Next he decided to buy seventy-five rabbits. No one else supported the rabbit business because we all knew he would wind up forcing his children to take care of them, even though he promised he would not. I would pick loud sheep over stinky rabbits any day. Datt penned the rabbits up in a barn, and while they could not get out or make loud noises like the sheep did, they pooped a hundred times a day, and soon the building filled up with manure we had to haul out. The odor from the rabbits and manure grew so severe no one had any interest in taking care of them. For his part, though, Datt kept his promise and did his best to raise the rabbits as much as he could himself.
The farm kept us busy. The boys worked for other Amish people at both a sawmill plant and a metal shop business. The girls worked in the house and helped on the farm from sun up until sun down; there was never any time to relax and enjoy life. Sarah and I finally got used to having a double workload, and our punishment eventually seemed less severe.
§
I believed there was another world out there, if only I knew how to escape this one. I was not looking for just any kind of escape, but I knew there was a destiny beyond my understanding. I knew it would be revealed to me if I persisted.
I thought I had someone to help me make my escape, but that changed when our neighbor lady, Nina, died of a sudden heart attack. I had been cleaning her house for three years, and at one point I confessed to her I wanted to run away from the Amish. I do not think she took me seriously since almost every child goes through a stage where running away sounds like a good idea. However, she said she would help me find a place to stay if I waited until I was eighteen. We did not talk much about it because I was still only fifteen at the time, but I kept my eyes and ears open for any opportunity to learn more about the outside world. Meanwhile, I planned the escape in my head. The plan included Nina helping me even though I was a little scared of her; I was certain she hated Amish people, but it was probably just in my head. She was not always the friendliest woman towards my family, and her goddess-like personality made me very insecure with the way I lived. And being unable to speak much English did not help my confidence.
After Nina died, I started thinking of other people who could help me. I was not sure about Roger anymore, since I could no longer communicate with him. It took me a while to realize it, but there was one other person, an outsider who had been around the family for a while. I did not think about asking him for help at first because he had a close connection with my parents. That could have spelled disaster because there was no way I wanted them to find out what was on my mind.
I met Virgil one day when he stopped by the farm to chat with my father about horses. After that, he started showing up on a regular basis, and eventually I met his wife Jolene. They were the nicest people I had ever met, and I was flattered they would visit the farm. Virgil had a charming and opinionated personality, which created some tension between him and Datt. Sometimes the questions Virgil asked about the Amish lifestyle made me want to bury myself because I knew Datt did not appreciate an outsider digging for answers he could not explain. Amish would rather just leave questionable actions under the rug and live quietly as they were raised to do. Most of the tension originated from questions asked about church, or Christianity, and education. None of those subjects ever made sense to me. It was complicated.
Despite the embarrassment, I was drawn to Virgil and Jolene because I was curious about the English world more than ever. I needed to hear everything possible, as it gave me hope for my future escape. I did not have enough guts to ask many questions about what it was like to live as they did. All I could do was observe silently. Mem and Datt would have become concerned if I began to ask too many questions.
In late 2004, when I was sixteen, and after Levi had left the Amish and I struggled with the dating scene, I started to get headaches regularly, and had to get some doctoring done. During this time, I finally had to think about giving up my plans to leave the Amish. It felt like I was having bad nightmares, horrible dreams that had been going on for years. Circumstances forced me to plan the escape by myself, and it was taking a toll on my health. I was confused and angry with my life, but I blamed myself for my unhappiness because I thought if I just behaved better, then I would feel better. I had been caught sitting in Roger’s vehicle, and Datt had found out I had hidden four radios in my room. I had a nervous breakdown and thought for sure God was finally punishing me, just like I had always expected.
My sickness became worse and I started to throw up and feel very weak. All I wanted to do was sleep; once I fell asleep, it was hard for me to wake up. I cried a lot in my room. The only good thing about being sick was I got a break from dating anyone.
My parents hired Virgil to take me to an Amish lady chiropractor and herb doctor about sixty miles away. She massaged my neck then used a small flashlight and looked into my eyes with a magnifying glass. My datt used to do eye readings when I was younger. Amish people from all over the community and surrounding areas would come to him and let him read their eyes. He had a chart which showed a diagram of everything that could be wrong.
Whatever the chiropractor saw in my eyes must have been serious because she talked to Mem in private about it. Later I found out from Virgil the doctor thought I had a tumor on my brain. I did not realize the seriousness of having a possible tumor, so I did not worry too much about it. I went to the Amish doctor a couple more times before she referred me to a quack doctor who specialized in shooting balloons up the nose. The balloon therapy was designed to help people with headaches by relieving the pressure. Quack doctors were not really doctors, but it was the only thing my parents believed in.
The balloon doctor was in a small town in Lathrop, Missouri, out in the middle of nowhere, about eighty miles away from home. The first time I went to see him, both Mem and Datt came with me. Virgil drove. It was okay to hire a driver to go to the doctor, but beyond that, Amish were not allowed to hire a driver. Horse and buggy was the main transportation. I should have been thrilled to get a chance to ride in a car, but I was too sick to care.
When we got to the doctor’s office, I had no idea what to expect. All I knew was he was a quack. After confirming my appointment, I sat down in the waiting room next to Mem. I started to feel paranoid from the small space and the bad, suffocating smell. Oh Good Man, why in the world am I here?
An elderly woman came out from the back room, and as she paid her bill I heard her tell the receptionist how much better she felt. I thought to myself Okay, this can’t be too bad then if she likes it. Soon a tall, long-legged gentleman in a white coat came to the door and called my name. Datt jumped out of his seat and walked to the doctor ahead of me. It annoyed me because the doctor called my name, not his. What is his hurry? I wondered. I did not want Mem and Datt to go back there with me. My English vocabulary was worse when my parents were listening, and I could never say what I wanted because they intimidated me.
I greeted the doctor with a forced smile and a handshake.
“How are you feeling today?” he asked.
“Umm, I am feeling fine,” I lied. My hands were sweaty and cold.
The doctor smiled and said, “Something tells me not to believe you. Don’t be nervous, everything will be all right.”
I followed him to a room behind the receptionist and sat down to answer several questions about why I came to see him. Datt could not keep his mouth shut and tried to answer questions for me. This is why I wanted to be with the doctor all by myself. With Datt butting in, I shut down completely. The doctor proceeded to tell me about the method he planned to perform, and he assured me it would not be bad. I wanted say, Are you kidding me… what you just told me sounds terrible, but I kept my mouth shut and my thoughts to myself.
Soon after the doctor explained everything, a nurse came into the room and arranged a table for me to lie down on. The table was extremely hard. The nurse then pinned my legs, and another person held my head. Then the doctor placed a special kind of balloon, w
hich looked like a gooey white plastic blob, on a pointed piece of pipe. Attached to the pipe was a hand-held device which pumped air through the pipe to fill the balloon while it was shoved up one of my nostrils. They pushed the balloon so far up my nose I felt when it reached the middle of my forehead. Once they had the balloon in place they began to blow a little more air into it and I thought I was going to die. I could not breathe or scream. I grabbed the doctor’s arms but he did not budge when I yanked on him. Everything happened in less than minute, but not fast enough for me. Then they moved to the other nostril. With tears running down my cheeks the doctor had enough pity to let me recover a bit before they did the second side. There is not a word horrible enough to describe how awful that experience actually was.
Once he finished, I left the doctor’s office with no feeling; my brain could not comprehend what I had just gone through. Apparently, the balloons were supposed to relieve some pressure from the brain, but for me it only succeeded in building up more pressure of frustration and anger.
Virgil had stayed outside in the car while I was with the doctor, so when we got back to the car, he asked, “How did it go, Emma?”
I smiled politely, and sarcastically said, “Great, I feel better already.”
My smile and the tone of my voice did not match my true feelings; Virgil did not let on if he noticed. I was far from feeling better, but I could not tell the truth because I felt I needed to say something that would make Mem and Datt feel like they had accomplished something. After all, they were paying for the treatment and I wanted it to work so their money did not go to waste. On the way home, Datt explained to Virgil the whole scenario performed with the balloons. I could tell Virgil was not too happy with Datt’s description because he became unusually quiet. But Datt was too excited to notice. I tried to act as happy as possible in the back seat with Mem, but on the inside I was hurt and angry. I knew I was faking my contentment, but complaining was frowned upon, and having an anger issue was a sin—so I just dealt with it the best I knew how.
As soon as we got home, I went upstairs to my room. I lay down on my bed hoping I could go to sleep, but I started shaking and could not find a place on the bed to relax. I was like a dog, turning around three times before laying down. Except I did it over and over again. I prayed to the Good Man to erase the memory of this day and let me go to sleep.
I went to the same quack doctor four more times after the first visit. Each treatment got worse. At first I did not complain out loud; my parents thought I was getting better because that is what I led them to believe. I thought the sooner I got better the quicker the treatments would end. But the suffering became so unbearable I told them I did not want to continue anymore. I started begging them to try to understand the pain I was going through, but they refused to listen.
I hated it when Datt would brag to other Amish people about the balloon doctor. It was something nobody had ever heard about, so he was proud he was the first one to discover the magic. He made it sound like it was the best thing to cure anything. How could I let him down?
Virgil came by the house almost every day just to visit and pass the time. Every time he dropped in, Mem or Datt would tell me to say I am feeling well if he should ask. Virgil despised the balloon treatment, so my parents decided it would be better if I made him think it was working.
On the fifth trip to the doctor, I turned to Mem and said, “Don’t make any more appointments after this, I can’t handle it anymore.”
“Well, you should talk to Datt about it,” she answered.
That was the exact answer I expected. I clenched my teeth.
“Talking to Datt will do no good because he is so caught up in his newly-found doctor; he would not understand nor will he care how I feel,” I muttered to Mem.
“Maybe just one more time and then we can stop, depending on what the doctor says,” she reassured me.
“No, Mem, we are not going to depend on what the doctor says,” I retorted. “For goodness sake, he’ll have me come for the rest of my life!”
She looked at me sternly, and I knew better than to say another word.
I was angry because I did not know enough English to tell the doctor how I really felt about his abusive treatments, nor was I ever without my parents, which made it much more difficult to communicate my discomfort. The worst part was when Datt answered the questions the doctor asked me, and I knew if I said anything it had to be something my Datt wanted to hear. At one point, I was so mad I wanted to scream at everyone, but I kept it all inside.
There is nothing more frustrating than not being able to express your true feelings. Bottling everything up inside was driving me crazy, but at the same time I had to act like an Amish girl and be submissive and do what the elders thought was best. I knew anger was a waste of space, but for the past two months, instead of the butterflies I normally had fluttering around in my gut in fields of rainbow-flavored stomach acid, I had killer bees buzzing around in an angry swarm.
Several times on the way home after leaving the doctor’s office, Virgil and Datt argued about whether or not the balloons were working. One day Virgil suggested I go to a hospital and have an MRI done, but Datt would not even hear of such a thing. They got into a big tiff over it. I was in the back seat with tears running down my cheeks. Mem did not go with us that time, so it was safe for me to cry without anybody seeing it.
When we got home I decided to ask Datt about the MRI. He was in the living room, sitting in his chair, smoking his pipe, and opening mail. My chance to talk to him was now, or forever hold my peace.
“What is wrong with getting an MRI done?” I asked bluntly.
He looked at me and muttered, “Don’t get that idea in your head.” He threw down a letter he was reading and reclined back in his chair, blowing smoke through his nose.
I was not satisfied so I pressed for more answers.
“But what is so wrong with the idea?” I prodded, hoping for an answer which actually made sense for once.
By now Datt was getting agitated. “It costs too much and the MRI machine is operated with electricity which can cause more health problems.” He paused, then added: “I am sure you asked because Virgil brought it up.”
From the tone of his voice, I knew better than to say anything more. Besides, he would never consider it because an outsider had made the suggestion.
I sat quietly, thinking about what Datt had said and wondered; Is an MRI really that bad? Could it be worse than the balloons? I could not imagine it being more expensive than five trips to the quack doctor, although I did not know how much they had paid for the balloon treatments. I had never been in a hospital except for the day I was born, much less knew what electricity had to do with it, so I just assumed it was really dangerous.
I must have been in tears, because Mem walked into the room and asked, “Are those treatments really that hard on you?”
I could only nod my head. If I said anything now I was going to start crying hysterically. Mem tried to comfort me by telling me that after the next appointment I would not have to go back.
Before my next appointment arrived, I decided to try my best to cancel it without permission from anyone. I wanted to go to the neighbor’s house and use the phone, but running over there would be almost impossible without looking suspicious. Plus I did not know how to use a phone. So I did what I knew best and wrote the doctor a note:
Dear Doctor,
Hopefully you receive this in time because I want to cancel the appointment for Thursday morning. I won’t be scheduling any new appointments.
Sincerely,
Emma Gingerich
P.S. I can’t stand your awful treatments anymore and they are too painful. My Dad might like you, but I don’t.
I put the note in an envelope and wrote down the address, then, to my disappointment, I discovered the stamp book was empty. I did not have enough money to buy a full book so I gathered forty cents in change, taped it to the envelope, and stuck it in the mailbox ho
ping the mailman would take it without a proper stamp. My parents were not at home when I mailed the letter, but I told them about it a couple days later, the day before my appointment. Datt was not too happy, but at least I saved him some money that was going to be wasted anyway.
§
The battle against the headaches continued with a different treatment. I got another checkup at the Amish chiropractor and herb doctor. By then enough time had passed for her to find another experiment for me to try. This time it was at a clinic in Kansas City. This clinic experimented with minerals administered through the veins. I had heard the clinic had just started this method and it was still in the trial stages, but many people were already raving about the results. Of course, my parents climbed on board instantly. Another new journey began. I traveled every Wednesday with a driver to Kansas City to have a needle poked into my arm and a mineral solution injected into my veins. I did not know what it was supposed to do to my body because after each treatment I did not feel any different. It was a waste of time and money, but it was not nearly as rough as the balloon treatment.
One morning I woke up early and could not go back to sleep. My gut told me something was about to change, but I could not put the pieces of the puzzle together. I crawled out of bed and opened the window. A sweet, cool morning breeze blew in as the warm sun climbed up through the trees. Today is going to be a beautiful day, I thought. I had to go to Kansas City again for my appointment at the clinic for the sixth time. I was tired of the needles they stuck into my arm, tired of traveling five hours back and forth, tired of Datt always acting like he knew how I felt, and tired of being trapped by my own headaches. I was slowly getting better physically and had started going to church with the family again, but I was still lost. My desire to get away from the Amish seemed like a dream. While I sat on the bed leaning against the windowsill and daydreaming, the flame ignited in my head: Why couldn’t I go by myself with the hired driver to the clinic? I watched as white fluffy clouds played together in the cyan sky. Suddenly I had a brilliant idea: maybe I could talk to Virgil about my plans if my parents did not go with me.
Runaway Amish Girl Page 8