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16 JILL MOLYNEUX summary
[DVCPro Tape 01 of 05 – VHS Tape 01 of 02] 01:00:38 - 01:58:25
Earliest memories
J. born in Torbay Hospital, Torquay - talks about circumstances of her birth according to her mother. Mentions her first memory - her father seeing her for first time - J. aged 16 months. Talks about memories of first house. J. describes her grandfather’s death. J. lived in grandparent’s home as child. Father in the Navy - since his death J. told stories about his gambling. Talks about stories her father told her about war time.
Living in Yorkshire
J. her mother, grandmother went to stay with aunt in Yorkshire. J. describes family relationships between the aunt and the aunt’s partner - he then became ill. Then J. mother, and grandmother moved to small place in same village. J’s Grandmother and the aunt’s partner both died - J. not told this by mother at the time - a cousin told J. J. went to a village school, had lots of friends and generally enjoyed Yorkshire.
Childhood memories - during war time
J. an only child. Talks about other children in the village who were evacuees. Village was Eldon nr. Shipley, Yorkshire. Middle class family - J’s father a Naval Officer - a Lieutenant - doing engineering work. J’s mother snobbish. Talks about grandparent’s house and about her grandfather’s occupations - J. very fond of him.
J’s relatives
J’s mother didn’t work. Talks about jobs that her aunt had. Aunt’s partner a self-made millionaire - but J’s mother looked down her nose at him - J. describes things he owned, he was a Freemason. J. talks about the people he employed who worked at the mill he owned. J. aged about three and four - talks of various memories of him. J. goes on to describe the various relationships between the various relatives.
J’s parents
J. describes her parent’s relationship with one another and towards her. J. later learnt from father’s letters that he didn’t want children. J. says neither of them should have had children. War broke out - bringing many changes. Family moved to Portsmouth in 1947.
J’s father and memories of (just before the official) VE day.
J. describes her father frequently coming and going on leave in Devon. Recalls playing with a sandbag with him in Yorkshire and him having to leave. J. talks again of relationship between her parents. Mentions day in Scotland two days before official announcement of VE day, and describes memories of spending time that day with the Captain of the Destroyer. J. says at time aged seven she didn’t understand why her father still had to leave - believing that day to mean the end of the war.
01:30:31:00
Memories of moving to Southsea Portsmouth
J. aged about eight. J.’s mother not keen on the house and J’s father had said they would only live there for three years. Recalls incident when her mother got angry about J. having marked the wallpaper.
School in Yorkshire
J. describes going aged four to a mixed-sex private primary school - recalls using slates. Thinks most children in the village went to this school. J. enjoyed it.
Understanding of what mental hospitals were as a child
J. has no memory of anyone talking about psychiatric hospitals etc. when as a child.
School in Portsmouth and J’s father
J. explains the type of school - describes it as similar to a “crammer” school - to accelerate learning to pass exams. Explains how her father never satisfied with her results and about how nasty she found his attitude towards her and how her memory of such has since been verified through his letters/documentation.
J’s mother
J. talks about her mother reacted to J. forming attachments to others. J. says she wanted to be shown some physical signs of affection but didn’t get this from her. J. explains how she developed psychological trick of preventing pain. Tells story of older children playing games and her mother berating them. Talks of how life then was heaven compared to life once her father had returned from war.
J’s relationship to her father
J. explains how she used to think her father had perhaps suffered post-traumatic stress, but later after reading his letters, realised that his behaviour had always been part of his character. J. describes how her father told endless dirty jokes at meal times - J’s aunt expressed concern about this, and J’s father told her mother he did it because she had no brothers. J. mentions her father exposing himself to her and him once touching her breast when J. in puberty - says this behaviour was covert and that otherwise he did not sexually abuse her but did abuse her mentally and emotionally.
J’s father being ill and later having breakdowns
J. talks of father being physically ill, and of him having two paranoid breakdowns whilst J. at college. J’s parents began to sleep separately as her mother believed he was having an affair - J’s mother blamed for his breakdown. J. then describes various other times that her father was ill - Jill - then a psychologist - expected to be able to help. J. says the paranoia possibly connected to fact that her father was working in the Civil Service when security was high due to the case of Burgess and Maclean. J. says a good thing was that her father insisted on her having a good education but how she experienced difficulties having been accelerated by two years at school.
[End of DVCPro Tape 01 of 05]
[DVC ProTape 02 of 05 - VHS 01 of 02 continues] 02:00:39 - 03:00:30
J’s father and J’s education
J. explains why her father was keen for her to get a good education. Her father had had to leave school which he had enjoyed to earn money for the family by joining the Navy. In his family - by marriage - there had been several doctors and he would liked to have been one. He was therefore keen for J. to go to the High School and become a doctor.
The 11+ exam and J’s school education
J. explains how the 11+ exam worked and talks about IQ tests and her views of them. J. says she would not have been a good doctor or a nurse. After two years at school dropped all the subjects necessary to become a doctor - and in a contradictory way her father showed no interest in the fact that J. did this.
J’s love of dancing
J. described loving her dancing lessons and how she had won a lottery to present a bouquet at the school’s annual show. Her parents then gave her a huge children’s encyclopaedia and forbid J. to go to the show - J’s reaction was to give up the lessons.
J’s early ambitions and more about J’s relationship to her father
J.’s main ambition was to dance. Also to be a vet due to J’s attachment to pets. J. explains why she was not allowed pets, but how a fellow officer of her father’s gave her a pet tortoise. J. talks about her parents’ contradictory attitude towards J. having pets and how as a result J. learnt never to ask for anything. Describes why and how she came to buy a racing bicycle out of her own birthday money aged 17 partly to get the better of her father. Talks about a black-humoured joke between herself and her grandmother of ‘greasing the step’ to plan to kill her father. J. Mentions becoming v. religious for at age of nine - related to feeling her father had power over her.
J. explains reasons for being accelerated by two years at school
J. explains how cheating in an exam in order to get 100% led to her being put into a class two years ahead of her age. J. very upset about this - father was supposed to stop it happening but didn’t. J. says she has no memory of him ever being proud of her. J.’s parents considered adopting an orphan child and explains why this didn’t happen.
J’s relationship with a Polish boy
In J’s first year at college - aged 18 - went out with a Polish exile for three years. Describes getting involved in political causes regarding the Hungarian revolution.
J. studying psychology at university / J’s boyfriends
J. chose to study psychology partly with hope of becoming an agony aunt. J. describes how later on when she was working in television, how this was a serious consideration. J. describes why she felt it necessary to have a boyfriend, how she always took men with her when visiting to her parents - and of her telling her father she wouldn’t marry.
Life at University College (UC) London
J. talks of the liberty of going to college in 1960’s and loving it. Lots of friends, popular and J. v. active there - Chairman of UC Council, member of debating team, going on political demonstrations - Hungarian revolution CND. Mentions mixing with people from the Slade School of Art - had a brilliant time.
J’s relationships
J. talks about having boyfriends, and mentions a stage at school when she fell in love with older girls who bullied J. and being two years older already had boyfriends. Describes in brief her sexual relationships - and how during University days there were plenty of men interested in her. J. explains why she was so happy being at college.
J’s activities after leaving sixth form
J. expected to be in sixth form for 3 years due to having been accelerated by 2yrs already but left after 2yrs and worked as an observer at a Child Guidance Clinic.
02:30:17
J. talks about her teenagehood
J. explains why she was surprised that after sixth form she was given a dress allowance. Then goes onto describe how in the 1950’s the concept of teenagers and them needing to wear different clothes to parents was not understood. J. talks of her need during the sixth form to get on with a particular group of ‘hip’ girls in her year. Talks of enjoying becoming 18yrs old and the freedoms it brought. Describes trying to learn how to behave rebelliously in order to get in with the gang at school. Mentions meeting two friends who joined the school late and the positive difference this made.
J’s. Memories of popular culture in the mid to late 1950’s
J. talks about the ‘bib bands’ - Ted Heath, Radio Luxembourg, jazz and going to dances, enjoying Elvis and rock music. Parents had no TV until J. finished school. Describes playing tennis and swimming, and J. explains why her parents were not happy when she did well at anything and why they stopped J. doing the activities. J. describes finding it odd that they (later) also showed no particular interest in the fact that she worked in television.
Living in a commune and other events during time J. working at Tavistock Clinic
J. describes how she came to live with an ex-boyfriend’s stepmother, au pair and other son, in an upper class commune set up the ex-boyfriend’s father. Talks about life there and how it led to her meeting the Head of Light Entertainment at Rediffusion. J. mentions he was interested in her. J.unhappy - mentions an abortion, and describes the illness and treatment her (ex) boyfriend had - he ended relationship with J. At time J. working at the Tavistock Clinic and her analysis treatment had gone badly.
Work at the Tavistock Clinic (TC)
J. began as a student on placement at the TC, but in final year was working there. Was feeling unhappy about prospect of having to leave and work in an ordinary Child Guidance Clinic.
J’s work in television - Redifusion tv and Southern tv
Then asked out by man from Rediffusion, Jill avoided this but as a result of meeting him got a temporary job there - finding music to match film - then got a three month contract, then went from Light Entertainment to Current Affairs. Mentions programme Ready, Steady, Go. Worked as a researcher, and then freelance on political programmes. J’s contracts got renewed and then worked on loan to Southern (TV) working with Brian Redford. Jill then describes ‘cracking up’ prior to a transmission.
J’s experiences with illegal drugs
J. describes how she began mixing with people who took drugs, and how she had tried dope (cannabis) a few times without it having much effect, then explains how she and three friends all agreed to try some acid (LSD). Explains in some detail how the man who supplied it had recently been put into a psychiatric hospital as a result of taking the drug, and J. explains why this had not acted as a warning.
J’s experience of taking LSD
J. describes some of the experiences she had whilst on the LSD trip and how she didn’t really come down from it for the following week. The group of friends then went to a friend’s parents in the country. The Police had followed - one of the group had previously been on TV as a sort of self-appointed spokesperson for defending the right to take Heroin. No one was searched by police. J. recalls probably taking a pill whilst there.
J. returns to London
J. returned to London by train and recalls finding too much stimulus at the tube station. J. living off Portobello Road at time with Ann and Ann’s children. J. describes behaving out of character whilst watching the TV there believing it to be communicating with her. As a result of this A. called for someone - poss. a Social Worker who happened to be Asian. Jill at time he called doing a form of yoga telling him she had a pain in her back - (which in later years was cured by a physiotherapist.)
[End of DVCPro Tape 02 of 05]
[DVCPro Tape 03 of 05 – VHS Tape 01 of 02] 03:00:33 - - 03:59:14
First admission to psychiatric hospital - Springfields
J. explains the circumstances around her being taken by car to Springfields - J. feeling she had little choice in this. J. then describes why mental hospitals were her idea of hell.
J’s prior knowledge of mental hospitals
J. describes how as a student she had been on some demonstrations with psychiatric registrars, had been to groups in Napsbury and various other places. As an undergraduate had visited a mental hospital in Amsterdam and as a result was v. apprehensive about going to one, realising that Springfields must be such a place.
First impressions of Springfields Hospital
J. describes the extensive grounds of the hospital. Recalls being taken to one of the smaller blocks and trying to fight being given an injection and being held down by about seven people. J. later discovered the injection was too great for her body weight.
Memories of coming round after the injection
J. doesn’t know what drug she was injected with - possibly Largactil. J. describes losing sense of time, being disorientated and not knowing where she was, finding that the noticeboards had nothing to help to orientate herself.
Memories of other people and ECT
J. describes effect of ECT on other patients - zombified - and how she tried to re-assure those who had had it that they were alive - even though J. unsure about this (whether or not she was alive) for herself. Talks a bit more about ECT.
J’s experience of walking as if she had had a stroke
J. describes how she began to walk trailing the whole of her left side - J. unaware of this herself at time. J. still had three remaining sugar cubes with LSD and asked for it to be analysed. J. thinks the staff there had little experience of LSD at the time.
Visitors to J. in hospital
J. had many visitors, and one of them confirmed to Springfield staff that J. was an Educational Psychologist and that she had been working at The Tavistock for three years and in television. J. thought staff may think this hallucinatory. J. says Springfield staff quite nice.
J. asked what therapy she would like to do.
J. explains why she wanted to have therapy in the garden, tells story about a man to whom she felt was a father-figure who was a scholar who enjoyed gardening whom J. had not met at the time but had heard of. J. explains the connection between this wish to find a gardener and how she related this to the Bible story of Mary Magdalene. J. felt she would be ok if she could find a gardener but was kept locked up at Springfields.
Life in the partially-locked ward - Narcissus - at Springfields
J. kept locked in ward for three weeks - describes loathing being confined. Describes various incidents with an aggressive fifteen year old patient there. J. mentions a Catholic Priest and a Rabbi. Approx. 30 patients on the ward.
Further descriptions of Narcissus Ward
J describes the following - Day room, windows, music, L-shaped dormitories, corridor, kitchen, tea. J. mentions hoping to be pregnant but turned out not to be. J. explains how she had feelings/thoughts associated with Auschwitz and Marlene Dietrich - in connection with being in the kitchen on the ward and making tea for other people. Mentions accidentally smashing a glass ashtray and as a result of feeling tremendous relief - being able to understand why people wanted to break windows.
Nursing and other staff
Nurses wore uniform - most v. nice - one a bit of a bitch. J. recalls being friendly with an Afro-Caribbean cleaner - and another woman who was Jamaican - Susan . J. describes why she was wonderful to her, and about a nurse remarking on J. liking black people. Most staff were white, J. doesn’t recall there being any black nurses.
J. talks about telling fortunes with cards
J. did fortune-telling on the ward- nurses and patients used to talk to her and as a result got on better with a Lithuanian nurse whom J. had thought may have been racist. J. talks more about the Jamaican woman and about other nurses and patients.
J. on hunger-strike/protest/stops eating
J. explains how as a result of seeing Oxfam adverts on postage stamp books she stopped eating in protest. A Malaysian nurse was delegated to J. who persuaded her to eat after two or three days. J. tells anecdotes about being given a pink elephant by this nurse and another about being given a jar of honey.
EEG
J. told to have an EEG - due to concern that her trailing of one side of her body might indicate brain damage. J. explains why she was scared to have it, concerned that the EEG might in fact be ECT. EEG showed everything to be normal.
Effect of the initial injection given at Springfields
J. says the ‘trailing’ wore off after approx. 6 weeks. J. explains how her mother visited and was asked about the trailing and what could be done for J. - the doctors then said they were already giving J. the maximum does of Largactil for her body weight.
J’s experiences of being allowed off the Narcissus Ward
J. recalls talking to people through the glass in the men’s ward J. on female only ward. Male and female wards separated by a long distance. A male patient sneaked J. onto a trip out.
03:29:38
Memories of a second hospital outing.
J. describes going on a trip. J. explains how she had checked the perimeter of the hospital and noted where the gates were and knew she couldn’t get out easily. The bus trip took her outside of the gates and J. describes the intense feeling of freedom.
03:30:00
J. describes looking for the gardener
J. (as previously described) wanted to find the gardener - who turned out to be Polish. J. offered to help him in the garden and as a result met a long stay patient called Bill. J. describes how there were people digging ditches - which led to J. making a connection to that and the first world war - singing 1st WW songs etc. briefly mentions how the first world war became significant feature in her breakdown.
Visit from a psychologist
J. visited by a psychologist who told J. that she would have to stay in the hospital for a very long time. J. describes a later visit to the psychologist in Hampstead.
Memories of being with Susan and a psychiatrists reaction
J. tells an anecdote about a time when she and Susan were pretending to smoke dope and how a particular psychiatrist - Steiner - came by and seemed to understand what and why they were doing this. J. says he was probably the best psychiatrist there.
Daily hospital routine
J. explains the routine - Breakfast, go off the ward, lunch, go off ward, evening meal, stay on ward until following morning.
Toilets, personal washing routines and privacy
J. talks about toilets - ordinary. No expectation of privacy but J. not bothered. Not forced to bath, no showers. J. feeling disappointed when her period came. J. explains why issues of privacy did not bother her - due to previous lifestyle and having had a very messy abortion, but how it did bother her to be locked in with lots of women.
Length of stay in hospital
J. unsure of whether voluntary or sectioned, presumes sectioned. Stayed for four months - had no means to leave. Mentions a visit by Paul (who had supplied the LSD) who apologised and gave J. tobacco - nurse impounded it believing it could be Cannabis. Also not able to leave due to not knowing where hospital was situated.
J. talks about Brian
J. talks about Brian (the male patient who had sneaked J. onto bus trip). J. explains talking to him through the glass which was cracked and how she then experienced a psychosomatic feeling of having a crack in her stomach. J. then told the psychiatrist - Steiner that she thought Brian was trying to kill her - unknown to J, at the time that Brian was in hospital due to an incident where he’d thrown darts at this wife. Steiner took incident seriously - as a result Brian sent to the main block - J. still feels bad about this series of events.
J. talks about her concern for her friend’s drug-taking
J. told a psychiatrist about her friends taking heroin - nothing happened - in the hope that they could be stopped from taking it. J. says that most of the friends are fine now.
J’s support from her circle of friends
J. describes how her friends were very supportive. Talks about a friend and his brother who had both previously been given insulin shocks in a mental hospital in the Transvaal - J. explains the circumstances of this - and how one of them had got out of the hospital to England. This friend took J. to another friend’s flat where J. stayed for the weekend.
J’s experiences in the flat during that weekend
J. explains how during her stay at the flat she had a feeling of need to arrange everything in exact form and how the flat then felt as if was becoming the Valley of the Dead. J. went to back to the hospital.
Second admission to hospital
J. experienced seeing a vision when wandering in a sort of field - J. took this as a sign that she would conceive again - went to the pig sty and screamed completely full out. J. then goes on to talk about going to patient’s dances about eight weeks after the admission. One time when dancing, J. suddenly unable to breathe and couldn’t walk - J carried back to the ward - and explains why she told the nurse she’d had an abortion. Says the vision came at the same time as the controversy over abortion laws of 1969.
J. talks about patient screaming
J. talks about hearing a patient screaming and being concerned that it might be her friend Susan - J. never found out what had been going on.
J. visited by a friend - Allen Ginsberg - Ronnie Laing - The Albert Hall 1965
J.’s friend visited (Irvine) and as a result J. went out for the weekend to an International Poetry Congress at the Albert Hall - J. heard Allen Ginsberg reading - felt a tension - and inspiration - and explains how she began dancing in order to interpret through dancing for the poets. J. explains how a film was shown about six years ago of the anniversary of this event which shows a clip of her dancing. J. also talks about a photo of the same event of her and the two poets. J. explains how this led to her being interviewed for a film last year for the BBC about the event. J. explains meeting Ronnie Laing at the time (1965) who commented on how high she was. Irvine then took J. home.
[End of DVCPro Tape 03] 03:59:14
[DVCPro Tape 04 of 05 – VHS 01 of 02 continues] 04:00:32 - 04:30:00
J’s memories of Ronnie - R.D. Laing
J. explains who Ronnie Laing was - famous psychiatrist and psychoanalyst whom J. had worked with at the Tavistock Clinic. J. then trying to get out of hospital, thought about living with a woman and explains why she didn’t. Explains asking Laing for help, and him agreeing that J. go to Kingsley Hall. J. desperate to leave Springfields.
J’s friendship with Bill Hill at Springfields
J. talks about the importance of her friendship with Bill - a patient at Springfields, and describes him and explains about events in his life that had led him to the hospital.
People at Kingsley Hall (KH)
J. describes going to KH in its early days. Talks briefly about Mary (Barnes) and the book she wrote. Talks of Ronnie visiting sometimes. Mentions others there: a young couple, Joan Sergeant a nurse - keen on ECT - looking after Mary whilst she went through regression. J. also mentions Esterton, a psychiatrist - J. had known at Napsbury - J. had seen present a patient who’d been in a concentration camp.
More memories of Kingsley Hall
J. describes KH building - owned by Quakers - three cells, rooms. Mentions her mother taking most of her clothing. Says Ronnie told her of the tensions going on between the personnel there - After six months - Esterton, Joan and Mary left. J. still on medication prescribed by Springfields. J. describes life at KH. J. says Joan had been Esterton’s mistress, and J. explains the relationship between him and Mary. J. talks of the young couple stirring up trouble re: the eating of vegetarian food.
J’s talks about friendships
J. explains why a male friend from her tv days didn’t visit her. Also about a Nigerian friend who also returned home - J. not having chance to say goodbye - M. feeling that things were going downhill.
Interested parties visit Kingsley Hall and J’s relationship to R. Laing
J. describes meeting some black and white people (a couple?) from the USA whom J. liked - who took Mary on - but when J. found they were leaving J. decided to leave - in order to get her mother’s approval of leaving J. told her that everyone at KH was sleeping with everyone else - and J. returned home to her mother’s in Portsmouth - J. then explains why she did and why it was not a good idea.
Further memories of Kingsley Hall - J’s friendship with Mary Barnes
J. explains why M. during her regression ceased to be company for her at KH. Also why she now believes if she had stayed longer KH may have helped. J. heavily medicated at the time.
Effects of a heavy drug on J. when at Springfields and J’s fear of ECT
J. describes the physical and psychological effects of this drug on her. Again talks of support from Bill. J. explains why she agreed to take it to avoid ECT - and explains her objections to it and fears of being sent to Joan Sergeant at Guys or St. Thomas’s.
ECT
J. describes being offered ECT in the Hospital by Dr at St. Clements - and being able to argue that her depression was caused by being engaged to one man and being in love with another - thus avoiding ECT. Says that working class patients were not able to avoid it in the same way.
J’s engagement
Whilst J. working for Which J. describes having an engagement party - engaged to Alan - but J. in love with Bill at the time. J. then describes a time when she was trying to get admitted to KH - taken there by her ex-boyfriend - the Polish man. J. describes meeting R. Laing outside and how she didn’t go in because she was ‘too far gone’. J. then left KH to meet Bill at a tube station - J. dressed in colourful clothing at the time walking around a builder’s site in Bow, London - as a result the Police were called - leading to admission to St. Clements Hospital.
Admission to St.Clements Hospital (St. C’s)
Following the incident in Bow, J.’s friends wanted her to go to KH - but mother objected due to what J. had previously said about it, so J. went to St.C’s.
ECT at St. Clements
J. describes the way ECT was given to other patients (including a man) on the women’s ward. J. felt claustrophobic in the ward and said she wanted no injections - as a result put into a padded cell.
Padded Cell - St. Clements
J. saw Hungarian writing on a cell cushion ,talks of a vision she had of Ganesha
Incident of a nurse having her arm broken by a patient
J. describes how an enraged young Glasweigan woman broke a nurse’s arm - nurse off work for three weeks. J. describes nurse as a bitch and explains how delighted everyone was and thankful to the Glasweigan women about this incident.
Violence in the wards - and patient and nurse relationships
J. talks about few incidents of fights (not in the hospital). Can only recall the one incident of violence towards the staff but suspects there was violence toward patients
J. mentions a female patient who had a relationship with a male nurse.
The main block at Springfield Hospital
J. describes her fear of going into the main block. Describes physical disabilities of patients there and J. felt they were being mistreated. Says in the smaller block not much violence went on - just a little ‘argy bargy’ between patients. Goes on to describe another incident at another hospital where a patient broke a nurse’s arm.
Demeanour of the nurses
J. felt (but didn’t actual witness) that staff were violent to patients. J. recalls being told by a nurse who’d been in Broadmoor that the regime was designed to break down the personality in order to build it up again. Generally J. says in her block there was not a big staff and patient divide.
Memories of long-stay patients at St. James’s Hospital Portsmouth
J. recalls middle and older aged patients having been in hospital for over twenty years. At Springfield J. not concerned of possibility that she would be a long-term patient, but was concerned about it at St. James’s J. talks about a particular psychiatrist there. J aged 30 when at St.James, had stayed three weeks in St.Clements.
Friern Barnet Hospital (FB) J’s diagnosis
J. describes FB- buildings, grounds. J. living with Indian classical dancer at time - taken to FB by ambulance - due to being psychotic/high. J. diagnosed manic depressive at St. Clements - told everything done there was to prevent her burning out.
J’s relationship to her parents
J. says her parents were toxic to her - talks of their reaction to J. saying she wouldn’t marry Alex and wanting to marry Bill and mentions their opinion of Bill.
J’s pregnancy
J. not aware at time that she was pregnant when at FB. Also unknown to J. at time was that the father of the baby - Leo - had asked to visit J. at FB, but J’s mother prevented this by referring the request to visit to the psychiatrist.
FB - previously Colney Hatch Hospital
J. talks about a fire that had killed lots of people that had happened in the Victorian part of the hospital. FB previously called Colney Hatch Hospital.
J. on a modern ward at FB
J. describes the ward - pre-fab - little cells - where J. locked in - J. explains how she used to bang on the door because she wanted the door open.
Nurses at FB, J. given a lumbar puncture - other staff at FB
J. mentions a Finnish nurse being quite nice, A Chinese nurse - who challenged Jill’s regressive behaviour - whom J. says was a really nice girl. J. given a lumbar puncture -but doesn’t know why she was - talks of being allowed leave and going to London.
Gardeners at FB
J. describes spending time with the gardeners - walking over a fire - and going for a ride on a gardener’s Vespa.
J. on trip to London / Visits by Bill
J. explains being in London, looking for Leo whom she’d met at the Dialectics of Liberation Conference - and whom J. was pregnant by. Also talks of looking for Bill and then describes two visits that he made to her whilst on a locked ward.
J. not aware of whether sectioned or not at the time
J. talks of making a fuss about being locked in. Then describes a time when she turned up at a friend’s house with Freddie Mercury (FM) (pop singer) whom J. had met by chance - J. assumes the friend then arranged for J. to go into hospital - FM then later phoned the friend to check that J. was ok. J. talks of valuing this concern.
[End of DVCPro Tape 04 of 05 – End of VHS Tape of 01 of 02] 04:58:27
[DVCPro Tape 05 of 05 – Start of VHS Tape of 02 of 02] 05:00:30- 05:20:35
J. talking about escaping from Friern Barnet Hospital
J. mentions escaping lots of times - one time being rescued by someone whom J. saw as an archangel. J. put in a subterranean ward - mentions shit and blood - but felt not treated badly by staff there. One escape led to J. being in a different catchment area.
J’s experiences of being in Bexley Health
J. explains why she was pleased to end up in Bexley Heath following a time she was picked up by police and taken there. J. pregnant and the psychiatrist thought J. should have an abortion - J. says the dose of Largactil induced an abortion - J. had tried to resist by saying she was a Catholic. Eventually J. sent home to her parents.
Another admission to St.James’s and being on a locked ward
J. found in London but admitted to St.James’s in Portsmouth. There met the same psychiatrist who’d insisted on her abortion at Bexley Heath - so J. changed to a different consultant and explains why that one was even worse - mentions use of drugs, and death of heroin-addicted patient through neglect. This psychiatrist put J. on a locked ward with no medication, no visitors etc. J. describes the ward and a vision she had there - mentions friends visiting, and of being v. high - hallucinating. Describes how things then improved due to a particular German night nurse and the visit of a film-director friend - Peter Baldwin - and going out with him for the day.
Length of admission at St.James’s
J. explains how she was an in-patient for many months - gradual process of being allowed leave and feeling she would never get out - mentions a vindictive psychiatrist who went on to run a drug unit - J’s friend who had experienced being in a concentration camp in Chile said this unit reminded him of the camp in Chile.
Horton [ph]Hospital in Epson - J. pregnant - illegal marriage
J. explains why this was the best hospital - due to a lovely consultant - J. pregnant -stopped them transferring her to Portsmouth, and had an illegal marriage.
J’s children and J’s parents deaths
J’s first child - girl - b. 1971. Son born in 1975. J’s daughter now has two children. J. describes her love of being a mother - and would like to have had more children. J’s parents both died in 1995 - having a big impact on J. Talks of support from John - her husband now and about son and daughter studying degrees. Describes the good relationship between her family. J. describes at length the experiences of bringing up her children, J’s involvement in this and in their schools.
Final thoughts
J. says that there’s always less to say about good things. Explains that whilst at Horton she realised that most mental hospitals had survivors of concentration camps in them. Talks of the value of the psychiatrist at Horton whom J. could discuss this issue with and how it led to other activities later in J’s life.
[End of DVCPro Tape 05 of 05 – End of VHS 02 of 02]
INTERVIEW ENDS
