50 Years in Polygamy: Big Secrets and Little White Lies Page 15
Soon after Aunt Maryann left, horrendous things came to the attention of Dad’s three wives who had custody of Maryann’s kids. At last, and way too late, they realized Rick had been sexually abusing them for years. Dad and his wives felt Rick was the reason for our youngest sister’s self-exploitation and promiscuity.
So many times they had begged Rick to stop, but he never did. He’d beat them up, say he was sorry, or threaten to harm another sibling if they told. He made sure his siblings felt just as responsible as he was for his disgusting behaviors and any repercussions if “they” were ever caught. The few times any of the kids tried to tell their mother Rick was abusing them; she would vehemently deny their allegations and exonerate him.
After listening to Rick’s versions, Dad chose to pass their claims off as “children’s vivid imaginations” or “childhood curiosity.”
When I heard just a smidgen of what had happened to my siblings, I fell into a deep depression for weeks. I was sure I was responsible and would be held accountable for their anguish. If only I had been strong and brave enough to tell my parents what was going on with him, it may have put a stop to the abuse. Three of my siblings would not have had to endure Rick’s torture, and suffer the terrible wounds and memories.
As usual, while in remorse, I sank to the bottom of my bed and tried to hide my shame under the heavy, suffocating covers, as I lay in the dark. It was the closest I could get myself to purgatory’s fire and brimstone. I needed to be there right then—and maybe forever.
I hoped I would never, ever see Rick’s face again!
CHAPTER 16
Legally and
Religiously Married
1969–1970
The Viet Nam war was raging and the draft was in full force. Among Fundamentalist Mormons, opinions vary when it comes to participating in wars. Aunt Amelia’s son Ari, had volunteered to join the army, and was reported “missing in action” in September of 1967, from near the Thu Bon River in the Quang Nam Province. My brother Luke had been drafted and served time in Vietnam, as well as my brother, Charles, who was still there. Mark and a few of his brothers chose to register as conscientious objectors. In accordance with Section 6-1 of the Military Selective Service Act, they were not subject to combat duty because of their religious beliefs. However, every conscientious objector was still required to dedicate two years of civil service to his country at a nonprofit health or safety organization.
Mark and one of his many brothers served their two years working in the laundry room at the Holy Cross Hospital in Salt Lake, City. To survive the heat (long before air conditioning) they tried to keep the nuns laughing. The brothers would tease, pull pranks, tell wild tales, and invent nun jokes. The two of them even drew and posted accurate-looking caricatures of each of their coworkers in action.
Meanwhile, Mark prayed for a better job than the one in the “laundry-room dungeon,” where the workforce often discovered body parts, surgical paraphernalia, and feces wrapped in blood-covered sheets and towels.
After a few more breakups and reconciliations with Mark throughout the fall and spring, he finally won my heart and steady devotion. I treasured our friendship and his adoration of me. We’d become inseparable, and yet worried about life’s upcoming challenges.
My new summer job in uptown Salt Lake City was at Almo’s Dry Cleaners. It kept me tied up while Mark was serving his army time. As often as possible, he would come by for a visit or pick me up from work. We’d talk and make out on the couch in the back room until a customer drove up to the window and held the buzzer down. Having our kissing and fondling interrupted caused physical distress, but enjoying and being tempted to give in to our newly discovered pleasure was even worse. Every time Mark and I would get going, I’d hear Mom’s warning in my head: “Having premarital sex is as bad as murder!” Too often our passion drew Mark and me near to this worst sin on earth. Miraculously, one of us was always strong enough to stop before it was too late.
If my guilt-ridden body hadn’t already run away from Mark, he’d hug me tight and beg me not to feel guilty about such “normal, God-given” sexual urges—especially, Mark stressed, “with young adults who are so madly in love.”
Still, I wasn’t sure if he was right. Sometimes my guilt for making out with him became so overwhelming, if suicide was acceptable by any standard, I believed I would have ended my wicked life right then—yesterday, a month ago, or a long time ago when we first got started.
*****
One evening, I decided to dress up more than usual. On my way out the back door with Mark, I told Mom, “Goodbye, we’ll see you later.”
“Where do you think you are going all dressed up?” she asked.
“We’re going out to dinner—for my birthday.”
I’m sure Mom didn’t remember. I was used to it and no longer expected her to.
“No, you’re not,” she snapped. “You didn’t ask me if you could go anywhere!”
“Mom, I haven’t had to ask you for years and years if I could go anywhere, so I didn’t think I had to ask you now,” I gently complained.
“That’s the whole point! You always come and go as you please. It’s way past time you become accountable.”
My precious mother was still trying to get it right after all those years of missing out on giving me guidance and discipline. It wasn’t really me she was angry at, it was herself. It was her guilt and remorse making her overreact. I was used to her inattentiveness toward my birthday, my life, and me and I was hardly torn apart by her sporadic and nonsensical outbursts. That day was just another reminder of the authority she never really held. Undoubtedly, she’d had enough of whatever was really eating away at her, so she had to remind herself, in this case, she was in still in charge.
Mark and I quietly sat on the couch in the sparse front room and listened to the dishes clanging in the kitchen. I stared at the ugly gray-and-black pebble design in the large linoleum squares. The dingy, marred walls that hadn’t been painted in forever loomed in on me. I’ve got to get out of here! I thought.
A couple of tears escaped and slid down my cheeks, and I leaned my head on Mark’s shoulder. The ten or so minutes we’d hardly spoken a word to each other felt like hours. Finally he moved toward the front of the couch, turned around, and looked me straight in the eyes. “Sophia, when are you ever going to marry me?” he asked, his warm voice quivering a bit.
A million thoughts raced through my mind. It was my seventeenth birthday, and Mom had said it was about time I become accountable. She was right. I wanted and needed a space of my own. If I didn’t take Mark up on his offer this time, he would surely give up on me. His proposal might be the last chance I’d ever have to get married. If I were single past age eighteen, I’d be an undesirable old maid. My thoughts rambled on. Mark loves me. He’s always been here for me—sometimes even when I didn’t want him to be. We know each other’s heartaches; have the same lifelong dreams and the same goals for our children. Mark surely must be the “right” man for me. He’s been right in front of my face this whole time, and I was too stupid and blind to see how easy God had made it for me.
“Soon,” I answered Mark at last.
“Are you serious? Did you really say soon? Is that a yes?”
“Yes. I’m thinking sometime next summer.”
We waited just under a month, until Sunday, December 7, 1969, to make sure I wasn’t going to back out or change my mind again. Just before sacrament meeting, Mark asked Dad for permission to marry me. Dad made me promise to graduate from high school first, and wanted us to ask his brother, Rulon, as well.
After sacrament meeting, we asked Uncle Rulon. Though he was reluctant, we proudly spread the word of our engagement to our family and friends.
As the next few months passed, Mark and I became close in every way possible, other than marriage and its consummation. We were deliriously happy together. Both of us believed with every fiber of our being we would have five boys for sure, two girls and possibly th
ree. We planned for our children all the things we never had and always dreamed of. We wanted their lives to be perfect, and we intended to be picture-perfect parents.
*****
In keeping his promise, my friend Bryan tried to remain my loyal friend. He would meet with Mom; and I’d join them once in a while at our house to discuss LDS doctrines and polygamy. With all of his heart, Bryan wanted to save me from “eternal damnation.” Each of them found their own “truths” and “facts” in the same LDS scriptures and recorded sermons.
After all was said and done, our dear and faithful friend Bryan had no choice but to wipe his feet clean of us and leave Mom and me to the pits of hell.
The last time we spoke, he said, “Sophia, the day you allow Mark to marry another woman is the day you and he will be damned.”
What a staggering contradiction, I thought. In the 132nd Section of “his” Doctrine and Covenants, God says I will be destroyed if I don’t allow Mark to marry other women.
Somehow, even though I didn’t blame him, Bryan’s goodbye felt like another desertion. And even after all of Mom’s and his doctrinal battles, I still worried. What if Bryan’s take on the LDS religion was right? I wished it were. I wanted it to be. I didn’t want to have to share Mark with other women, then or ever.
Squelch those wicked desires to be a “normal” person, Sophia! Sixteen years of conditioning ordered. Press forward with the will of God. You must live polygamy!
Though I still had many doubts and worries about marrying Mark, I continued to ignore them and push our wedding date closer. We bumped it up from July to the middle of April to help maintain our oath of virtue, which was becoming nearly impossible to keep.
On the big day, Val, Amy, and I spent most of the day decorating the LDS church gymnasium Dad rented for Mark’s and my reception. Mark and my brother Alan gathered the arbor, flowers, cake, punch bowls, glasses, and drinks. We barely made it back to my house in time for our wedding ceremony.
I paced all alone from Mom’s bedroom, down the hallway, and into our dismal-looking front room, where our family and closest friends were waiting. I smiled in delight when I saw Mark and Alan both wore tuxedos, which they swore they’d never do. My beautiful bridesmaids stood next to them.
Mark (twenty-four and a half years old) and I (seventeen and a half) stood in front of my father. He placed my hand in Mark’s to symbolize the “sacred handshake.” Then he recited what he believed to be the marriage ceremony originally used in the temples. Near the end of our “priesthood” wedding ceremony, Mark took from his pocket a man’s gold wedding band (he’d found it in the washing machine at the hospital) and placed it on my ring finger.
“This is just for the time being,” he’d informed me earlier. “It will have to do until I can afford to get you another one.”
It meant the world to me Mark cared enough to come up with a ring for our wedding. We’d talked about not having one at all. However, even when we were first engaged, I longed for a diamond engagement ring and a real wedding band for our special day. I wanted to be like the other girls at school and in The Group, who pranced around with treasured proof they were cherished, and going to be married to the love of their life. I tried so hard not to care—not to be vain or worldly. After all, none of that really mattered in the vast scheme of the gospel. But without an engagement ring, hardly a soul believed I was really engaged to a single man. Many of my classmates assumed “that poor polygamous girl will soon be married off to some old geezer who already had a bunch of wives and kids, and we’ll never see her at school again.”
Our honeymoon was also postponed until Mark made more than minimum wage.
After our wedding reception, we celebrated with an extravagant meal at The Hawaiian, before we went home to our tiny apartment in Sandy.
Just as before when we’d make out, I’d get easily excited. I relished our lovemaking, but whenever I became aware of any bodily fluids whatsoever, I was traumatized, nauseated, and repulsed—putting a stop to everything. Neither one of us knew why I was so disgusted with something I was told was wonderful and holy after marriage.
*****
At the elementary school across the street from our tiny apartment, I sat on a child-size tire swing that snuggled my bottom tightly. My eyes were blurred with tears. Mark and I had been married five and a half weeks, and most of that time I wanted to move back home and have our marriage annulled. I felt I’d made the biggest mistake of my life. I wasn’t sure about the man I was living with. He looked like my friend Mark, the man who had patiently and ardently pursued me for three and a half years. He looked like the same guy who took me out on dates, who was proud to be with me, who listened to me, and who spoke to me with love, respect, and kindness. He looked like my active, attentive fiancé who said the two of us believed and felt the same way about everything that mattered in life. But I was living with a stranger. Hardly anything about him felt the same.
Nearly every night, Mark hung out with my brother Alan and other bachelor friends. When he’d get home late at night, my husband didn’t want to talk or listen. And because neither of us understood my unfavorable sexual issues, there were problems with intimacy.
Before our marriage, during the thousands of hours Mark and I spent together or were in the same vicinity, I had only witnessed him lose his temper twice. The first time was when he had a knock-down-drag-out fight with one of his brothers who broke into his bedroom and took his clothes. Though it broke my heart to see them fight, Mark’s reaction seemed justified. The second time I saw him become enraged was when he forced me up the hill into his car and drove recklessly home without concern for our safety. With him now losing his temper on a regular basis, it was painfully clear I’d married a volatile man.
As much as I thought about it, while sitting on the swing, I couldn’t ever go home to my parents. I was too embarrassed and ashamed; and God certainly wouldn’t approve of me breaking my covenants. Instead, I’d have to save face for Mark and myself. I secretly vowed to hide my discontent and keep my marriage promises, both legal and religious, forever. I was sure things would get much better.
Mark and I argued about anything and everything. Between our fights, his temper, and my cold retreats, we kept trying to build on our commitment and the deep love we both desired. The most precious gift in the universe—even with my bouts of morning sickness—was discovering our first baby was due the following March.
*****
Mark took my left hand in his and stared at it. “This ring is not good enough for you,” he said. “We need to get rid of it.”
When he tried to remove it, I fussed and withdrew my hand. “Leave it alone. This ring is better than no ring at all!”
“No it isn’t,” he said. “It’s some old guy’s ring. Let me take it off.”
Quickly, he had the gold band off and replaced with a beautiful gold-and-silver band. I was in ecstasy over the ring and his gesture of love. I loved and stared at it every day, but it didn’t satisfy my longing.
I wanted a ring even a quarter as noteworthy as the diamonds all the other girls inside and outside our group had on their fingers. My lack of clothing, shoes, decent lunches, the fact my family could never afford to let me take dance or piano lessons, and now my ring, all felt like proof of my insignificance compared to everyone else.
Even worse, I felt like an ungrateful piece of slime for not being utterly happy and satisfied with what I had.
*****
Near the first part of July, my sister Amy and her husband asked us to rent Gregory Maynard’s home with them. In fear his baby would be taken away, Gregory took her from a hospital, and moved that child’s mother and her six older siblings to the Pinesdale Ranch. We were told they’d be hiding there for a couple of years, and he needed renters for his home.
None of us had ever liked or trusted Gregory. I still couldn’t stand to be around him since I was a little girl and he asked Mom if he could take me to get ice cream. Though it was considered e
vil and unrighteous, Amy and her husband and Mark and I questioned how insane it was Gregory had been called to be on the priesthood council in the first place.
We decided to help him out, only because we felt it would benefit us as well.
It was very hard on me to live with Amy and her husband. Both she and I were pregnant, but I always ended up playing second fiddle to her. Mark seemed to be more interested in her than in me. He doted on her constantly. When she felt ill, cried, or just wanted to talk, Mark stayed up for hours with Amy while her husband slept. In the quiet darkness of our room I would swallow hard, gasp in deep breaths of air, and pull the pillow over my face to keep them from hearing me weep. I didn’t want Amy to know how much her grand presence seemed to completely invalidate mine. I tried every minute to be happy and gracious about the attention she always sought and received, even from my husband.
*****
Francine was finally able to get away from her west desert home and come to Salt Lake for a while to help me. I’d had morning sickness for so long I’d lost nearly fifteen pounds. She took me to see Uncle Rulon to get some medicine he recommended, and then she spent the next few hours helping me find food my stomach could tolerate. She let me cry and carry on over the few things I was willing to talk to her about, and then I cried some more when she had to return to her home and family. I felt so alone when she left, I wanted to get in our car and follow her home. There I’d be loved and appreciated.
Amy, her husband, and Mark sounded disappointed when we were told, after four months of renting Gregory’s house we had only a few weeks to move out. He wanted his house back so he could move another one of his wives in. We’d spent hundreds of dollars and hours cleaning, scrubbing, painting, mowing, repairing, and gardening. Though I loved Amy, I was so grateful to be rescued from living with her.