“Sheila’s book is a moving account and a powerful piece of social history. It should act as a reminder of mental health care in the past, and the impact that mental ill-health can have on friends and family” – Paul Farmer, Chief Executive MIND

Description

About the Author

Sheila Brook was born in 1931, and spent long periods living in other people’s homes occurred during the first eight years of her life, owing to her mother’s recurrent episodes of mental illness. Shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War her mother was again admitted to a Psychiatric Hospital and Sheila did not see her again for over twenty years. Her father employed a housekeeper and Sheila was able to return once again to her own home in Kenton, Middlesex, now part of Greater London.

On leaving School at fourteen in 1945 Sheila had a little further education, which included what was then called ‘commercial’ training (shorthand, typing and bookkeeping). She then became Secretary to an Almoner at a private, pre-NHS Clinic in London before becoming Secretary to a Harley Street Consultant.

She left work when she married in 1952. She and her husband spent the first eleven years of their marriage living with her father in Sheila’s childhood home, looking after her father, husband, and, in the course of time, two children. In 1963 she moved to Hertfordshire with her family, and when her sons grew older she studied and passed the required examinations that enabled her to go to Teacher Training College.

In 1971 she began teaching in a local Primary School, and soon enjoyed the responsibility for Girls’ games, coaching the Netball Teams for the inter-school matches and annual Netball Rally, activities that she had been unable to enjoy herself during her education, due to the restrictions of the war years. Severe, long-standing, facial neuralgia forced her to take early retirement after some years of teaching, and the satisfaction she had in her chosen career made this hard to bear. She felt that she had made a positive contribution to her pupils’ futures, which had been curtailed because of the constant neuralgic pain.

Sheila has always enjoyed an active life, and played tennis until she turned seventy. She attends a weekly Keep Fit class and also a Medau movement session. She spent many years singing in a Senior Ladies Choir, and enjoyed Folk Dancing until very recently. She is an avid reader when time permits, loves her garden, but now has a lesser love for the work it requires. Her marriage continued for almost fifty-five years, until her husband died from cancer in the Spring of 2007. Eight months later Sheila herself was diagnosed with breast cancer, and had surgery in January 2008. Her other hobby of doing jigsaw puzzles has not been indulged for some time. Life is too busy, and she is in constant pain.
Sheila Gaylor wrote her book in her maiden name of Brook as a tribute to her late parents. As she wrote her story she appreciated how much anxiety and sorrow her father had suffered, and how her mother’s mental illness had deprived her of her home, her family and her freedom.

Book Extract

We experienced very severe winters in the early nineteen forties with dense, ‘pea-soup’ fogs, when you could scarcely see a hand in front of you, hard frosts, heavy falls of snow. The house never seemed to be thoroughly heated; the hall and bedrooms were always chilly. Carpet was quite thin and lino was a cold surface – especially to one’s feet when stepping out of bed in the morning. Cold houses often meant frozen or burst pipes and there was real hardship if the coal shed became empty.

I had two grey school blouses at Junior School and two white ones when I moved on to my Senior School and wore one each week. Men’s’ business shirts had separate collars and a clean collar could be attached each morning to the neckband of the shirt with a collar stud, removing the necessity of putting on a clean shirt each day. It greatly reduced the amount of washing that had to be done! My father wore the same shirt for a week. He used to roll up his shirtsleeves beneath the sleeves of the jacket of his navy-blue three-piece suit, so that the cuffs were not exposed to any dirt or dust when he leant across the counter at the shop. The restrictions and shortages, as well as the difficulties of washing and drying clothes, precluded the frequent changes of any clothing. Everyone had to ‘make do and mend’ and keep as clean as possible, but although we may have looked a bit drab, most people took care of their appearance and dressed as smartly and neatly as possible. Nobody had a wide range of clothes, unless they had contact with the ‘spivs’ and consequent access to the illegal ‘black market’. Old pictures of the times, together with my recollections, indicate that people took the trouble to look well dressed. It was almost part of the war effort not to look shabby.