Looking back on my tumultuous childhood, I remember many details. But it's funny the things I don't remember — like whether I actually had a stomach ache when I called my mom from school that day in May 1969.
I might have just made the whole thing up.
But I do remember thinking that my secret had to come out before my baby did. I could not believe that I was nearly eight months along and still no one in my family, none of my friends, none of my teachers seemed to notice I was pregnant.
I sure couldn’t fathom a heart-to-heart with my mother. She was not the heart-to-heart kind. So I called her from school, told her my stomach hurt and begged her to make a doctor's appointment for me. He would figure it out. I would make the doctor tell her.
Mom made it clear I had disrupted her day.
“You’d better have a stomach ache because if you don’t have one now, you’ll have one when you get home,” she snapped back into the phone. She talked a tough game, but she never followed through on threats like that.
Still.
I was only in eighth grade, so my mom had to come into the exam room with me. I banked on that. I settled in on the exam table, and she was in a chair behind me. I knew what was coming, so I had difficulty looking any of the adults in the eye. But finally, when Dr. White put his hand on my swollen belly, he asked me the question — and I gave the answer — Mom needed to hear.
“So when was your last period?” he asked knowingly.
I could not see Mom’s reaction to the question, and I could not hear her stir, either.
“I don’t know. October? September?”
I just could not make myself look back at my mother. I remained facing forward, my eyes locked on the middle button of the doctor’s white lab jacket. I finally lifted my eyes to his when he asked, “Do you know that you’re pregnant?”
I began to cry.
“Yeah, I think that I know that.”
Now, finally, my mother did, too.
She started talking with the doctor. I tried to follow their conversation, but I do not remember any details. At some point, though, Dr. White gave me a pelvic exam and then a due date — I think it was June 15 or maybe June 18.
The doctor left the room, and Mom and I were alone. Neither of us said a word. We just looked at each other. When the doctor finally returned, he gave Mom some pamphlets and a few further instructions that I don’t recall. Then we left.
At no point after our departure did I think, “Boy, I’m gonna get it when I get home.” But I prayed I would never have to look at my mother again. I was so ashamed.
Mom was eerily stoic. Her face betrayed no emotion. She did not scoop me up and say, “Oh, honey.” Neither did she yell or curse me. She said nothing to condemn and nothing to comfort. There was just … nothing. The only thing I could imagine running through her mind was, “Oh, hell! How am I going to tell Ernie about this?”
This kind of indifference what I had come to expect from her since long before I got pregnant. Even when my dad was still alive, there was seldom any emotion in the household, except when my parents argued. They could really get a rise out of each other.
I remember one particularly nasty fight when we lived in a small apartment on Limestone Street in Springfield, Ohio. My brothers and I were home when the shouting started. I was very young — probably about 5 — and very scared. So I just went to my room and covered my head. My brother Tim came in and told me to be quiet and not make a noise. Ride it out. My oldest brother, Steve, wanted to help our mother, but we convinced him that would only make things worse.
When the fighting ended, neither my mom nor my dad came into the room to check on us, to tell us everything was OK, to soothe us. They knew damn well we heard every bit of it … and saw quite a bit of it, too.
From then on, I knew anger toward my dad was the only emotion I would ever witness from Mom and that I should look elsewhere for nurturing. To her, I always seemed to be a “situation,” something to be managed or concealed, like the black eyes Dad gave her.
And what was true before Dad died remained true on the day he passed, as well.
He had been in the hospital in Dayton for several days, battling some sort of brain injury sustained either around the house or at work. I am not sure which — that was never clearly explained to me. I was only 8, but it was not unusual for the house to be empty when I woke up, or for me to get myself ready for school. This morning, I awoke to find that Tim and Steve were already gone. Someone had left lunch for me in the kitchen, though, so I grabbed it on the way out the door and walked to school.
When I arrived, Mrs. Bandy was standing in an alcove leading to her classroom. She was there most mornings to greet us. But on this day, as I was about to walk in, she pulled me aside.
“Lynette, dear, I’m sorry to hear about your father.”
In the flippant, little-asshole way I had already cultivated by age 8, I replied, “What did he do, die?”
As long as I live, I’ll never forget looking up at her, seeing her eyes widen and her jaw lock for just an instant before replying, “Why yes, honey, he did.”
Stunned, I ran home. Still no one there. I do not remember what I did that day, but eventually — hours later — Mom came home. I told her what Mrs. Bandy had said. She matter-of-factly informed me that my father was indeed dead. There were no tears, no hugs, no kissing. She just relayed the necessary information, then went about making funeral arrangements and reviewing life insurance policies.
I was neither consulted nor informed about any of the arrangements. I went to the funeral but not the visitation. Maybe that was all because of my age. Maybe Mom was just trying to shield me. Whatever her intention, though, it seemed to me I did not have her permission to process what had just occurred.
So for obvious reasons, my mom was a real puzzle to me growing up. Only when I got older and traded recollections with my brothers about our upbringing did her distance make any sense to me at all. Over time, I realized that sorrow followed Mom from her earliest years. She was an orphan raised primarily by her grandparents but also shuttled between aunts and uncles a good bit, as well. I think they raised her in regimented environments, where she got along by conforming quickly and asking few questions. I suspect that she felt like an imposition everywhere she was sent and that she did not receive much nurturing.
As a consequence, she never learned to nurture her children, either. And the punishment life dealt her never seemed to end. After her parents died, Mom lost a sister at age 16, a daughter at age 1, then, her husband just shy of age 39.
For his part, Dad was something of a wild man, and that probably explains why he appealed to Mom. Perhaps only someone so untamed could drill deep enough to tap what little emotion remained in her. Dad was not without a heart. Occasionally, he allowed Steve and Tim's friends to stay with us when they were having problems at home. (Ironic, wasn’t it?) Once, we took in a boy from a local children’s home.
Nonetheless, I always figured Mom and Dad’s sometimes-violent relationship was more a result of his demeanor than hers.
Gerald Arthur Rigel was born of rugged, Eastern European stock. His great-grandfather migrated to the United States from Bohemia in the 1850s at age 18 and became a prominent farmer in Linn County, Iowa. But three generations of North American refinement were insufficient to smooth my dad’s rough edges. He liked to brawl, and I think many Fridays, he took his paycheck to the local tavern and tried to double it with his fists.
He also tried to infuse his sons with the same tenacity. My oldest brother, Steve, was somewhat small in stature, like me, and if a kid picked on him, Dad would make Steve fight him. Then for good measure, Dad would find the kid’s father and kick his ass, too.
Dad and Mom were an odd couple when it came right down to it, quite unalike. I have many memories of Mom sitting quietly in a chair, drinking her tea and reading a book. She was remarkably intelligent, graduated early from high school despite all the tumult of her childhood, and also had a college degree, not common for a woman back then. Mom was not mean. She was just tragically detached.
Mom’s second marriage did not seem much different to me than her first, except the black eyes stopped.
After Dad died in November 1963, she worked hard to provide for us, but she did little more than before to care for us. One of the first times I called home sick from school, it was to tell Mom my period had started. I was in fourth grade. My teacher, Mrs. Filson, a very large lady, took me into the girls restroom and gave me a very large Kotex. I had no idea what to do with it, but I sort of figured it out on my own. I had little choice. Mom was not much help.
Her first and only attempt to tell me about the birds and the bees consisted of — I am not kidding — “don’t get your feet wet.” What the hell does that even mean? I tell you what, though, after that, I was pretty damn serious about keeping my feet dry, which was particularly challenging during Springfield’s rain and snow seasons. Boots became very important to me.
I’m not sure exactly when Mom started dating Ernie. His wife died in 1964, so it had to be after that. I don't know how they met, either, but once they started going out, she was never home. After work, she put food on the table for us, dressed up, and then out the door she went.
One year, around Christmas time, Ernie came to our place and asked if our family would come to his house for the holiday. He posed the question to me, implying the decision was mine. That was ridiculous. Of course it was really up to Mom, and of course her decision had already been made. I did not care one way or another, though, so I just said, “OK,” then resumed whatever it was Ernie had interrupted. But that is how the Rigels came to spend their first Christmas with the Oesterles. I can still remember what Ernie bought me — a pair of green pants, a green shirt and a green sweater.
Mom and Ernie married in February 1965. I was the youngest of Mom’s three living children. Ernie’s daughter, Cindy, was the oldest of his three children, and we were the same age — she was born just nine days before me. I think they thought that, for that reason alone, we would really hit it off. And to be honest, we got along just fine. It’s just that she was very, very different from me. I was a budding free spirit. She was as straight-laced as they come. A serious student. Dutiful daughter. Literally, a Girl Scout.
I got along pretty well with my step-brothers, Doug and Rob, too. I do not think Ernie liked me much, though. I don’t think Ernie liked anybody, actually. He was not abusive or mean, but always much smarter than the next guy, or so he thought. And I got the distinct impression I was little more to him than an impediment to my mother’s full attention.
Shortly after Dad died, Mom sold the house they owned, and she rented half of a double unit. When she remarried, Mom and I moved into Ernie’s house. It was crowded and odd. Ernie lived in his childhood home with his three children. In fact, to that point, he had never left his childhood home. His father was still alive and still living there, too, in a tiny, upper-story bedroom, across the hall from the bedroom Cindy and I would share. He got assistance from a live-in caretaker, Mary.
Ernie certainly needed help with his father. He was advanced in years and nearly mad after a botched surgery to treat a brain aneurysm. He said and did all sorts of weird things. We literally had to tie a rope around the refrigerator to keep him out because he was apt to rummage through it, shoveling into his mouth leftovers, ice cream and anything else he could scoop up with his bare hands.
His caretaker was nearly as strange and off-putting.
Mary was smelly and obese, with very greasy hair. She often complained that her scalp itched, and she would sit in a living room chair and implore us children to come scratch her head. It was absolutely disgusting. I flatly refused, so Mary hated me.
I did not have to endure her for long, however. When Mom and I moved in, Mom quit her job and became a full-time homemaker. Mary was fired and booted out of the house. She was not at all happy about that decision. I suspect she thought she would be the one to marry Ernie, who would inherit the house when his father died. She would have been set for life as far as she was concerned.
But as far as Ernie was concerned, Mom was a considerable upgrade. She kept a very tidy house — scrubbed it like it was a crime scene, in fact. Mom was a real clean freak. I got that from her. I like cleaning, too.
I stayed away from the house if at all possible, though, and Mom and Ernie seemed happy to let me run free. If I could go to a friend’s house after school, I did that. But I never invited people over to my house. I did not like it there. It never felt like home.
But for all the dysfunction that followed me from my Dad’s home to Ernie’s, I must hand it to him — we never lacked for anything, materially speaking. We had a cottage at the lake and a boat. When I was in junior high school, Ernie purchased a five-acre parcel of old farmland that was surrounded by new development. There, he built a sizable new house, constructing much of it himself — he was quite handy — finishing the bathrooms and installing all the house’s plumbing. He also did most of the painting.
The whole family got involved in the project, too. The only time I was under Ernie’s roof and not running wild was during the house’s construction.
And I hated it.
We crammed into the car every day after school and were hauled off to paint or sand baseboards. Boy, I grew to hate sanding.
Once the house was built, it was really quite nice, though. We even had a pool and purchased a large, color console television for the living room. We moved in during my eighth-grade year.
One might think that working shoulder-to-shoulder with family to construct such a nice, new house would have marked a turning point in my home life. But sanding baseboards together does not make for emotional attachments. So once we moved in, my routine was not much different than in the old house. I continued to seek social connections wherever I could find them, and that was outside our shiny, new home. I met a few new kids in the neighborhood, many older than me. I was accepted, but in part because I tried very hard to fit in.
Too hard, in fact.
And to the extent Mom and Ernie paid any attention, I’m sure they thought I was just a hellion. A brat. Uncontrollable. And, honestly, I was.
So while I was trying to fit in with the older neighborhood kids, I got pregnant.
Incredibly, that still seemed to win me no attention from Mom. Because if Dr. White told her something she already knew, Mom never said so, and her indifference to me changed little once she learned this.
The hours and days after that doctor’s visit were a whirl. We did not go directly home. First, we went to my brother Steve’s house and told him and his wife, Diana, about my condition. I don’t remember much of the conversation. Specifically, I cannot recall if I was being talked to or talked about. Whatever the case, Mom and I then went home, and she broke the news to Ernie. I do not really remember that conversation, either, and I imagine I just went to my room, covered up my head and prayed I never had to come out.
But at some point — either that evening or the next day — I was presented three choices.
The first of these options was to let Steve and Diana raise my child. If I ever got to the point where I was ready to do it alone, I could take over. Or I could allow them to continue on as the parents. Tim, who by this time was also out of the house and married, made the same offer.
The second possibility was to let Mom and Ernie raise my child. That was a non-starter for me.
I should pause here to mention that, in Ohio at that time, abortion was not a legal option, although that did not matter — I would not have chosen it, anyway. I knew a little person was growing inside of me, and I could not fathom killing the little one somersaulting in my belly, no matter how embarrassing and stressful pregnancy was for me and everyone around me.
Well, stressful for those around me who knew, I should say.
Even though the new house was larger and more modern than the old one, I still shared a bedroom with Cindy. As with Mom, I do not think she ever realized what was happening with me. Each night of my pregnancy, I pulled the trundle from beneath the bed and lay there beside her. Night after night, as she drifted off to sleep mere inches from me, I could feel my baby kicking inside my belly. The little flutter was like a friend, someone I was responsible for, someone I was connected to like no one else in my life.
But I would wake up in denial, thinking I just needed to continue as if nothing were out of sorts. I still went to football games on Friday nights. I still went to sleepovers at my friends’ houses. Empire dresses were in style back then, so my clothes were loose-fitting. I was petite, anyway, and no one seemed to notice. I guess Mom wasn’t the only oblivious one.
But babies have a way of commanding your attention and snapping you back to reality. Once, in science class, I felt him kicking up a storm. I hunched over my belly with a nervous smile, cutting my eyes to the students sitting at the black-topped lab tables around me, sure that someone must have seen my stomach moving. But for all my shame and embarrassment, I was overwhelmed by joy because the fluttering told me my child was safe and healthy. There could not be anything wrong with him if he were performing such acrobatics, right?
I did not return to that science lab or any other class after my doctor's visit. Mom went to the school, got all my assignments for the rest of the year, then collected my books and brought them to me.
By then, I had made my decision.
I knew I was too young and too crazy to care for a child and that it would be quite some time before I was ready to do so. And I did not want Ernie or my mother to have a strong hand in raising this child in the meantime. For the same reason, I would not impose this responsibility upon my brothers, either, though their offers to do so touched me deeply. Not only would this have been a burden upon them, I also believed that even if Steve or Tim had assumed the responsibility — even temporarily — somehow my Mom would be in charge. I could not stand for that. Mom and Ernie were not loving; they were not kind; they were not emotional. Why would I subject my baby to an environment I could not stand myself?
So I chose the third option — adoption.
Mom, Ernie and I worked hard to make sure as few people as possible found out about my pregnancy. That campaign extended even into our own house. Cindy, Doug and Rob knew nothing about my condition. Mom told them I had become so incorrigible that I was getting shipped to Iowa to live with relatives for a while. I guess my step-siblings found that believable.
In reality, I would spend the next six weeks in Columbus, Ohio, at the Friends Rescue Home for unwed mothers. Knowing now how everything would eventually work out and that this place was a lifeline for my son, I suppose I should be grateful for my experience there. On a certain level, I am.
But I was about to enter a home that would provide no more warmth or nurturing than the home I was temporarily leaving. It left a bit of a scar.
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