#17: Whisper Campaign

“There are people so addicted to exaggeration that they can’t tell the truth without lying.”

~ Josh Billings

During September 2017

While I was out of work, I didn’t have use of a cell phone as Wayne had held onto my cell phone since my incarceration. I believed he held onto my phone to shelter me from calls from friends and family, allowing me to rest and recover. Perhaps too, he needed information from my phone to call my office and let them know I’d be out. Oddly, Wayne kept my phone charged, turned on, and answered it when it rang. I heard him tell people that I wasn’t available and he wanted people to give us privacy. Who died? It reminded me of what people say when there’s a tabloid death (and/or scandal). I imagined my friends were paparazzi looking for a comment or statement. But I was alright with his screening as I didn’t know what to say to people. My world was upside down and sideways.

Because of his comments about us needing privacy, I thought Wayne was being very circumspect with information about my deplorable circumstances, but I found out later that I was wrong.

My hospital stay was years ago, but in all this time I’ve only told the story to a handful of people that needed to know, preferring to keep that whole episode of my life private. I really want to forget it ever happened, but that one long weekend would shape every facet of my life over the next many years. I knew it wouldn’t be easy, but I never planned on telling another soul about the indignity, horror and shame that I experienced that weekend. I planned on telling everyone that I was not able to make events, was busy at home, was ill, or whatever it took to get people distracted and onto another subject. Of course, with a broad circle of friends, who overlap, it was unlikely that my absence wasn’t felt and definitely noticed at certain times. Certainly my radio silence was a cause for concern given my nature of keeping touch with practically everyone I’ve ever met. So I prepared myself for what to say, how to be vague, how to deflect and so on. I forgot one small thing. That Wayne would be out and running into some of those very people.

The friends I communicated with regularly, who met me at parties or luncheons, were leaving messages and trying to reach me. They would leave a one or two messages, getting more urgent, concerned, impatient or annoyed. If they got emotional enough to seek resolution, they would contact Wayne. Like, they tried me, I didn’t reply, something must be wrong, ask Wayne what’s up. I think that’s how it probably went. Some calls never reached that level of curiosity or concern and were able to be ignored. I figured too, that since my circle of friends were also friends to each other, that gossip or information would be shared once discovered. Another reason I wanted to be mum. Those that did reach Wayne would be able to share his information broadly. Women are like telegraphs, able to cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time.

Surprisingly, I had very few friends that asserted themselves into my life during this time, as most chose to give us space. I assume that was due to Wayne’s spiel about needing privacy.

Over time a few friends have brought up the subject of what they had heard or assumed happened to me. I can specifically recall the first three times when a friend would retell their version of what they heard via Wayne about my dropping out of society for a period.

The first person was my grocery clerk. Wayne and I went grocery shopping together once a week, a practice we’d had for 20 some years. I know many women hate grocery shopping but for me it was an enjoyable outing, not only because I consider myself a foodie and enjoy thinking about and planning our meals for the week, but more because it was a chance to spend time together. And we took advantage of that time to enjoy each other. We would often shop, hand-in-hand through the store. We didn’t mind waiting for service at the deli counter as we took that opportunity to whisper “I love you”, or hug, and even kiss. (My friend Mary thought it cute when she spotted us in the grocery store kissing like a young couple newly dating). We might have been in our late 40’s but we were still madly in love and enjoyed each other’s touch and caress, especially while doing our mundane activities.

Going to the same grocery store we were friendly with the regular clerks. When we went to check out, we would choose the line based on the clerk we wanted to talk with, not how long the individual line was. I’m sure that the grocery store staff thought it odd when they didn’t see Wayne and I together as usual. I discovered just how odd when one of the grocery clerks left a message on our answering machine at home. Wayne must have shared the information about me being locked up and crazy because the man left a message to be sure that I was ok after my breakdown. Maybe he didn’t use that exact word, but it sounded like he thought I went crazy. I don’t know what Wayne said. I didn’t ask, because I didn’t want to know. I felt horrible that the man was so traumatized for me. I assumed he was confused about what Wayne must have said.

Another friend retold the story about when her husband, Mitchell, and Wayne, ran into each other at a local brewery. Their meeting happened within a month of my hospital stay. As the men talked, Wayne shared some information with Mitchell about my status. Mitchell left immediately to tell his wife about their conversation. According to my friend, her husband was left with a sense of criticality, believing that I had tried to commit suicide. Mitchell thought Wayne was behaving oddly and suspiciously and he told his wife that she needed to check on me immediately and find out what was going on. I can’t imagine what Wayne might have said to leave Mitchell with the impression that I had attempted suicide. Since I didn’t hear the story from this friend until a year or so after the long weekend, I had no idea that Wayne scared our friends so badly. And I couldn’t imagine how Mitchell would have gotten it so wrong, that I assumed my friend misinterpreted her husband’s details. You know, like the telephone game.

Just like in the telephone game, where you sit in a circle and someone starts by whispering a message in another’s ear, then each person whispers what they heard to the next person. The last person announces the message to the group. Usually, the message is wildly different than how it starts out. I don’t know what Wayne said to our friends, but people ended up with different interpretations or versions of my situation. One friend of mine relayed the story about running into Wayne in a parking lot at the grocery store. When my friend inquired after the family, Wayne replied that everything was fine, but he didn’t want her to come by. She was told that our family needed some time alone to heal and that she needed to respect our privacy. Her impression was one of me being ill and needing to recover from a physical illness. She found it odd, but not necessarily alarming.

At the time, I assumed Wayne was keeping mum about everything and that people would just think I was busy at work, or had the flu, since I had been avoiding everyone. Looking back now, I was naïve to think that my privacy would remain intact given Wayne was spreading his version of my weekend like a Covid virus super-spreader. I had no idea the drama that Wayne’s blabbering would incite behind the scenes as people compared stories.

As I returned to work, blissfully ignorant of Wayne’s actions, I knew that my absence was sure to have raised questions among the large group of people that I interacted with on a daily basis. Surely my coworkers would be curious or concerned. I would have to deal directly with their questions and concerns as I returned to work. I worried about my image, knowing that people love to gossip, and my absence was good office fodder. I determined to offer a standard reply. I’d keep it minimal to something about being out for personal reasons. Monday would definitely be stressful.

I often think back to these stories from my friends, and Wayne’s insistence that I stay home on disability, looking for clues. The feeling everyone took away from their interaction with him was that his wife had a serious problem, be it illness, private issue, or suicide. All deeply concerning to those who talked with him. Yet, I was taking care of house, family, parents, myself, and going back to work. Why did he paint such a portrait for people? Was he trying to appear a strong, caring husband? Did he like sympathy from our friends for his plight? Did he want me to be a basket case? Did he want people to think I was crazy? Was I really crazy and didn’t know it? Psychotic, like he said? Getting worse, maybe even becoming schizophrenic? And what was he thinking this meant to our children? Was he thinking about how his stories would cause some blowback to our kids? Was he worried that they would have to carry the burden of a mother who attempted suicide? And was he concerned about the judgement they’d get from others? If I had known these stories at the time, we could have planned a strategy to manage the fallout from my long weekend. Wayne’s a smart man. He must have known, and even planned his moves, but that would mean that he intentionally ignored the implications to our children. And I just couldn’t believe that. Yet.

Photo by Kristina Flour on Unsplash