Growing up with Janice
My sister Janice was twelve years older than me, and my earliest memories are of her. Mum was often unwell, and it was Janice who looked after me most of the time. She took me to school on my first day, and was waiting at the gates when the bell rang. Janice always made me laugh: she was full of fun. Janice always made me feel safe: she cuddled me, and reassured me. She was more of a mother to me than Mum, a quiet wraith who was bedridden by the time I was eight, and died before I was ten. Dad went to work, came home, ate his tea, which Janice prepared, went to the pub, came home late, and went to bed. He didn't do much for us, but he did earn a good wage and make sure that we were well-fed, clothed and with a roof over our heads.
After Mum died, it was just Janice and me. Dad was never around. Janice made sure that I enjoyed life just as much as my friends. She was working as a clerk in the local council offices, and had a boyfriend, Jimmy. Jimmy used to come round to our house most evenings to eat tea with us, and then we'd sit and listen to the radio, or play cards. Janice used to say that when I was a big girl, with a job of my own, she and Jimmy would be married.
Really, despite Mum and Dad not being around mine was a happy life until I was 14. That was thanks to Janice. Then, things began to go wrong. Janice started to act strangely – sometimes she laughed for no reason – a shrill, high-pitched laugh not at all like her usual throaty chuckle. Sometimes, at night, I heard her talking in her room, though there was nobody there. Rapidly Janice changed from a loving, caring, happy person into somebody who was unpredictable, frequently angry, and sometimes even violent. Jimmy stopped coming round. I never knew what to expect each time I saw my sister. Sometimes she was her old self, and other times she had dark moods, muttering to herself, accusing me of things I hadn’t done, asking why I was staring at her.
Often she didn't go to work, but moved frenetically around the house, re-arranging the furniture, repeatedly washing the crockery, putting it away, taking it out, washing it again.
Soon I became afraid of Janice. My loving sister had disappeared, been swallowed up by a monster. Once she tried to smash a shop window with her fist and the owner came out and yelled: "Get off, you bloody loony." People began pointing at her in the street, laughing at her. At school, other kids asked me what it was like having a crazy sister.
One day when I came home from school Aunt Gwen was waiting at home in our front room. Very unusually, Dad was there too. His face was grey; Aunt Gwen was crying. There was a policeman in the front room.
Aunt Gwen put her arm round my shoulder and told me that I was going to stay with her for a while. She took me upstairs and packed my things into a couple of suitcases. I was too afraid and shocked to ask what was happening, and nobody told me at the time.
Dad just nodded towards me when I said "Goodbye" to him, and Aunt Gwen and I travelled by bus to her house in Colchester.
There, I was told that Janice was ill, and had been taken to hospital.
I never saw Janice again. Two months later I was told that she had died in hospital. Subsequently I learned that she had died under the wheels of a bus just outside the market in Ilford.
For decades I have pushed into the back of my mind those memories which were so painful. Janice was seldom mentioned, except in hushed voices. The sister I had adored had become a skeleton in the family cupboard, somebody to be ashamed of, and I betrayed her memory. Instead of keeping it alive, instead of remembering the lovely sketches she drew for me, her beautiful poems, her gentle and merry nature before illness overtook her, it was the wild, uncontrollable and frightening figure that remained in my mind.
Now, more than fifty years on, schizophrenia is better understood. I learned that it most often affects young people, and can be triggered by stress. How much stress must Janice have had to cope with, losing her mother and struggling to raise a sometimes-rebellious teenager, while holding down a job and running a household, instead of marrying her Jimmy and having her own life? If it hadn't been for her devotion to me, she might be alive and happy now.
If only I could have told Janice how much I loved her. It's too late now, but not too late for me to make this tribute and apologise to her, my poor, tragic, misunderstood sister, undeserving victim of a cruel illness.
I want to say here what I should have said all those years ago:
Janice, I love you.
After Mum died, it was just Janice and me. Dad was never around. Janice made sure that I enjoyed life just as much as my friends. She was working as a clerk in the local council offices, and had a boyfriend, Jimmy. Jimmy used to come round to our house most evenings to eat tea with us, and then we'd sit and listen to the radio, or play cards. Janice used to say that when I was a big girl, with a job of my own, she and Jimmy would be married.
Really, despite Mum and Dad not being around mine was a happy life until I was 14. That was thanks to Janice. Then, things began to go wrong. Janice started to act strangely – sometimes she laughed for no reason – a shrill, high-pitched laugh not at all like her usual throaty chuckle. Sometimes, at night, I heard her talking in her room, though there was nobody there. Rapidly Janice changed from a loving, caring, happy person into somebody who was unpredictable, frequently angry, and sometimes even violent. Jimmy stopped coming round. I never knew what to expect each time I saw my sister. Sometimes she was her old self, and other times she had dark moods, muttering to herself, accusing me of things I hadn’t done, asking why I was staring at her.
Often she didn't go to work, but moved frenetically around the house, re-arranging the furniture, repeatedly washing the crockery, putting it away, taking it out, washing it again.
Soon I became afraid of Janice. My loving sister had disappeared, been swallowed up by a monster. Once she tried to smash a shop window with her fist and the owner came out and yelled: "Get off, you bloody loony." People began pointing at her in the street, laughing at her. At school, other kids asked me what it was like having a crazy sister.
One day when I came home from school Aunt Gwen was waiting at home in our front room. Very unusually, Dad was there too. His face was grey; Aunt Gwen was crying. There was a policeman in the front room.
Aunt Gwen put her arm round my shoulder and told me that I was going to stay with her for a while. She took me upstairs and packed my things into a couple of suitcases. I was too afraid and shocked to ask what was happening, and nobody told me at the time.
Dad just nodded towards me when I said "Goodbye" to him, and Aunt Gwen and I travelled by bus to her house in Colchester.
There, I was told that Janice was ill, and had been taken to hospital.
I never saw Janice again. Two months later I was told that she had died in hospital. Subsequently I learned that she had died under the wheels of a bus just outside the market in Ilford.
For decades I have pushed into the back of my mind those memories which were so painful. Janice was seldom mentioned, except in hushed voices. The sister I had adored had become a skeleton in the family cupboard, somebody to be ashamed of, and I betrayed her memory. Instead of keeping it alive, instead of remembering the lovely sketches she drew for me, her beautiful poems, her gentle and merry nature before illness overtook her, it was the wild, uncontrollable and frightening figure that remained in my mind.
Now, more than fifty years on, schizophrenia is better understood. I learned that it most often affects young people, and can be triggered by stress. How much stress must Janice have had to cope with, losing her mother and struggling to raise a sometimes-rebellious teenager, while holding down a job and running a household, instead of marrying her Jimmy and having her own life? If it hadn't been for her devotion to me, she might be alive and happy now.
If only I could have told Janice how much I loved her. It's too late now, but not too late for me to make this tribute and apologise to her, my poor, tragic, misunderstood sister, undeserving victim of a cruel illness.
I want to say here what I should have said all those years ago:
Janice, I love you.
posted by Doris Villiers at
9:07 AM
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