I read many asylum patient stories to gain an understanding of the torturous and unfair treatment in the asylums as well as the reasoning for their imprisonment. The vast majority of stories I found were from women and non of the examples I read would have been classed as having a mental illness. Examples of the reasons for them being locked up and separated from society were adultery, birth out of marriage or opposing religious views. Today's society would not tolerate the shocking treatment given to the patients and I found it genuinely disturbing reading some people's experiences. I have watched a few documentaries; however I felt reading a personal story had even more of an emotional impact. A story that particularly touched and saddened by Annemarie Randall's story of her experience in mental asylums.
Below I incorporated extracts from TheGuardian (Bedell, 2002) by journalist Geraldine Bedell, who interviewed people who were willing to share their asylum experiences. I wanted to keep Annemarie Randall's story in its entirety as it is mainly told by Annemarie herself.
Annemarie Randall's Story
Annemarie Randall was born in June 1941 on Hackney Road, in east London, and never knew her real parents. She was adopted by a couple from Kent, but her new mother died of TB, and her father remarried a woman who frequently hit her. 'I learned to hide my feelings, because if I cried, I was hit.'
At weekends, she worked in the Naafi in Gillingham, where, when she was 15, she met a 21-year-old military policeman in the Royal Engineers called Brian Marks.
They married the following year. 'He broke my jaw twice. You didn't say so, though, in those days, and there was no help for you anyway. I used to say I'd fallen over.'
Annemarie had a baby, whom she called Donna Louise, who lived for 17 hours. Then she had another child, Laura Jane, who died when she was three days old, 'a Thalidomide baby, although we didn't realise it at the time'. Finally, she had a son, Robert - six weeks early, but healthy.
When Robert was six, his father 'brought his girlfriend to the house. She was preggers, and he wanted her to live with us until she'd had the baby. I packed my bags, and told Robert to get his things, and we left. We went to Hackney Road. It was the only other place I knew of. It was a good time. I set up a catering business, doing weddings, birthday parties, cake designing. We lived in a two-bedroom flat. We had what we wanted and how we wanted it. I was trying to keep my head above water, working, earning a living and keeping things going for Robert. I was determined he was going to have a good life.'
For his twelfth birthday, she bought Robert a bicycle. The following day, he was killed by a hit and run driver. 'For years and years I blamed myself for buying that bike. I started shutting the world and people out. He had a good life till he was 12, bless his soul. We had a car and we used to go out together. I helped him with his homework. He helped me with the catering business. He was one of my waiters. He was taller than me when he died, though: he was 5ft 10in.
'Afterwards, I was completely broken. He was my life story - someone to work for, someone to do things for. The solicitor wrote to Brian, to tell him, but he'd remarried. He didn't come to his own son's funeral. So I was really on my own. My father was dead. My stepmother didn't want to know.
'I gave away a lot of stuff and left the flat, just wandered. I'm not proud of it, but I abused my own body. I stuck a bread knife in myself 11 times and opened up all my arms. I wanted to punish myself all the time for buying that damn bike. I had no pain, no nothing.'
Annemarie returned to Kent. 'I just drifted. Then one day the police picked me up near Chatham and put me in hospital. They told me I had to stay there because I was a danger to myself. I attacked myself with razor blades, broken bottles; I used to put my hands through glass.' She shows her arms and her wrists, criss-crossed with long scars.
The hospital was Oakwood, near Maidstone, where Annemarie was prescribed insulin therapy. 'They thought that was good therapy, many moons ago. They'd inject you with insulin and you'd go into a coma. Then they'd wake you up and feed you, and after you'd go back to sleep. But it frightened me all the more when I woke up and remembered. I was depressed, but I didn't understand that then. I couldn't tell anyone because I didn't know how to trust people, and I thought it was wrong for them to know about my life.
'I found the nurses a little bit brutish, I don't know why. They were very strict. And if you didn't do what they said when they said it, you got put in a side room, and I got put in a padded cell a lot.
'I was given ECT. I didn't sign up for it. I was told I had to have it, and I had no one to fight the battle for me. They said it made you forget, but it was worse afterwards, to be frank, when it all came back. I used to think, Why haven't I got anybody? And I used to hate Annemarie more and more.'
She spent four years in Oakwood. 'I used to do runners - say I was going for a walk and jump on a bus and go to the seaside. Over the years I escaped from hospitals and went to Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool. But I always got picked up again.'
When Annemarie came out of Oakwood, she moved to London. 'I thought you could make your living there, but I wasn't prepared to be a prostitute or anything. I found it hard going. I still couldn't settle.' While flitting 'from hostel to hostel, bedsit to bedsit,' she met an older woman. Pat, who was sick with cancer, and nursed her until she died. 'I wasn't going to let her be on her own. I knew what that was like.'
After Pat died, Annemarie 'felt as if nothing could hold me any longer. I saw myself as a jinx. Anything I touched fell ill or died. The police found me on a park bench, slitting myself open with a dirty bottle.' She was taken to Banstead Hospital, in Surrey, for more ECT, and stayed there for 10 years. 'It was better in Banstead. They listened more. I worked on the hospital radio. I'd meet people who phoned in to say they were having a bad time. I got quite a lot of friendships that way. I enjoy helping other people, but I cheat, because at the same time it helps me.'
Banstead closed in 1989 and Annemarie was transferred to the Gordon, a small hospital in London. Today, she lives in a hostel in Westminster, with her cat, Flo. She has to take 25 pills a day for her heart and to control her blood flow (she has had two cerebral haemorrhages), but is no longer on any kind of medication for her mental health. 'All the treatment I had didn't make any difference. I was on so much dope at Oakwood; I was just given pill after pill and I didn't know what they were for. I couldn't go out in the sun because I'd burn to buggery, and I ballooned up on another one, got a moon face and everything.
'The one thing that would have made a difference, I think, would have been someone to talk to. That was what I was always wondering, when I went into hospital: would there be someone to talk to? But I used to shut myself off. Maybe if depression had been explained to me earlier...'
Annemarie has ferociously bright eyes and exuberant levels of energy. When she was refusing to be docile in hospital, she would have been a handful. But how difficult can it have been to see what she needed? Even now, she lavishes affection on her cat, and seems more interested in her than in herself. She says she is waiting for the cerebral haemorrhage that will kill her. 'I didn't used to have much faith in God when the kids died. I used to think he was a horrible bloke. When I wanted to die, he didn't want me, the old git. Now he's practically telling me he's got room for me, he can blooming wait.'
Inspiration
'I learned to hide my feelings, because if I cried, I was hit.' This is reminiscent of discrimination and bullying as people feel if they show their emotions they will be punished for it or look weak because of it. This hiding from her own emotions was only the start of her difficult journey to come, emphasising how important it is to have someone to talk to and someone to help, whether that be a family member, a friend or a charity.
It was shocking for me to read that even though she was getting physically and I'm sure mentally abused by her husband, there was nowhere for her to go for help. This must have been extremely frustrating for her as she was clearly the victim of domestic abuse.
Annemarie said "I saw myself as a jinx. Anything I touched fell ill or died." She had been through some extremely difficult situations, from her husband leaving her, to her only son getting killed, so this is her admitting to blaming herself for all of these things, even though that is not the case. This is common for people who get discriminated against, they start to blame themselves and start hating themselves for being different. I want this feeling of self hate and depression to be portrayed in She's second scene where she is drawing her memories. I want this scene to portray the possible devastating effects discrimination can have its victims that isn't necessarily obvious to an outsider. I want this scene to evoke emotion from the viewer to make them stop and really think about how they treat people. I think this is a lesson everyone can learn from as just one hurtful comment to someone can put doubt in their mind which could have a knock on effect to their daily lives.
She hated herself so much and blamed herself for all the awful situations that she turned to self harming. This is so unfair and cruel for anyone to feel like this and it genuinely made me stop and think about how I treat people on a daily basis. I definitely don't class myself as someone who discriminates or says hurtful things; however I'm sure everyone could improve on how they treat people, even if it is just smiling at someone or saying thank you if someone opens the door for you. I really want this look and scene to portray how low and depressed She is feeling.
The key words that come to mind when reading this are:
frustration
confusion
depression
self harm
self hate
I am so glad I looked into so many touching and disturbing stories of mental asylum patients as I now feel a strong passion towards this subject. I now feel like I can put my understanding of these patients and my emotions towards them into designing She's look to create something that I hope will capture the emotions of the viewer.
References:
BEDELL, G., 2002. 'It was twenty years of hell' [viewed 7th February 2017]. Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2002/apr/07/mentalhealth.observerreview
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