Whack!

A rock hit my head, and I opened my eyes.

Where am I? It’s dark in my bedroom so this must be the middle of the night.

I tried to brush my arm across my forehead. 

Whack!

Suddenly I was wide awake. Ouch! I whimpered. Why does my arm feel like a rock?

Then my mind flooded with images. Falling off the monkey bars just after I came back to boarding school for second grade. Driving an hour into the big city of Jos, Nigeria. Getting an x-ray of my arm. The doctor pressing a mask over my face. Then everything going black.

I must still be in the hospital.

The sharp smell of antiseptic filled my nose as I lay there, shivering. I pulled the thin sheet up over my shoulders. Why can’t I go back home to Egbe and live with my family on our mission station?

I called out. “Someone, please help me. I’m cold.”

Tears filled my eyes. Can anybody hear me? I want my Mommy to come here.

A nurse walked in and turned on the bedside lamp. “What’s wrong? Why did you call?”

I squinted my eyes from the light. “I banged my head with this heavy thing. It’s as hard as a rock.”

“That’s your plaster cast. It will protect your wrist until it’s healed. It’s heavy for your skinny arm, but you’ll soon get used to it.”

In the dim light, I looked around at the bare room. The only thing on the walls was a clock. I’m glad they fixed my arm, and it didn’t break off like my dolly. But I don’t like being in this strange place all alone.

I shivered again. “I’m freezing. Can I have another blanket?”

“You’ve kicked your blanket off, so of course, you’re cold.” She bent over, picked it up off the floor, and spread it over me. “You don’t need another one.” Her voice was hard, just like the cast.

After she hurried off, I sighed. I’m just a bother.

The cast stretched up past my elbow, and I patted the bulky, white beast. Then I tested it, slowly lifting my arm up, down, and around. I can’t bend my elbow even a little bit. How will I ever do anything?

It took me a long time to get back to sleep. I was still shivering, and the scolding made me feel even colder.

Back to Kent Academy

The next morning, I was unusually anxious to go back to K.A. The dorm wasn’t anywhere near as nice as home, but at least it was familiar, and I was getting used to the other kids. Except for the other Debbie in my class.  Debb was big and loud and often played mean tricks. Even though her name was just like mine, I didn’t like her much.

The van driver dropped me off near the dining room just in time for supper.  A group of girls gathered around to comfort me and one of them said, “I’m so sorry you broke your arm.” It felt good to be noticed and to have sympathy.

Friends helped me carry my things. In the dining room, someone cut up my meat and potatoes and spread butter on my bread. I didn’t feel quite as lonely or homesick.

Often, I felt frustrated because it was hard to do anything with my arm trapped in the cast. I couldn’t bend my elbow. Getting dressed and doing room chores like sweeping and dusting were awkward with only one good arm. But I still had to do my best to do my share.

On the way to breakfast the next morning, my brother Larry, a big third grader, walked beside me. “I’m glad you came back from the hospital. Can I sign your cast?” 

I held out my arm but pulled it back. “It still hurts!”

“You don’t have to let people sign it. I’ll stick up for you.”

I put my good arm around his waist. “Thank you, Larry.”

Debbie the Terror

The next day on the playground, Debb ran up and crashed into me. I lost my balance but caught myself before I fell. “Look out!”

I cradled my right arm to protect it. “Why are you always a bully?”

Feeling the weight of my cast, I grinned. “Now I’m going to get back at you!”  I raised my arm high and swung at her head.

She backed away a few steps. “That thing is really hard. If you thump me, it’ll hurt.” Then she laughed. “Now I’m not the only bully. You are too! But you won’t hit me because you’ll hurt yourself.”

I swung my arm at her head again, and she ducked.

“Okay, Okay! I won’t tease you. Just don’t bash me with your cast.”

I smiled and started walking toward the school building. I had become Debbie the Terror.

Debb skipped along beside me. “I’m sorry you think I’m mean.” She shook her head, and her short, red hair flipped from side to side. “At home, we tease each other a lot, and I just like to laugh and kid around. Why don’t you think it’s funny?” She looked down at the ground and scuffed her shoe back and forth. “I promise I won’t be mean to you when you get your cast off.”

“I don’t want you to bump into me like that.”

“I’ll try not to. And please don’t whack me with your cast.”

No More Monkey Business

If only she would’ve been allowed to help me with my schoolwork. Writing was terribly hard. Eventually, I had fun trying to use my other hand, and I got good at being left-handed.

In bed at night, I got used to sucking my left thumb instead of my right. It wasn’t as comforting, but I couldn’t get to sleep without it.

After a couple of weeks, my arm started itching inside the cast. I tried using a stick, a ruler, a clothes hanger—anything I could find—to scratch the itch.

The day finally came when the K.A. nurse took my cast off in her office.

“Phew!” I said, “What is that smell?” Inside the cast, my arm was wrinkled, sweaty, and awfully stinky. The nurse washed it off.

For the rest of the semester, I stayed away from the climbing gym on the playground. No more monkey business on the monkey bars for me!

Looking Back on My Childhood

While writing this story, I asked my mom, “When did you find out I broke my arm?”

She said, “I probably received a radio message, but it would have been after you returned to K.A. from the hospital. So, there was no way I could have flown up and stayed with you.” Her voice broke. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t with you during this traumatic time.”

When she said that on the phone, I could hear the pain in her voice. I felt enveloped in a warm hug and finally felt the love that was missing all those years ago.

This month, as I chatted online with friends about this incident, it warmed my heart that people remembered me breaking my arm. For some reason, I thought I was a quiet, reserved, little mouse at K.A. and assumed no one would recall any details of my life. I didn’t realize how much the others cared—so much so that they remember this incident when it wasn’t even their arm.

Overall, the experience pushed me into a new stage of maturity. Because I was weak and skinny, I got teased a lot and often felt rejected. The much-needed sympathy soothed me with positive attention.

My memories of this event were mostly dominated by pain and loneliness, as that part matched many other experiences. But revisiting this and communicating with others led me to understand my schoolmates did care about me, even though I rarely could hang onto that feeling.

After the injury, I viewed K.A. differently. Things got easier because I learned to stand up for myself on the playground and in the dorm. I finally felt like I could hold my own with teasing by both girls and boys. No longer did I back down from Debb.

Lately, I’ve renewed my friendship with my old nemesis. During our school days, she went by Debbie F. and I was Debbie J. Now she goes by Debb, so I’m using that in the story to differentiate between us.

What I Know Now

In a three-hour phone call with her this month, the red-headed powerhouse said, “I knew I deserved a cast-whack from you, and I was relieved when it came off. After that, I had more respect for you.” Then she added, “I really was a bully, and I sincerely apologize.”

“In my home, teasing was a form of affection,” she continued. “At school, I’d do stuff I thought was funny, only to later find out I’d hurt someone. I never intended to push people away. I just wanted them to laugh.”

Now I’m able to appreciate there’s much more to Debb than what I perceived all those years ago. As adults, we gain understanding. Kids think everything is about them and think they’re the only ones who are insecure, struggling, or hurting.

As we get older, we know that when someone behaves poorly towards us, it most often stems from how they feel about themselves not from how they feel about us. As we mature, we’re more able to talk about it, consider how the other person is feeling, and work out our differences.

A friend of mine from K.A., Maribeth Poole has a wonderful website and blog. As a therapist, she teaches a course to help us to “Learn about attachment patterns and how you can grow into an increasing secure attachment style. Increase your relational capacity and help those around you by applying the teachings in this course.” You can find it here.

Link It to Your Life

How did you feel as a kid? Did you put on an air of false bravado? Did you try to hide unnoticed in the shadows? How have you been able to process that and perhaps reconnect with someone who you didn’t understand well in childhood?

            Thank you, Father, that you help us mature and understand. Give me the grace to be able to reconcile with someone who is willing. Amen

 “…We know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.” Romans 5:3b-4

To read more about how I came to be living in a dorm in Nigeria, click on my About page here.