To be shocked at the appalling treatment of Rosemary Kennedy?

[IfyouseeRitaMoreno]

And even more shocked that the Kennedys never suffered the consequences for what they did to her (well the father to be more precise).

I’ve just found out about her story and can’t stop being horrified. Sister to JFK, she had minor developmental issues, was considered mentally deficient because she had sexual liaisons (the horror!) as a teenager.

Her father, Joe Kennedy, took her without the consent of either her or her mother, for a secret lobotomy with a physician Dr James Watts. It left her unable to walk or speak. It gets worse...

So then they dump her in various institutions and barely visit her for 20 years. Her siblings tried to make up for it in some way (JFK passed a law to help mental illness and her sister introduced the Special Olympics) but her parents just abandoned her and NOTHING happened to the physicians Watts and Freedman who did this to her knowing the risks. Except of course that they went on to have illustrious successful careers.

I also read that 80% of lobotomies were performed on women which shocks me even more. Why?

Will someone else be shocked and horrified with me? I guess I’m just that they could do this to their daughter, cover it up, and face no reprisals.

[post edited by MNHQ to remove offensive language]

My great-grandma committed suicide, two of her sons committed suicide and one of their sons has tried several times when he has been severely depressed. Nothing has ever worked to alleviate his depression when it is that severe except ECT. He has been hospitalised for weeks and months with all kinds of options tried but in the end ECT has been what has 're-set' him as he puts it.
As he has become very elderly the depression seems to have lessened naturally.

Her treatment was barbaric when we look back on it, but there's nothing to suggest that her father did it becase he was a barbaric father. He was wealthy and could afford the newish treatment that was suggested to him by doctors.

She wasn't hidden away before that though. She was even presented at court to the King and Queen when her father was ambassador to the UK. After it they, unquestionably, didn't treat her well with not visiting, but that wasn't unique to them. That was what many many people did with relatives in hospitals and institutions.

Rose Kennedy was very unhappy about Kathleen marrying a protestant. Her eldest brother, Joe, did go to the wedding though. It's also impossible to tell if any other siblings would have attended as it was during WWII. She threatened to have her cut off financially if she married Fitzwilliam after she was widowed - he was protestant and in the midst of getting divorced! She died in a horrendous plane crash. Her father went to her funeral, but he was the only one.

About Kathleen, nicknamed Kick, I heard about her for the first time the other day because of Kick Kennedy the actress - she is Robert’s granddaughter and named after the original Kick. So she must have been very much loved in the family for them to name a baby born in the late 80s after her?

I think Kathleen ‘ Kick ‘ Kennedy was very much loved.
She was certainly loved very much in England, by her friends here, by the men she fell in love with and their families, by the ‘ ordinary’ people she worked with during the war. She went back to America after her husband ( William ‘Billy’ Marquis of Harrington,) was killed. She couldn’t wait to get back to England. She joined the Red Cross in order to gain a berth in a ship coming to England. She worked for the Red Cross in London and loved it. I haven’t ever read about anybody who didn’t like Kathleen - apart from her mother.
From memory, I’m pretty sure that Rose forbade any of her children calling their children after Kathleen. She never forgave Kathleen for getting involved with men who were not catholic. She greatly discouraged any of her remaining children from going to Kicks funeral. Only her father defied Rose and went to his daughters funeral. I think the lady who was the Duchess of Devonshire (and Kicks Mother in law) told Joe that they had brought Kathleen home as they loved her and considered her theirs.
She still lies there in the soil of the country which she took to her heart - and which loved her in return.

She wasn’t a great beauty but she had ‘ it’ ‘ the x factor’ the ‘je ne sais quoi’ that some people possess - a love of life, an effervescence which is palpable, a personality which just draws people in. She was a very special girl and JFK was devastated when she died - he had lost Joe his older brother in q1944, Rosemary had been lobotomised and was barely functioning and he was on his own. His closest siblings were all lost to him .

Am I right in thinking her sister Kathleen 'Kick' Kennedy was one who was friendly with the Mitfords? I think she was buried at Chatsworth?

I think the lady who was the Duchess of Devonshire (and Kicks Mother in law) told Joe that they had brought Kathleen home as they loved her and considered her theirs.
^

Yes- she was called Deborah Mitford.

MandalaYogaTapestry

^^

Its awful the way people were just left to the mercy of these “treatments” and shut away. It annoys me when people say that autism didnt used to exist. It did people with it were labelled as subnormal and shut away

To be quite honest, I am never surprised about anything I read about the Kennedys. They sounded appalling.

I fell down a wikipedia hole while reading about this. What happened to Rosemary was horrific.

Kick Kennedy's partner who was killed with her was married but apparently planning to divorce his wife. He had a daughter who is now Jacob Rees-Mogg's mother in law!

To be quite honest, I am never surprised about anything I read about the Kennedys. They sounded appalling.

Chippaquiddick

Just googled Chippaquiddick

Wtaf

That women are not really considered to be full human beings, still, are not as valuable as men, are not considered capabable of making decisions for themselves.

This reminds me of the whole Mesh scandal where women complained for years of terrible pain only to be dismissed by their GPs whilst the companies that made the meshes had never even properly tested them even though they knew the dangers.

Dontfeellikeamillenial

No, I’m afraid you are wrong.
Kathleen ‘ Kick’ Kennedy’s mother in law was not Deborah ‘Debo’ Mitford, Later Duchess of Devonshire.
Her mother in law was the wife of the 7th Duke, formerly Lady Mary Cecil.
Debo was married to Andrew Cavendish who was the second son. Kathleen was married to William Cavendish, Marquis of Harrington who was destined to be the 8th Duke of Devonshire. However William ‘Billy’ was killed in 1944 a mere 4 months after he had married Kathleen. At that point Andrew, to whom Debo was married became his father’s heir to the title as Billy was dead ( shot through the heart by a sniper) and had no issue.

Kathleen wrote ‘So ends the tale of Billy and Kick’ after she was informed of his death. I have always thought how very sad those words are- the pain felt by her - and thousands of war widows- resonates down the years with that sad little line.

Kathleen ‘ Kick’ Kennedy’s mother in law was not Deborah ‘Debo’ Mitford, Later Duchess of Devonshire.

^^
I know. I'm just saying the the Duchess was called Deborah Mitford, not that she was the MIL.

The Duchess who told Joe Kennedy that they had brought Kathleen home was her mother in law, Formerly Lady Mary Cecil.

Deborah was the Duchess , wife of the 8th Duke who became duke on the death of his father in 1950. Kathleen had been buried for two years by then.
You comment reads as if your understanding was that Debo was Kathleen’s MIL.

I thought they weren't allowed to use the nn Kick for a couple of generations as she was so special to them.

Was just googling the younger generation of Kennedys and come across Caroline Kennedy's daughter Rose, a dead ringer for Jackie O!

The young Kennedys

If you look up records from institutions over the years, the reasons for commital are astounding
Masturbation
Post natal depression
Menses
Sexual drive..lack of or too high
Adultery
Laziness
Tiredness and exhaustion
Stealing
Blindness
Deafness
Limp
Stutter
Bad temper
excessive crying
It goes on.
In one, a woman was admitted because she argued with her husband and her language was not ladylike.

I did some work in the local hospital which dealt with mental health patients.
One ward was full of elderly people with dementia .
One lady seemed slightly different from the rest.
She was tiny - her feet didn’t touch the floor when she sat on a chair.
She didn’t miss a trick - her little bird like eyes darted everywhere.
The unit was secure- these people never left the ward.
The lady didn’t speak - she just made little squeaking noises for attention.

I asked how long she had been there. The senior nurse told me that this lady had fallen pregnant. She was the unmarried daughter of a local , well known , wealthy family.
Her father decreed that his daughter must in fact be suffering from ‘female madness’ as ‘ no daughter of his’ would have behaved in such a way without having gone mad. She was taken to the hospital by her father, he signed the comittal documents, walk out and left her there. This was 1926.
She gave birth to her child which was immediately taken off her. She never saw her child, the father of her child, her mother or father, or any friend/member of her family again. She was just left in there to rot.
It took her 20 years to loose her mind.
By the time the NHS was established her parents were dead and she had no where to go -so they just kept her there.
By the time I met her she had been there for 66 years.
The saddest thing was that every time the inner ward door opened her head snapped up with a look of expectation on her face- her face dropped when she saw who came through the door.
She had done that apparently since the day she was taken there.
66 years later her eyes were still searching for a familiar face to come and see her.
She died after being in there for 72 years. She had never been outside since 1926. I still think of her and hope her soul flies free and that she has been / will be reunited with her lost love and lost child.

This treatment makes Rosemary Kennedy’s life seem tolerable in comparison. At least Rosemary had people who loved her.

Don't assume that current treatments and practices promoted by the medical professions and that are accepted as reasonable by society won't be shown to be barbaric/dangerous/wrongheaded in the future. Recent examples include PIP implants, mesh implants, infected blood used for transfusions etc.

That's unbelievably sad @yorkshireyummymummy. It reminds me of the Maggie O'Farrell book The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, all about a woman who's released from an institution after 60 years there. How could people be so cruel?

yorkshireyummymummy that’s awful, I can’t find the words to adequately describe how sad that actually is.

Good god @yorkshireyummymummy that's one of the saddest things I've ever heard. I wonder how many women ended up like that? Shut away by their families because they were independent-minded it didn't conform to societal norms. It's scandalous how easy it was for it to be done.

I loved Jackie Kennedy. Even though Marilyn Monroe shagged her husband and drunk dialled her , Jackie knew she was unwell and being exploited. Years later she refused to have anything to do with Arthur Miller because he wrote a horrible, spiteful play about his marriage to Marilyn. He was banned from attending events she held.

I thought it was pure class for her to be able to empathise with someone who had wronged her.