Friday, September 14, 2007

How an Amish girl left her community but kept her family

By Sarah Poulton

Byler was born Amish and enjoyed none of the “English” luxuries.

NEW WILMINGTON, Pa. — Some choose the simple life, others are born into it.

Elizabeth Byler remembers a time when she would do anything to lead the life the average American is accustomed to. She felt like a slave to the black, blue or purple dress that made her so hot in the summer, and longed to cut her hair into a cute bob that was then the trend.

She would watch the “English” teenagers walk around town in their fancy shoes, listening to loud, hip-hop music and talking about what happened last night on a TV show like “Melrose Place.”

Byler was born Amish here, and enjoyed none of the “English” luxuries.

The Amish refer to anyone who is not in their community as “English,” she explained.

She said she always wanted to leave the community, and even though she watched her brother leave with his new bride, she could never picture herself actually doing it. Watching the “English” made her curious, she said, and sometimes even envious of what they enjoyed.

“I thought they were great,” Byler said. “I thought to myself, ‘Someday I will leave.’ It was just a feeling.”

Seven years ago this month, Byler, 31, was working at a bakery in Enon Valley. The then-25-year-old worked there with other Amish women, serving the Amish community.

She doesn’t know what happened that day, she said, or what made her do it, but she called her brother’s wife, Mattie, to pick her up.

Mattie took her to their house in Plain Grove, where she stayed until she could get her life in order. She said she didn’t tell her parents she was leaving, but she thinks they knew it was coming.

“I just left,” Byler said. “My mom had an idea though.”

The first thing she did when she got to her brother’s house was watch TV, with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. She also changed out of her traditional dress and bonnet into new “English” clothes.

She said she didn’t feel nervous or scared to leave her community, and knew she wouldn’t regret her decision. Her brother had left before she did, and if he could do it, so could she, she thought.

“I don’t miss much about being Amish,” she said during a recent interview. “I don’t miss the lifestyle at all, just family and friends.”

It took about six months for her to contact her parents after she left the community, she said. Most of the time, parents of Amish who leave are furious and refuse to ever speak to them again, but Byler said her parents reacted differently when her brother left, and that made her feel better about leaving.

“It’s not that I didn’t love them, it was just hard to go back and see them,” she said.

Since leaving the community, her life has changed drastically, she said.

When she was Amish, she played cards, quilted or visited with family in her spare time. Now, she works practically all the time.

In her free time, she absolutely loves watching TV, but doesn’t do it as often as she did when it was “new.” She also used to drink alcohol, but even that got old, she said, adding that she doesn’t have much time for it anymore.

Byler said she noticed a huge difference in her environment. Instead of living with her entire family in a house with no utilities, now she lives by herself in an apartment above a laundry.

She supports herself by working multiple jobs. During the day, she helps out a friend at Whitings with her catering business. In the evening, she is a bus girl at the Short Stop Inn.

The adjustment has been difficult, she said, especially because you can’t just leave the community and fall right into a good job. There’s a lot of learning to do before you can really do anything, she said. And it’s especially difficult for her because she always had a hard time learning, she said.

“I guess I just felt like I wanted to do better,” Byler said.

She’s currently taking classes at the New Castle Public Library. Right now, she’s not sure what she wants to do with her life. She used to think she wanted to be a waitress, but now she’s not sure exactly what she wants to do, and is considering working from home.

Carol Short, owner of The Short Stop Inn here has known Byler for about four years. She said a woman brought her in to apply for a job, and when this woman told Short Byler’s story, her heart went out to her.

“Me, having a big heart, I wanted to find something for her to do,” Short said. “So we started her out as a bus girl.”

Short described Byler as an honest girl who really wants to better herself. She’s a hard worker and good with her customers, Short said.

“Elizabeth is such a nice girl, so brave,” Short said. “She really wants to better herself. I try to help her as much as I can.”

Byler is on her way. In June, she got her driver’s license. She doesn’t own a car yet, so for now, she drives her boyfriend’s truck, or hitches a ride with him on the back of his motorcycle.

Her boyfriend, Larry Kaufman, is very understanding of her past, she said. She met him about a year after she left the community. She needed to make a phone call, and at the time didn’t own a cell phone. Someone was on the pay phone, so Kaufman lent her his. They have been together for almost 6 years.

Between their relationship and her new found freedom, she can’t picture herself ever returning to the Amish community, she said.

Byler said she could go back to the Amish community at any time if she wanted to. Acceptance, she said, depends on the parents. When you are shunned from the order, usually community members won’t speak to you, or acknowledge you at all.

“We do, but it’s against the rules,” Byler said. “My parents are much more understanding than most.”

Since she’s been shunned, she’s not supposed to eat at the same table as other Amish, including her parents, she said.

Joseph Donnermeyer, Ph.D., professor of rural sociology at Ohio State University said that Byler’s story is typical for someone who’s left the community. While technically, the family is not to have contact with members who’ve left, through research, he has found that most still communicate with them.

“If you can do things quietly and privately, it’s fine,” Donnermeyer said. “Family is very important to Amish.”

Donnermeyer said that in order for Byler to go back to her community, she would have to go to her church and confess what she did. She would then have to convince the church that she was serious and be put on a period of probation, he said.

“When you grow up in such a dense culture, it’s an adjustment for you to make that jump,” Donnermeyer said. “If she does decide to go back, it will be a jump just as large because she will have to confess and there will be probation.”

For better or for worse, that is a jump Byler says she will never take.

She can’t go back and visit her extended family at all, she said, and she’s been completely shunned from the church. She said when her youngest sister, Sarah, got married, she visited her at the house before the ceremony, but was not allowed to attend.

“I don’t know if I’d go to my aunt’s or cousins’ funerals if they died,” Byler said. “They make you feel like an outsider.”

It’s sad, but true, she said.

She added that she loves her family very much, but her home now is with the “English.”