Patricia spent months in a lock up ward at Weskoppies hospital. I had not seen her for quite some time and still felt glad that she was gone. Home was a far more comfortable place now that she wasn’t going on with her nonsense.
After about a month my mother convinced Tracy and myself to come along and visit Patricia. We were both quite reluctant at first, but we finally agreed. On the way to the hospital I could feel that my tummy was filled with butterflies and I was feeling quite scared.
It was over an hour’s drive to the other side of Pretoria. We entered the premises through a large set of gates. The surrounding fence was covered on top with barbed wire and the institution looked like a prison.
Once inside the premises we headed across to my sisters ward. The ward itself was a lock up with high fences and barbed wire. A woman opened the entrance gate for us and she looked quite rough. She could have been mistaken for a man.
We walked inside the building towards the dormitory area. The rooms were dark and smelled quite miff. The beds had been neatly made but it appeared as though there was a shortage of space and the beds were almost positioned on top of each other.
Patricia appeared from the corner of the room and looked like a scarecrow. I remember jumping back in fright. She had lost a great deal of weight and her face was pale. She was very heavily medicated and she was drooling at the mouth. She grabbed hold of my mother and started sobbing. I felt sorry for her and placed my hand on her shoulder.
The female warden escorted us outside and locked the dormitory door. She joked with my sister about her having visitors. My sister forced a shaky smile.
According to Patricia the warden was actually a patient as well, and she was also a lesbian. That didn’t make much sense to me. It was only a few minutes later that I realized that Patricia was very sick and was not making any sense at all. She seemed so far gone; I thought there was absolutely no hope for her. She looked much worse off than she did when she was first admitted. A side of me felt glad, as I was not ready for her to come home.
No comments:
Post a Comment