Jenny
Karen Anderson’s eyes were fixed on her daughter Jenny. It was hard to believe that this sullen woman who sat with her face turned toward the floor, arms wrapped around herself as if she was cold, or scared, or both, was the same girl with the laughing blue eyes and long blonde hair that once had charmed everyone who came near her. Karen looked at her watch. Visiting hour was almost over. She and Jenny had been sitting in this cold, white room for almost an hour, but they had barely exchanged 5 sentences. Karen had taken in just about everything in the room, from the chart on the dry erase board that detailed ways to reduce stress, to the pamphlets on the table by the door about AA and NAMI support groups. Jenny had sat shivering in her chair most of the time with her eyes fixed on the gray floor tile beneath her feet. She was wearing pajamas and those hospital socks with the grips on the bottom for traction. Some of the other residents were wearing clothes, but Jenny said she hadn’t wanted to get dressed. Her hair was greasy and stringy. “When did you last take a shower, dear?” Karen had asked half an hour earlier, but Jenny mumbled something about the water being cold, people watching and the dead people in the bathroom. Her talk of dead people alarmed Karen, so she didn’t ask anymore.
“Well” Karen said with forced cheerfulness “It looks like it’s just about time for me to go dear. Matt is coming by on Tuesday, do you need anything from home?” Jenny looked at her mother for a moment with haunted eyes, then shook her head slowly and returned her gaze to the tile at her feet. Karen stood up and kissed her daughter lightly on the head, trying very hard to hold back the tears that had been threatening to fall since she arrived an hour ago. “I’ll see you soon” she said as she turned to leave. Jenny remained where she sat and Karen wondered how many hours of the day she sat in that chair watching the floor. The orderly who unlocked the door for her and other family members reminded everyone that the next visiting hour would be Tuesday evening.
Karen rushed to the sanctuary of her car to let the tears gush down. It was so hard to see her beautiful girl in this condition. There was no sign of the high school cheerleader and debate team captain who could win anyone over with a single smile. No sign of the girl who could have gone to any of the 5 colleges she’d applied to. And the tears flowed with greater intensity. Why hadn’t she chosen Richmond, or Davidson, or Sewanee or Mary Washington?! Jenny had been too considerate, wanting to spare her parents the expense of private school (even though they easily could have afforded it), Jenny had opted to go in state. Having grown up in Fredricksburg, Mary Washington was too close to home. And then there was her father’s near fanatic following of his beloved Hokies; the maroon and orange shirts he donned for games, and his constant encouragement to go to Blacksburg that began sometime shortly after Jenny learned to walk. She set her heart on Virginia Tech, probably to please her daddy, whom she adored. And that was half the problem Karen was convinced.
Driving home, she flashed back to that morning in April, nearly 10 years earlier. As she began tidying up the house, with the Today Show playing in the background, she heard something about a shooting at the college. Her heart sank for a moment as she picked up the phone to dial Jenny, but she calmed herself thinking “it’s a big campus, she might not be anywhere near that building.” The line was busy. The cells were overloaded in Blacksburg with parents trying to reach their children, students trying to reach their parents, students trying to reach one another and reporters beginning to descend on the town. Karen kept trying for the better part of an hour. Then she called her husband at work and they decided to drive to Blacksburg to find their daughter. It was nearly 4 hours away. Karen was recalling how she sat praying the whole way there that Jenny was fine, that perhaps she’d been a sleep when the whole thing happened, or at least on the other side of campus.
Jenny, however, had not been asleep, nor had she been on the other side of campus. No, she had been in French class on the second floor of Norris hall that morning. She had lain, crouched on the floor while almost a dozen of her classmates and her teacher had been shot to death. She had seen the shooter, and the haunted look in his eyes as he kept his finger on the trigger of his gun and rained bullets down on her friends. She had lain on the floor surrounded by the bleeding and the dying for what had seemed like hours. And eventually she was escorted from the room on the arm of a police officer, without a single mark on her body, though her mind was filled with images that would haunt her whenever she closed her eyes.
It was late evening by the time the Andersons found Jenny and were able to get her into the car on the way home. Karen was relieved that her baby was alive and well, but troubled by the silence that was so uncharacteristic of this normally bubbly college freshman. No one rested on the long drive home, though their eyes became increasingly bleary. It was after midnight when they arrived home. Jenny collapsed on her bed and started crying. It was the first sound she’d made since she had gotten into the car with her parents. Karen sat and stroked her hair for an hour or so, but then she went and got an antihistamine pill to help Jenny fall asleep. Early in the morning, Karen was startled awake by screaming coming from her daughter’s room. She rushed in to find Jenny sitting up in bed with a terrified look on her face as she tried to tell her mother about the nightmare she had.
The first week went by in much the same way. Jenny would be strangely silent for most of the day, then she would sob for hours at night until her mother came in and gave her something to help her fall asleep. And she would sleep for a few hours and then wake up screaming, terrified by the visions that haunted her sleep. The Andersons decided not to send her back to school to finish the term. They had been given the option to keep her at home and Jenny would receive whatever her current average was in each class as her final grade. Since she was a bright girl and a diligent student, her parents thought it best to keep her at home where they could keep an eye on her.
Over the next month, Jenny slipped slowly away from the world around her. She simply wouldn’t respond when you spoke to her. The slightest noise would make her jump. And when she closed her eyes she would see bullet ridden bodies, and blood spilling out all around her. It wasn’t long before she just couldn’t sleep at all. At first Karen had shrugged off Jenny’s behavior because she had been through such a traumatic event. But after 4 weeks, with Jenny sleeping less and less, becoming more removed, and more agitated, she took her to their family doctor.
Jenny had been going to see Dr. Cohen since she was 10 years old. He knew the whole family, and they all loved him. “Jenny, tell me what’s wrong.” He asked her. “No, no more bodies, please, no more bullets.” She whispered. “Jenny, do you know where you are?” “Please, make the blood stop, make it stop.” She said with greater agitation. Dr. Cohen looked at Karen. “Karen, this is serious. She’s not responsive, she’s not aware of her surroundings. I can’t do anything to help her at this point, I think she needs to go to a psychiatric hospital.” “Oh dear Lord!” Gasped Karen. “Look, I know it sounds bad,” Dr. Cohen put his hand on her arm, “but psychiatric medicine is a very advanced science, and we have a wonderful hospital here in town. It’s peaceful and quiet, and I think with the right help she’ll recover. There’s no shock therapy or padded rooms, it’s group sessions, art, sports, normal daily activity under the watch of social workers and psychiatrists.” “Oh I don’t know” worried Karen “I hate to think of sending my daughter to the insane asylum.” “Karen, this is modern medicine, not some facility from the 1800’s where they paraded tourists through to see the crazy people. I really think it’s in Jenny’s best interest. And I’d like you to go along with this. Since Jenny is not responsive, we’re going to have to admit her without her consent, but I’d like to at least know I have yours.” “How long will she have to be there?” Karen asked. “It’s hard to know, this is not my area of expertise. But I think you’ll find that most people go for a relatively short amount of time, a week or two, just until they are stabilized, on the right medication, and able to function in the world outside.” “Okay, if you think it best.” Karen agreed.
So they took Jenny to the hospital where she stayed for 2 weeks. When she came home she was sleeping at night. She talked to her parents, although it was a few more months until the smile returned to her face. But by Thanksgiving she seemed to glow nearly as she had in years past. There was a hint of sparkle coming back into her eyes. Finally Karen began to hope that Jenny was going to be just fine.
That spring Jenny enrolled at Mary Washington. She wanted to get on with her studies, to take as little of a pause as possible, but she didn’t want to go back to Blacksburg. Somehow the thought of ever going there again was more than she could imagine. Karen was quite relieved, she just felt better having her daughter at home with them. Jenny worked hard, and she was very bright. She took an extra class each semester and kept herself on track to graduate on time, even though she had taken a semester off.
By the spring of her junior year, she began to think it was a blessing that she had transferred to Mary Washington, especially when a handsome young man named Matt would come over and pick her up for a date. He was charming, and kind, caring and considerate. And he had just about the nicest smile Jenny had ever seen. When his green eyes looked into hers, she thought she would just melt.
Jenny graduated with honors in May, 3 years after that day she watched a shooter open fire on her French classroom. The next evening Matt asked her to marry him and it seemed like her life was just about perfect. The tragedy of the past and melted away and a new life was opening ahead of her that promised nothing but joy and happiness.
Matt’s family also was from Virginia, but they lived in the hills in the western part of the state. They had a house with several acres. Farming was not their main source of income, but they did have some horses and cattle, and a large vegetable garden each year. Their bond to one another was built around harvesting what nature has to offer, from the garden, the rivers and the game in the field. While Jenny’s family never lived this way, there was something natural about the way they received nature’s bounty and also respect her limits.
Matt and Jenny were married the next April and moved to Charlottesville where he entered Law school the following fall. It was a good location for them, about half way between his family and hers. And so the settled into life together, and the work of incorporating their different family traditions into the new family they were building together. For Matt’s family There are annual fishing and hunting trips that they take as a family, and everyone joins in together. That way, if one person gets more than they can use, he or she can share with the others, and as a family they assure that everyone is provided for.
At first Jenny was uncomfortable about going hunting. While she was in all other ways fine, the sound of gunshots was a little unsettling. Her only prior experience with guns took away human life. Over time, however, she grew to enjoy the week they spent each fall setting up hunting camp and rejoicing in the game they brought back. It was a time to get to know her husband’s family, and a time to appreciate the way they supported one another. And after a while, Jenny decided she might even like to try and join them in the hunt. Matt taught her to use his rifle, but coordinating the sharing of it on a hunting trip meant that they couldn’t take full advantage of their numbers and ability to spread out and take different strategic spots in hope that someone would have the perfect shot. So the next year, they decided to get Jenny her own rifle.
On the way to his Parent’s house before the hunting trip the following fall, Matt and Jenny stoped at the local sporting goods store where his family had been shopping for years. The owner Bill could remember Matt before he was walking. And he loved to hear of their stories they’d tell before and after each hunting or fishing trip. He had shared in much of their life as a family. In fact, as a friend, and a neighbor, he was even there at Jenny and Matt’s wedding. Bill was happy to help them find the right rifle for Jenny, and he even offered a small discount, a way of recognizing the loyalty Matt’s family had shown to his business over the years. “We just need to do some paperwork,” he said apologetically. “It’s procedure, I have to do it or I could loose my license. Sorry to trouble you with it.” He asked Jenny fill out some forms, and then he went to make a phone call for authorization.
While Bill was on the phone, his face suddenly clouded as he grew agitated. “I’m sorry, you must be mistaken.” He said sternly into the phone. “Please check again.” Another minute went by. “Are you absolutely sure?” he asked the person on the other end. He hangs up, and is clearly upset. “I’m sorry, Jenny.” He started. “They say I can’t sell you this rifle. I’m sure it’s a mistake, but it seems that I can’t get clearance for you.” “Why, what’s wrong?” Matt asked “Well, the law says that if you have a felony record, or if you’ve been involuntarily treated for mental illness, you can’t buy a gun in the Commonwealth of Virginia.” Explained Bill. “Clearly they have a mistake in their records, they must have Jenny mixed up with someone else.”
As Jenny took it all in, her mind started racing. She made the connection between that day in French class, her illness and the hospitalization that must have led to this moment, and she became very agitated. She started talking rapidly, angrily, and what she said made no sense. She rattled off the names of people they’d never met, she couldn’t be calmed down, she talked of death, and blood. Matt ushered her out of the store, perplexed by what happened. He drove her to his parents’ house and tried to get her to lie down and rest. But she couldn’t rest. She started having flashbacks when she closes her eyes. She would startle at the slightest sound, jumping back, and sometimes crying out. Matt’s family went on the hunting trip without them, and Matt took Jenny home.
On the nights she managed to get to sleep, she would wake up sweating, and crying in terror. Days turned into weeks and pretty soon, Jenny once again became withdrawn. She seemed to be unable to remember simple things about herself, or pay attention to what happened her. Karen remembers the night Matt called her to seek her advice. He tried to explain to her how Jenny was acting. She knew better than his words could explain, because she had seen it before. Karen tried to remain calm for Matt’s sake and told him that he needed to take her to a psychiatric hospital. She tried to reassure him the way Dr. Cohen had done for her several years before.
For Karen, the relapse into this illness seems particularly tragic; Jenny had been fine. She had suffered briefly from an illness and recovered fully. She went on to live a full and happy life. Her illness was all but forgotten. This time it wasn’t a shooter who burst in to rain bullets down on Jenny’s world. Standing at the counter that day in the sporting goods store, Jenny realized in a brief moment that this shooter had left her unscarred to live her life, except that his actions drove others to toughen the gun control laws. His actions caused her illness, an illness that she had recovered from fully, but the law did not recognize that she had or could recover. For the rest of her life the government would see her as mentally ill and regard her as a quasi-criminal, too dangerous for gun-ownership, not for the person she had become. And the realization that one violent man had taken from her the right to live her life free from the damage he caused sent her back into the illness she had been free from for years.
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