Thread: Lunatic Asylum Question

Good Evening Kathleen

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History to Her Story - Lunatic Asylum - What Was it Like?

Hi Kathleen!

Very sadly, many children and women and men were committed to lunatic asylums with very little reason. If a husband or parent felt that the wife or children were "out of control" they could apply for them to be committed. And yes, they may then have been in the Asylum for life! They got forgotten by the system and once they became institutionised, it was pretty near impossible for them to go back into the real world. In fact, there wasn't anywhere they could have been released to unless the husband or parent went back for them!

I did some studying for a course I was taking, on this subject, many years ago and some of the treatments - even up to the mid 1900s- (particularly for women) makes very distressing reading.

In the 1980s the Government decided that they could no longer afford to keep people in Asylums who were not mentally ill and so they introduced a programme of releasing them. As they had often been in for over 60 years they then needed 24/7 care as they had absolutely no life skills. Boiling a kettle, handling cash, buying and cooking food, crossing a road etc was completely alien to them.

I ran a day care centre during this time and some of these poor unfortunate women were brought in to visit on a daily basis. One had been committed because she became pregnant at 14. Another because she would be sent to the shops to buy food and come back with the wrong thing or lose the change etc. A couple of others said "their Mum couldn't cope with them" (as they told us). My goodness you just wanted to cry at their stories and such a waste of their lives! Those I met weren't sad though - they were enjoying their new lives - they didn't realise what they had missed and I am grateful for that. Some children/adults were committed because they were "slow learners". These women I met and spoke to were in their 60s and had been in an Asylum from being 15 or younger! It is completely shocking to us in this day and age. Older women were committed when they were going through the change or suffering from baby blues or perhaps they were simply argumentative! (If you Google "why women and children were committed to luntic asylums" you will get many hits).

So, in answer to your question, many men, women and children were committed to Lunatic Asylums who were not what we would think of as having a mental illness that necessitated them being incarcarated for life and some of them never needed to be there in the first place! However, this was a different time and with different attitudes!

Unfortunately, those in the Asylums were used as guinea pigs for new treatments!