The Story of Liz Franklin, Installment 7 - Nearing the End

We left off in Installment 6 where Liz grabbed a knife on the way to her dorm at school.  She had just given what she called, "the performance of my life" where the girls of her college dorm ate up every joke and every laugh she had to give.  But, like many funny people, she was dying inside. Now, it was her turn to literally try to end it all and die for good.  Let's follow her to her room.

*****

So- anti climatic, this.  I scratched myself with it. Didn't even produce blood.  But the fact that I had actually moved closer to hell scared me to death.  I told a girl I trusted, who told the dorm mother, who called the college president, who called the conference president... My name was making the rounds.  In the middle of the night, they came to the dorm to yell at me, and pray with me, and generally discuss the sorry state of my soul.  I did pray, and I guess I got some relief, because for awhile, I was ok.  Or not as not-ok as I had been earlier.

This was right before Christmas break, and somehow I went home and acted as normally as I could.  Went back after break, and actually made some friends (whose friendships I value to this day), and had a semblance of a life outside the spiritual.  I knew I was being watched for signs of depression. You know, demonic possession, so I managed to stuff things down even further.  Emotionally, I was numb.  My soul felt dead, and I knew I was just never going to be good enough for god.  But some how, I hid all this from people.

When the second school year started, I got a new bff, and then, eventually, my first boyfriend!!  I so did not know how to relate to people.  I had never in my life been loved.  I was an oozing hole of need, which severely strained my relationship with my bff.  My boyfriend...I was on autopilot with him.  We weren't allowed to ever be alone, so conversations did not go deep.  I thought he might be my salvation. After all, girls were expected to marry, bear kids, and let the husband make all the choices.  So I wrapped myself up in these plans.  That summer, it hit me undeniably that I did not love him.  I needed to be married, though, to be loved, so I drowned out that inner little voice.

During my second year, the pastor's wife of the church I attended while in school (still part of the Allegheny Conference,those were the rules) took note of my behavior.  The constant praying, the suicide "attempt", the cloying neediness, the way I was just about the only girl who didn't go home on weekends or shorter breaks...  I only lived 45 minutes away.  I was scolded soundly for this, too, by no less than the president of the college.  My mom had cancer; I should be going to help her.  I'd feel guilty when she died.  (she did, I didn't, how bad a person does that make me?)  Any way, the pastor's wife got together with my bff, and decided I was an incest victim.  (I'd told no one).  This was actually pretty forward-thinking of her.  She got a book on it, and my bff and I went through it in an attempt to heal me.  That, I think, was so sweet, and even sincere, but she was in no kind of way equipped to do that.  The church didn't believe in mental health professionals at all.  They were satanic! They opened the door! So that was how they tried to help me.

Instead, they sent me into a tail-spin.  What I had managed to keep wrapped in a box now overwhelmed me.  I had no idea how to cope with this. None. Zero.  It became a monster, bigger than me, and chasing me, chasing me always.  Although I continued to seek god, it was really all I could do to get dressed in the morning.  god became, out of necessity for my survival, second, or even further down in my mind.

Then, in '89, mom died.  I was at school, and dad called, saying she was in the hospital, but was good, real good.  The thing was, he always acted the opposite of what was going on with her.  If she stubbed her toe, he called 911.  When he said things were good, we needed to call 911. So, I knew I needed to get there, fast.  She hung on through surgery, and we left (my bff and I) back to school after a couple days. We had just gotten back when my brother called to tell me she had died.

*****

The final installment will follow Liz to the "getting out" of her spiritual misery.  She still has room to fall lower - and she will - but the end is good and still is writing itself to be a true victory.

The Story of Liz Franklin, Installment 6 - Suicide or College...or...Murder?

We witnessed some of the most disgusting spiritualized sexual abuse in Installment 5 by Liz's own pastor, his wife, and an elder, no less.  It was horrid to read. Something that no child - at any age - should go through.  But that was not the end of Liz's story.  Not by a long shot.  She would continue trying to become the unattainable perfect being that she thought this church's god wanted her to be.

*****

Why by now my being hadn't just said enough! and imploded, I don't know.  I wanted to die, but that was another sin.  By my senior year, I was in full-on rebellion.  Or reacting normally to the circumstances in which I was raised, to put it another way.  I was going to hell.  I firmly believed this.  So I just didn't see the need to try any more.  I was still miserable, but at least now, I wasn't heaping abuse on my own self.

My twin brother and I were the graduating class of 1987.  I was the valedictorian, and as such, was awarded a scholarship to the church Bible college. Allegheny Wesleyan College in Salem, OH.  I guess I decided to give myself another shot.  Surely, being surrounded by holy people 24/7 would produce results.  Maybe when I got out of dad's house, I could do it. Away from the abuse. Away from mom, whom I didn't like very much any way. Besides the fact that I didn't like her, she'd been diagnosed 10 years prior with cancer.  Her fainting became the norm.  I couldn't sleep at night, waiting for the bang! that meant she had fainted again.  Then feeling the guilt for not praying with/for her.  So, I decided to go to AWC, and even got excited at the prospect.

That fall, I began my journey away from the insanity that had been my life up til this point.  I didn't know it yet, and indeed it would get a bit more insane before it got better. My first year was probably the worst.  I don't have a lot of specific recollections.  I barely recall myself during that year.  I do know that I did not acquire holiness through osmosis.  I still went to the altar every time there was an opportunity.  It still did not work.  I had other things on my heart, too.  It seemed that no one liked me.  I didn't have one good friend to talk to at all.  Oh, they were my friends when they needed things. I had a car, so people could be very friendly if they needed to go to town.

One thing about me is my sense of humor.  I have a wicked one.  I love to laugh, love seeing people laugh; there's just too little laughter in the world.  Somehow, my sense of humor lived through the stuff I barely survived, and it breaks my heart, but I turned the humor against myself.  People started counting on me for laughs, and did I deliver.  So many people told me of how I had made them laugh when that was just what they needed.  I cheered people up, and I got good at it. I was dying inside, but hiding it behind the humor.  I also gave good back rubs, so at one time or another, the entire girl's dorm had beat a path to my door.

When I needed to be cheered up, no one was there to make me laugh.  When my back ached, no one was there to rub it.  The things that I had been taught about myself were true: I was unlovable.  Spiritually, I'd given up.  I still desperately wanted to be good enough for god, but I had resigned myself to reality.  It just wasn't gonna happen.  Daily, I gave of myself to my fellow students, and nothing happened to fill myself back up.  I became depressed; that seems like too tame a word for what I was feeling.  A living death, that's what I was living.  I began thinking of suicide.  I just didn't have what it took to live through one more day.  These thoughts scared me back to the altar, because suicide was an unforgivable sin; the express train to hell.  I didn't talk to anyone about this.  Just told them I was having spiritual problems, and since I'd obviously been having them all semester, they weren't alarmed in the least. 

Finally, one night I delivered the comedic performance of a life time. This was on a Sunday after evening church service.  The dining hall was in the basement of the girl's dorm. People had gathered there for a late supper. I had them rolling.  And I was funny!  I was ON!!  And with every joke, with every burst of laughter, I died a little more inside.  Finally, everyone left, the lights were turned off, and we girls headed upstairs.  On the way, I grabbed a knife.

*****

Aaaand...you'll have to wait for Installment 7 to see what Liz does.