Chapter 16 — Hospitals

Emotional abuse

Any other act or omission towards the child which results, or could reasonably be expected to result, in serious impairment of the physical or mental health or development of the child or serious adverse effects on his or her behaviour or welfare.6 This section refers to witness evidence of emotional abuse including; lack of affection and approval, deprivation of family contact and personal denigration which had an effect on witnesses social, emotional and physical functioning and development.

The forms of emotional abuse reported included; exposure to frightening situations, lack of affection, criticism, humiliation, deprivation of family contact, witnessing the abuse of others, and the failure to provide for their emotional needs as children, particularly while in adult hospital facilities. Loss of identity and lack of safety and protection were other components of the emotional abuse reported by witnesses: It’s something you won’t forget, them iron-bar cots... the little one beside me, she was crying, God love us we used put our hands out between the bars and hold her hand for comfort, you know... I never remember any kindness, never heard my name. • I didn’t know what affection was, anyone to put their arm around you, you’d no support....

Seventeen (17) witnesses made 18 reports of emotional abuse. One witness reported being emotionally abused in two different hospital facilities. The 18 reports referred to nine hospital facilities, as follows: Five (5) hospital facilities were each the subject of two to four reports, totalling 14 reports. Four (4) hospital facilities were each the subject of single reports.

The anticipatory fear experienced by witnesses in relation to medical procedures was one of the most frequently reported abuses in this category. Several witnesses emphasised the fear associated with waiting for the day when the treating doctor would come. They recalled a lack of information and reassurance provided by nursing and other staff regarding their painful treatments. I couldn’t understand why people could send you different places and you don’t know what they’re like. ... Nobody told me nothing. ... I had a friend who told me he had to go to hospital himself when he broke his leg ... he was a soccer man. ... He explained to me that he had to go to get his leg fixed up ... (similar medical treatment as witness)..., but nobody else told me anything. ... People used run me life for me, used tell me what to do and where to go.

Many witnesses commented on the frightening reality of being children in a hospital, particularly those who reported being placed in county homes or those who were on wards shared with adult patients. They described observing the pain and, at times, death of other patients without any acknowledgement by staff of the distress it may cause them, as recalled in the following three witness accounts: They ... (co-patients)... were put into beds with old men in the county home, we all shared a big dormitory, old men, boys, all. The old men went in there to die. There wasn’t a week or a day when someone didn’t die. They came in there to die. • The ward that we would have been in you would have had geriatrics, Downs Syndrome people and children, everyone would have been in these big wards ... no segregation or anything. People would have died roaring absolutely roaring during the night, they would have been dead in the morning and taken out then • Then you’d hear the other kids, you’d hear them crying and you’re thinking “what’s happening?”...The thing is you’re a cripple and why should a cripple have to go through that?

Isolation was a form of punishment reported by six witnesses and included being locked in a darkened room, a linen cupboard, an outside shed, being ignored, not spoken to, put to bed early, and excluded from recreational activities and the company of co-patients. Witnesses described such punishments: There was a change of Reverend Mother ...named religious staff .... She came in with a whipping attitude.... I did not want to be an exhibition to someone who was coming in. She came in this afternoon with Health Board people and she says “now show these people what you can do” ...(witness instructed to demonstrate unusual physical dexterity).... I said “no, I don’t want to do it”.... That evening I was summoned to the convent, she came in and she’d tell the nurse to leave, she ridiculed me then for not doing this exhibition. I was banned from everything. ... I wasn’t allowed out anywhere, I had to come straight back to my ward from school, if there was homework I was to do it and then be put to bed, no telly ... the curtains were to be pulled around the bed ... they couldn’t turn off the telly for the other lads. I wasn’t to play with anybody or go around with friends, nothing for 2 weeks. • If you were sick in school and got sent back up to the ward ... you’d have hell to pay. ... They ... (lay staff)...were like the priests, they’d give you penance ... (for being sent back to the ward).... Like one day she ...(lay ancillary worker)... locked me in the ...(linen)... room and she wouldn’t let me out, locked me in ... and I didn’t get out until the following morning, left me there in the dark and I was petrified. ... One of the orderlies came down in the morning to get the linen to make the boys’ beds and he said “Jesus, Mary and Joseph, what are you doing in there?” I was sitting in there on a pillow and she’d taken away my chair ... (wheelchair)....

Witnesses also reported being punished for behaviours over which they had no control. For example witnesses who were immobile reported being punished for bed-wetting.

Witnesses who were placed in adult hospital wards, where they were the only child among a large number of elderly patients, also reported that experience as frightening. Witnesses commented that no allowance was made for the fact that they were children, there were no toys to play with and there was no acknowledgement of childhood fears and anxieties. Several witnesses described being treated as objects of amusement by staff, without respect for their feelings: They’d... (lay staff)... make fun of you because of how you spoke and they’d call you names to do with where you’re from. I was from...X... and they’d call you...X..., it sounds funny but it wasn’t funny to a child. You never had the confidence to ask them what are they talking about...it just went over your head, what they said, you weren’t allowed to speak, you just had to go and find out.

A witness who was placed in an adult psychiatric hospital at 14 years of age described being placed in a locked ward with disturbed and institutionalised adults, and told the Committee: ‘I saw things and things happened that I can never talk about.’

Witnessing co-patients being beaten, force-fed and humiliated was reported by five witnesses as a frightening experience. There was a nun called Sr ...X ... she was the worst, most violent, most terrifying person I have come across in my life. ... She had a number of sticks of different shapes and sizes. ... (One day) ... when she called in a lad to her room ... she didn’t close the door and I just remember seeing him ...(co-patient)... get a crack across the side of the head and he didn’t fall backwards and he just slumped like a rag doll, unconscious, and I just knew that one day I’d have to go in there.

Two (2) other witnesses commented on the fact that they believed they were in hospital because they were going to die, although nobody spoke to them directly about this or provided any reassurance to allay their childhood anxieties.

Witnesses spoke about the indignity they experienced at the hands of staff, especially in relation to personal hygiene and toileting. I used to go home for the summer and used to come back for the head shaving and the sheep dipping ... for lice. ... I suppose we weren’t as health conscious then as we are now. The bus used to collect us in the afternoon and drop us back to ...(named hospital)... and a male orderly that was on would be there, there was no “welcome back” or greeting or anything, just fuck them all in the bath and the disinfectant piled in and you’d be brought out and your head shaven completely. ... The staff didn’t care what way you were treated, every kid went through it. • When we didn’t have wheelchairs we had to crawl up the steps on our knees, to go to the toilet out in the yard, and in the wintertime that is terrible when you’re not able to walk. ... But they treated us any way they liked, that was their idea, we had to do what they wanted, not what you wanted yourself.

One female witness reported being prevented from using her wheelchair to go the bathroom by herself, although she was capable of managing the task independently. The witness commented that, instead, she was ‘manhandled’, in and out of the toilet. Similarly, she reported not being allowed to feed or dress herself as she was considered too slow. Another witness described the way in which toileting was managed on the ward of a hospital where children were bed-bound but not immobile: They ... (staff)... hated to be disturbed at night.... If one wanted to go the bathroom we defecated or wee’d ... (urinated)... into our face flannels and we’d all rush to the loo in the morning to get rid of it.... Scrubbing and scrubbing the face flannels.... The smell of it was appalling.

Three (3) male witnesses reported being bed-bound and having to pass a urine bottle around from one to the other and being punished if it was dropped. There was this pee jar ... (urine bottle)... it was passed from bed to bed between the lads. ... This morning I dropped it and she ... (Sr X)... came around with the stick.... I got 24 slaps on the hand, she couldn’t hold my hand in front, to hit me on the hand in front ...(due to disability)... and what did she do but she pulled the hand behind and hit me like that ...distressed... I got 24 slaps.

Other witnesses reported being reluctant to request assistance from certain staff who complained when asked to take them to the toilet. The witnesses reported they were subsequently punished for wetting or soiling themselves. One witness who wet her bed was put outside at night to await the ‘special ghost train that comes to take children who wet their bed’. Another witness gave the following account of being punished because his physical disability prevented him from being able to perform certain functions: The abuse was unbelievable, Jaysus, like, the beatings for no reason. I was beat for being unable to tie my shoes.... This particular nun... (distressed) ... was most abusive, it was one of them ... (wooden stick)... she had.... I could not put down my hand... Witness described particular physical disability....They beat me the whole day the day of the Communion because I could not put my hand down, for the photograph for my mother.... You were afraid of your livin’ daylights.