one would be ten minutes long. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. How was I going to get through this? How could I get away? Could I transfer out of his class? It seemed like some teachers enjoyed making me miserable!
The following day, in this same history/speech class the teacher told us to take out our pencils. A boy in the front row with bright blond hair said that he had lost his pencil. The teacher’s face got real red, and he grabbed this boy by his shoulders, and threw him against the blackboard. He landed on his butt, and then crawled back to his chair and desk. The student was speechless as was the whole class. I never saw this boy at our school again.
Because of that incident, I was terrified of this teacher. I was sitting in the row of seats that was the farthest from the door, and all I wanted to do was run and hide. My mind was spinning and I didn’t know how I was going to get through this year of school, and do the speeches that he now required of me. On top of that, this guy had an anger issue!
The same