Stories found online

Here I will post Stories and first-hand memories that I have found on the internet.

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"The patients in F. Ward were terribly violent. They screamed and yelled all night and half the day. There were no drugs – they were locked in single rooms and you couldn’t go near them. You’d almost get the sack if fewer than three or four people went to their room to give them dinner or tea. Sedatives were almost unknown. Straitjackets were used a lot and great big leather gloves that were locked on – they had a key to lock them on – because some of them would tear you to pieces."

Recollections from 1925 by a nurse in ‘Out of mind, out of sight: the story of Porirua Hospital’ p. 83 by Wendy Hunter Williams, written for the 1987 centennial of the hospital.

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“I had to work on all my own Pandora’s boxes at the time,” says Ms Helm.

“I had to learn not to be distressed. I had a beautiful embossed bag with me in the room – and I’d touch it to remind myself there were still beautiful things in the world.”

The final report, Te Āiotanga, was presented to former Labour ministers Michael Cullen, Pete Hodgson and Rick Barker.

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Porirua - universally pronounced Porarua back then - meant only one thing: the loony bin, the nut-house, the place where mad people were locked away, the place where, if you weren't good, you might wind up yourself. They might even come and get you and drag you there screaming if you didn't look out.

"There were all sorts of ghoulie stories told about the place, and what was supposed to be walking around, and happening," recalls Bruce Shepherd, who has lived in Porirua for 50 years and remembers, as a child, the "secretive" reputation of the mental hospital on the hill.

"If you were a woman walking along the street as a prostitute," says Shepherd, "you could end up in Porirua; if you were an alcoholic, you ended up in Porirua; if you were classed as being a bit strange and weird, you ended up here. You had your epilepsies, your senile dementias, your Parkinson's - a whole range."

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They tell of an environment in which patients were often "treated as animals", humiliated and threatened with ECT if they did not do as they were told.

Elisabeth Gamlen said: "I saw people stripped of all dignity, subjected to callous and painful procedures such as electro-convulsive therapy [shock treatment] administered without muscle relaxants, as punishment. 'If you don't behave it will be shock treatment for you tomorrow'.

"And it would be. Patients were terrified.

"People were herded naked, like animals, down corridors into huge bathrooms and roughly sluiced down."

Vicki Carnell recalls a distressed elderly woman being pulled by the hair to the bathroom after telling staff she didn't want a bath.

"It was heartbreaking. I tried to intervene and was punched in the face by a staff member."

There was no point complaining because such treatment was regarded by most staff as normal. With some exceptions, staff had no respect for people's rights.

"Every day there were threats, 'Do this or you will get 'The Treatment'. That's what they called it, 'The Treatment'," Vicki Carnell said.

"It didn't take much to get it. A mild misdemeanour could lead to an episode of ECT.

"I'm amazed anyone could have come out of there and live a normal life. It's a credit to those who did."

Helen Talbot said: "It was dehumanising. To continue working there you would have to anaesthetise yourself against what was happening. There was no emphasis on anything remedial or any spark of hope introduced into the patients' lives."

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https://publicaddress.net/access/cool-asylum-porirua-hospital-museum/

http://www.newswire.co.nz/2013/03/forgotten-hospital-abused-petition-for-apology/

https://www.noted.co.nz/archive/listener-nz-2003/in-two-minds/

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZTR19290221.2.29

http://rsnz.natlib.govt.nz/image/rsnz_75/rsnz_75_00_0061_0045r_ac_01.html

http://www.peterellis.org.nz/Institutions/Psychiatric/2004/2004-0710_NZHerald_PatientsLived.htm

Photos

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/23237182?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpage%5D=2&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/23023161?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpage%5D=2&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/22307776?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpage%5D=3&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/22677152?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpage%5D=4&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/23163082?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/22835420?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/22751467?search%5Bi%5D%5Bcategory%5D=Images&search%5Bi%5D%5Bis_catalog_record%5D=false&search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=PORIRUA+HOSPITAL

https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/29413/day-room-porirua-hospital-1950s

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Stories found online