“You’re gonna be OK.” I knew the voice. It was
Bobby’s sister, the woman we called Donna
Summer. She was tall, elegant, and beautiful. We
had seen her infrequently, but she was always
kind and loving when she was with us.
She lifted me from my bed, and I screamed in
pain. She continued her gentle reassurances, as
she carried me from my room. I heard muffled
voices, as we escaped from the apartment and
down the stairs. Though she tried to hold me
close, my battered body jostled in the young
woman’s arms, as we made our way through the
cold stairwell. It was even colder, as I was placed
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onto the back seat of an unfamiliar car. Debbie,
several months pregnant, Matthew, Ruby, and I
were shuttled to a local hospital. The ride was
uncomfortable, and I cried most of the way until I
fell asleep.
When I regained full consciousness, I was laid out
on a hospital bed in the center of a long, bright
hallway. Debbie and Matthew were also in beds
close to me. My head was fixed to the bed, but I
could see Debbie’s bruised and swollen face
several feet away. My vision was blurred, but I
recognized the beaten face of my mother.
Matthew was sitting in his bed, playing with a toy.
I tried to reach out, but I could not move my
hands or even my arms. I tried to move my legs,
but immediately started to cry from the intense
pain. In frustration and panic, I called for my
mother. She spoke to me through swollen lips,
and I heard her telling me, as she often did, that
everything was going to be all right. Through my
tears, I saw a young nurse appear over my
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immobilized head. She told me everything was
going to be fine, and she wiped my face. I saw the
blood-soaked rag, as she wiped it back and forth
across my face. My vision was clearing up, and I
tried to talk to Debbie, whose bed was across the
narrow hallway from me. She reached out for my
bed and wrapped her thin, skeletal hand around
my bedrail. She promised that I would be OK
and that the pain would go away soon. She began
to describe the medicine the doctors had given
me, and how soon I wouldn’t feel any pain. I
wanted to yell at her in disbelief, but I knew not
to yell at her. I didn’t know where Bobby was, but
I was sure he was close by. I was confused and
light-headed. Unable to move my body, I was
unable to speak clearly, unable to reach out for
comfort, but watching Matthew playing on his
bed – having a good time as usual. Staring at
Debbie’s slightly blurred face, I fell silently back
into unconsciousness.
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There were voices squabbling when I woke. I was
in a private room with no sign of Debbie or
Matthew. The two young nurses who stood at my
feet bickered about something I didn’t
understand. They were using medical jargon that
I had not yet become familiar with. Finally they
approached my bed from opposing sides and
stopped midway along the bedrail. They spoke to
me in hushed tones, but their words were nearly
inaudible. They told me about a catheter, but I
did not know what they meant. The younger
looking nurse pulled the pale blue sheet from my
body and I saw my legs in casts extending beyond
my knees. My surprise was short lived.
As I stared at my legs, the nurse pulled my thin
papery hospital gown up, exposing my naked
body to the chilly hospital air. With gloved hands,
the two nurses attempted to insert a hard
catheter. The pain was instant and intense.
Bobby had often made sport of hurting this
particular area of my body in his nearly incessant
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attempts at my emasculation, but this was
different. I squirmed and screamed, but there was
no escaping. They tried to settle me down, but I
wouldn’t cooperate. Even when they explained
that they were not trying to hurt, but to help me,
I screamed and cursed them. After conceding
defeat, I surrendered to their insistence. The pain
was excruciating. The two had significant trouble
inserting the catheter and it took a third person to
come in and assist. Once the procedure was
complete, I no longer felt pain or animosity
toward the staff. I tried to apologize, but my cries
overpowered my voice.
The nurses stayed and talked me through my
tears. They tried to joke with me, but I insisted on
detailing life with Bobby, and all of the terrifying
sexual experiences I had endured living with
Bobby. They listened long enough for me to feel
better; then they all excused themselves, closed
the curtain surrounding my bed, and turned the
television volume higher. I lay there in my bed,
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staring at the new apparatus extending from me.
Every now and again, one of the nurses that had
been with me earlier came in to check on me,
each one catching me playing with the long tube
extending from me, and each one warning me
against playing with it. After learning the hard
way that trying to pull it out was as painful as
when it had been put in, I finally left it alone.
I stayed in the bed for some time before seeing
Debbie or Matthew again. While I remained
strapped to the bed, most of my body cast in
plaster, they both came to visit me to tell me they
were leaving the hospital. Debbie’s face was still
slightly bruised, but she looked healthy and more
noticeably pregnant than I had remembered.
Matthew ran around and played in my room,
until he noticed the tube coming from beneath
my gown. After explaining to him what it was, he
cringed momentarily, but then laughed. His
laughter made me flush with anger, then jealousy,
as I watched him bend over with joy. I wanted to
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be free from the restraints of the bed. I wanted to
walk around, but I never wanted to go home. In a
very short period of time, I had developed a sense
of calm within the hospital.
The hospital staff paid a lot of attention to me;
even though sometimes it hurt, it felt nice to be
taken care of by such gentle and caring people.
The parts of my body that were exposed were
softly sponged clean each day. Every couple of
days a nurse would come in with a couple of
scrub sponges. The sponges came in shiny silver
airtight packages that we would squeeze open and
make them pop. The popping sound always made
me laugh, and it was the lead in to the circus of
distraction she used to allow my mind to ignore
the scrubbing of the scabs from the multiple
infections on my exposed skin. After she would let
me pop one open, and squeeze it until the soap
suds appeared, I’d scrub my hands and fingernails
like I’d watched the hospital staff do so often
before they touched me. The sponges had short
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rubbery bristles on one side that the nurse would
use to scrub the scab away from my infected
wounds. The other side of the sponge was a
scouring pad with which she would tenderly clean
out the exposed skin more thoroughly. Her
sympathetic attention was obvious as she winced
each time she began. It seemed to pain her more
than me, though I was too busy scrubbing my
hands and playing doctor to notice any pain.
Additionally, the hospital was a much more
pleasant environment than life with Bobby, and
the pain of my body healing was much easier to
bear than the pain of the beatings that got me
there.
Throughout my extended stay in the hospital, I
watched a lot of television. I had never been
allowed to watch much television when Bobby
was around, and having unlimited access to my
own television was thrilling. Life with Bobby and
Debbie had never afforded the luxury of a stable
sleep pattern, so even medicated I had trouble
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staying asleep throughout the night. Though the
medications made me sleep odd hours, I became
a faithful fan of prime time programming,
especially
Charlie’s Angels
,
Buck Rogers
,
CHiPs
,
Fantasy Island
and
Love Boat
. It was never a
problem getting the staff to change channels for
me. Everyone that stopped by was eager to make
me happy. The staff brought me snacks,
magazines, and comic books. In the middle of the
night, I would talk to doctors, nurses and
orderlies just to pass the time.
One day I got a visit from someone who did not
work at the hospital. She was tall, dark haired,
and soft-spoken. She introduced herself, but I did
not pay attention to her name. I was young, but
since being introduced to sexual activity I had an
uncommon awareness of and attraction to
beautiful women. Staring at her brought me into
my new fantasy world of loving Kelly Garrett
from
Charlie’s Angels
. In my mind this stranger and
I lived happily ever after, until she said the words
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“protective custody.” Instantly, I was back in my
hospital bed talking to a social worker. I had
heard the words protective custody before.
Several times during our visits to the welfare
offices, Debbie had been threatened with
protective custody. After Matthew’s dalliance into
foster care, I came to have a better understanding
of what the words really meant. She didn’t say
where we were going, but she promised me that I
would not be going back to the Village. The
statuesque woman lulled me back into my fantasy
family life, as she spoke of taking me with her as
soon as I could leave the hospital. All of a sudden,
leaving the spoiling comforts of the hospital could
not come soon enough. She left me with a quick
kiss on the forehead and a promise to come back
as soon as I was able to walk on my own.
Standing and walking took on a new urgency now
that I believed I was going home with one of
Charlie’s Angels
. I had been ready to get out of the
bed for some time, but every time I tried, the pain
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was nearly unbearable. Meeting Karen, the new
social worker, was all the motivation I needed.
The nurse warned that I would feel a “little sting”
as she eased the catheter out. The sting was more
like a stabbing, as the seemingly endless tube was
pulled free. I clenched the bedrails and did my
best to keep my body still. With the casts off, the
infections cleared, and cuts healed, the catheter
was the last thing keeping me from being fully
mobile. At the final tug the relief I felt was
indescribable. After wiping my legs dry, my nurse
lowered the bedrails and took my hands. She sat
me up and coaxed me out of the bed. Having not
used my legs much since the casts came off, the
nurse lifted them gently and draped them over
the side of the bed. I cried the moment my feet
touched the ground, but with the nurse
supporting my weight and steadying me as I
went, I made it the few steps to the doorway and
back again. Standing up and looking down the
hallway was overwhelming. I was crying from the
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pain, but also the joy, of walking. All of the staff
in the hallway clapped, as I emerged into the
stark white hall. I was embarrassed from the
attention, and that everyone had seen me crying.
The nurse quickly escorted me back into the
room, where she eased me back into my bed. She
didn’t say anything as she left me crying quietly in
my bed.
Days later, my room was half-filled with balloons
for my “Going Home” party. I had cried my way
through walking rehab, but after a few days and
many trips back and forth to the bathroom, I was
told I was ready for discharge. Karen had been
by several times encouraging me to get better,
and with each visit I was more invigorated. Now
it was time to leave all of my hospital friends, and
I was more than ready to go home with Karen.
During my stay in the hospital, I had been able to
put all thoughts of living with Bobby, Debbie, and
Matthew out of my mind. On her last visit, Karen
had told me she would be taking me to a foster
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home, where I would live with Matthew and
some other children. Until she mentioned
Matthew’s name, I had believed that Karen was
taking me home to live with her. She may have
mentioned foster care to me during an earlier
visit, but since our first meeting, I had only
thought of living with Karen.
Matthew was waiting in the hall when I was
wheeled out of my room in a wheel chair with all
of my new clothes, toys, and magazines that the
staff had brought for me packed into plastic bags
on my lap. Though I had been walking on my
own for a while, I was not allowed to walk out of
the hospital. Seeing Matthew made me