Her Name
was Flora
It was the time
when mental illness was not understood and considered a shame.
My mother was hospitalized with what I found out very much
later was postpartum depression.
I remember, as a little child, standing outside this very
strange building and looking up at the windows.
The neighborhood children would taunt me, calling out “your
mother is crazy”.
I would answer “no, she is dead”.
My older sister kept track of her illness. She would visit her
and watch over her.
When I was a teenager, she sent me to visit. I walked into a
huge room with a lot of beds.
The woman sitting there was a stranger to me and I felt no
connection.
After nearly 20 years, Ida was finally able to get our
mother’s release and bring her to her home. When we would
visit, I would feel the same. Who was this beautiful person?
Now, when there is no one alive that I can talk to about this,
there are so many questions that I think about. How did she
act when this happened? What was she like? What was so
terrible that she had to be put in a hospital to live there
for so many years.
a book
on the night table
one page turned down
"Her Name was
Flora was previously" published in CHO.
