In season 7, episode 1 of Bob’s Burgers, the family unfortunately all take turns  (to some extent) distort or destroy Louise favorite toy.  Kuchi Kopi. A.K.A: Her doo dee buddy. After she lays down and the family all return her toy (knowing she’ll be uber angry)  When Louise sees Kuchi Kopi in his new form she’s distraught.  She screams.  She tells the family she will never forgive them for this and proceeds into a short song.

I’m Not the Forgiving Type

While I openly admit to being in love with the Bob’s Burgers series, this episode resonates with me for a different reason than one would think.  Sure, Louise Belcher is somewhat sociopathic in ways.  To her, this is a deep scarring in her young life when she’s particularly vulnerable.  It may just be a toy, but she’s also super young and doesn’t really get all the other stuff yet (respectively).  When I first watched that episode, I think it hit a trigger with me that i didn’t quite understand yet.  Now, I do.  Here’s my trigger.

In the past, I’ve commented about how I felt like I was traumatized through my experiences at church.  It was my responsibility as a child to attend the church my family went to.  By the time I was six years old in the Ishpeming, Michigan IALC branch (upstairs), I knew I wasn’t going to be attending this church when I was 18 years old.  Even as a little kid, I knew something was off.  I don’t know if it was the fact that I was scolded for playing with my Barbies in church – or if it was something deeper.  The fact that I saw my older sister Dianne married in the church and no one, not a soul, stood up when she walked down the aisle (as is customary in our church, possibly many others too… but this is my lived experience).  FYI – she was pregnant (very pregnant – like eight months along).  It was everyone that was attendings way of saying, we’re judging the fuck out of you right now.  In my estimation.

Dianne was far from perfect, but she was the first person that I looked up to in my life.  I did things that was reminiscent of her.  Wore two different size earrings in both my ears.  I liked to dress like her.  I wore a beret to school with my funky earrings.  I also smoked cigarettes like she did.  And for the longest time, I wore her coat and listened to the B-52’s.  When she died, it shattered me.  Quite literally shattered my core.  And then there was Stephanie.  After Dianne died – within maybe a year, Stephanie was moving with her father from Upper Michigan (where we lived at the time) to Japan.  We didn’t know about it until the last minute.  Stephanie told my mom that the movers packed her toys.  My mom was aghast.  She knew nothing about the move.  She confronted Duane and he confirmed that they were moving overseas where he’d now be posted with the Air Force.

Things got radically worse when it came to Stephanie and our family.  It seemed as though (from what I heard from my mom) that the grandparent side (Novak’s) resented our family even being acknowledged by Stephanie.  When Stephanie, as a child, referred to her grandma and grandpa Seppanen – her grandfather allegedly said they’re not grandma and grandpa Seppanen.  They’re Ted and Shirley.  And allegedly slapped young Stephanie across the face.  Now, I don’t know if this is true.  I was a kid and I was also highly emotional.  I trusted that everything my mom said was as good as gold, too.  When things stayed tough, seeing Stephanie, the distance just got greater and greater.  The relationship dwindled.  Maybe some day, things will get better.  I hope. 

When my mom went into the coma from October of 1991 until April 1992 and then subsequent vegetative state – I was in the biggest depression I think I had ever faced.  I was going through so many good yet bad things at the same time. Eventually, after I realized my mom wasn’t going to get better (despite my hopes to the contrary) I began to rebel. 

I did realize after a short time that people were looking at me different.  Silently (to me) judging me and how I behaved.  I didn’t have the same feeling when I was at church either.  I didn’t like the process of learning the faith through confirmation.  It was tedious.  I already felt separate and had depression and anxiety.  After the group of us were confirmed in the IALC, there was an initiation activity that was goofy.  I don’t remember what it was, but I had so much anxiety that I was going to be laughed at.  My brother Tim told me there was nothing to worry about and everyone does it.  I cried, I was so anxiety ridden.  I never did go through with it. 

Throughout that time – I continued to feel awful whenever I’d go to church.  I’d avoid people in the church by sitting int he car.  I HATED the male dominated sexist culture.  Only men could sit at the pulpit and women prepared the food in the kitchen.  It was such garbage.  No woman could achieve anything beyond the menial feeding of the people and cleaning.  I guess maybe that explains why as time goes on, I feel more of a feminist.  And I hate the idea of being stuck at some gender preconceived ideology.  I knew I would never fit into their gender based roles. I would not conform.

I think the point when it became the worst was when my mom was in the nursing home.  Prior to this, family was everything.  Particularly from my mom’s side of the family.  I realize that grief does things to people, but the way things were handled was incredibly selfish.  I had rare opportunities to feel like I was a part of something bigger during that point.  Where people felt for me, instead of judging me.  My cousin Mike was taken away from me, I was only allowed to hang out with people under conditions, and when I brought people to church that were not members, they were viewed with suspicion.  When I brought my now ex husband and his friend to church with me – no one sat in the pew with the three of us.  It was like we were pariahs.  There was no welcoming.  It was a sense that they didn’t belong there.   And the exclusion was going to show them this.  And me, by proxy.

It’s a very lonely feeling when you’re subject to this kind of scrutiny.  You’re told that unbelievers are not good.  You’re not allowed to drink or dance.  I understand the idea of drinking at that time.  I was underage.  Dancing?  What is dancing going to do to me?  I wanted nothing more than to fit in and to feel accepted.  Yet at the same time, everything about this experience felt wrong. 

When I started to distance myself from the church, it felt good, yet oddly sad.  I only saw my uncles and aunts on a few rare occasions.  Now, I really have only my aunt Susie on my mom’s side of the family.  My middle name is after her.  My aunt Susie hasn’t had any contact with me since I got married in 2002.  And I have a feeling that was grudgingly.

My aunt Susie was someone I felt so very close to when I was younger.  Her and her children meant the world to me.  Susie was very much like my mom.  When my mom went into the coma, I wanted nothing more than for her to help me.  She did not.  I spent some time in Minnesota with her and my cousins, but beyond me trying to establish a connection with them – I was written out.  The unsaid tells you everything, sometimes.

One could imagine that my life was pretty much scripted by the circumstances that I faced.  That psychology can explain it all.  It’s a wonder why I’ve wanted to be like Darryl Hannah’s character in the movie “Splash”.  I  wanted to be studied like a science project.  Hook me up to a machine that reads my brain waves, sees the activity in my brain.  I wanted said scientist to look at all the information they received through my testings and validate my experiences so I could take the information to the “believers” and say “AHA! I’ve been validated!  I’m NOT bad!”  Science says that children who experience trauma react in different ways.  So many people I went to church with were emotional and/or logical thinkers.  Some of them were teachers, clinicians, etc.  No one helped.  Not a one.  Everyone stood back and watched, like a really bad Truman Show.

I was raped, I was taken advantage of, I was beaten by people that I involved myself with because I was looking for love.  I was absent so much love – it was ridiculous. 

All this time, I’ve fellt unworthy.  And all this time, it was because of those people I was judged by at church. I’ve tried going to other churches in the past – every time I look at a parishioner, I see what I experienced at my old church.  The judgment, the incapacity for compassion.  Because I was an unbeliever.  In my core, I always have been.  I haven’t deserved anything, because that’s how they made me feel.  Not only did I lose my community, but slowly I was losing family members to the RYR2 mutation that wasn’t understood until around 2014-2015. 

So now, I’m 45 years old.  I’ve lost so much in my life.  I have a very small tribe that I’m grateful for.  Yet I rely on them for far too much for so few people.  My brain swirls with activity that I can’t slow down.  And when I realized the depth of the trauma for me and the church, and hearing that song…. my body just went limp.  I had no capacity to imagine life getting any better..  As I slept last night, my subconscious told me how traumatized I am.

Some time ago, I worked at APAC on the Hotwire.com program.  In the duration of that time, I had one phone call that I took that (in my already damaged state – mentally), I collapsed.  Well, not literally.  I couldn’t cope anymore.  I broke down.  After that phone call, I know I took vacation time and I never went back.  I didn’t quit – I just couldn’t do it anymore.  I avoided my supervisors’ phone calls to inquire what happened.  I just broke down and wound up on social security after that. Move to yesterday, about 3:55:

3:55 pm, yesterday. I was writing up a list of things I am good at.  This was five minutes prior to my therapy session.  Why does this matter?  Because in my dream last night, I was working at American Tent, but answering phones like a confused person.  I (for some reason) couldn’t remember the name of the company.  I kept answering the phone saying, thank you for calling Hotwire, my name is Janet – how can I help you?  A person that I spoke to in person at one point asked me how many pieces were going to come with the tent they ordered.  When I asked Linda, my boss and she didn’t know – the customer berated me.  Told me that I was terrible at my job. That likely I should find employment where I’m more suited.  Why this picture matters?  Because I sited my job as something I am good at.  And this trauma with the church reminded me of how I’m afraid of not being good enough – even at the things I deem myself to be good at.

Getting back to the song.  The lyric that struck me the most.  “I’m not the forgiving type”  I’ve been keenly aware that forgiveness happens in stages.  You can’t just proclaim that you’ve forgiven someone – and all the hard work associated is just – POOF!  Gone!  Nope, you continually have to work at forgiveness.  Maybe ad nauseum.  I look at all the fundamental parts of me that the experiences with the church and my upbringing took from me.  I lost my identity.  The idea that I was worthy of anything.  My family, my friends, my children.  Quite literally, I had nothing.  So, now that I know this – will I ever be the forgiving type?  I hope so.  Kuchi Kopi is representative in this case of my self esteem, my self worth.  And my family (in a large part) is my family – but they took from me my favorite thing.  Who I could have been.  Without the abandonment, without the neglect, without the judgment, I might have been okay. 

Now that I’m aware of this, in its entirety, I have to rebuild.  I have to grow.  And I will not allow the IALC to break me.  I am an unbeliever, and dammit, I am good at who I am.  I will rise above.  It’s just going to take more time and effort.  And a wonderful therapist and friends.