An Interview with Abigail Truman, a Former Nurse at Bog Brook Asylum.
Abigail: Before we begin, I wanted to thank you again for being so understanding of my schedule.
Journalist: Of course, I would like to ask you some questions regarding the men and women you used to work with. Let’s begin with what your first impressions of the asylum were. Did you think the staff enjoyed their work? Do you think the patients were benefiting from their treatment?
Abigail: Everyone seemed friendly enough, I guess. They smiled at each other as they passed one another, they shook hands, even exchanged hugs on some occasions. The thing that made me feel extremely uncomfortable though was when I talked face to face with them. They would be looking at me, but not exactly. Their eyes would look like they’re looking a thousand miles behind me. In fact, I don’t remember one time where a member of the staff didn’t appear that way. I just assumed that it was awkward for them to accept a brand new member to their team and they didn’t want to look me dead in the eyes. As for the patients, well, they actually didn’t strike me as people suffering from mental illness. They talked and acted just like you and me, and often had complex conversation with other patients.
Journalist: Interesting. Do you think that the patients and staff got along well?
Abigail: Oh, god, definitely not. It would be kind of weird if they didn’t immediately start sweating and/or crying when one of us walked into the room.
Journalist: Why do you think they acted so extremely anxious around you and other doctors and nurses?
Abigail: Well, I actaully don’t know. They fired me before I ever was trained with any kind of treatment. It seemed like whenever a patient needed to be treated, they would be wheeled off into oblivion. They would turn at the end of some hallway and you’d pretty much never hear from them again.
Journalist: That seems very strange. And this happened with every patient receiving treatment?
Abigail: Yes, I can’t remember any- .... actually now that I think of it, wow, how did I forget.
Journalist: Forget what?
Abigail: There was this one woman. Maria Hope.
Dated August Seventeenth, 2006.
Journalist: Of course, I would like to ask you some questions regarding the men and women you used to work with. Let’s begin with what your first impressions of the asylum were. Did you think the staff enjoyed their work? Do you think the patients were benefiting from their treatment?
Abigail: Everyone seemed friendly enough, I guess. They smiled at each other as they passed one another, they shook hands, even exchanged hugs on some occasions. The thing that made me feel extremely uncomfortable though was when I talked face to face with them. They would be looking at me, but not exactly. Their eyes would look like they’re looking a thousand miles behind me. In fact, I don’t remember one time where a member of the staff didn’t appear that way. I just assumed that it was awkward for them to accept a brand new member to their team and they didn’t want to look me dead in the eyes. As for the patients, well, they actually didn’t strike me as people suffering from mental illness. They talked and acted just like you and me, and often had complex conversation with other patients.
Journalist: Interesting. Do you think that the patients and staff got along well?
Abigail: Oh, god, definitely not. It would be kind of weird if they didn’t immediately start sweating and/or crying when one of us walked into the room.
Journalist: Why do you think they acted so extremely anxious around you and other doctors and nurses?
Abigail: Well, I actaully don’t know. They fired me before I ever was trained with any kind of treatment. It seemed like whenever a patient needed to be treated, they would be wheeled off into oblivion. They would turn at the end of some hallway and you’d pretty much never hear from them again.
Journalist: That seems very strange. And this happened with every patient receiving treatment?
Abigail: Yes, I can’t remember any- .... actually now that I think of it, wow, how did I forget.
Journalist: Forget what?
Abigail: There was this one woman. Maria Hope.
Dated August Seventeenth, 2006.
I chose to write this interview to shed light on what kind of environment the asylum had within it. It depicts what working at the asylum was like for a nurse that was fired for seemingly ambiguous reasons. The interview ends with further distinguishing the Maria Hope character from the other patients. The reader now knows that this patient stood out for what may not be a good reason.
A Text Exchange Between Two Bog Brook Nurses.
Nurse One: “Hey. You told me to text you?”
Nurse Two: ”Hey, I wanted to go through the plan with you one more time. I don’t want to mess anything up.”
Nurse One: ”Oh my god how dumb can you be? It’s so simple.”
Nurse Two: ”Shut up and just tell me the plan for the psychopath.”
Nurse One: ”We walk in, tell her to come with us to treatment, and BEFORE she sits in the chair, you trip her. That’s literally it. I don’t know why I need to go through this so many times.”
Nurse Two:”I just feel a little weird about it.”
Nurse One: ”Oh my Jesus, look. She’s a nut. Do you really hold her in such a high regard? If you’re second guessing yourself when we go through with this, she’ll probably kill us.”
Dated October Thirtieth, 2006.
Nurse Two: ”Hey, I wanted to go through the plan with you one more time. I don’t want to mess anything up.”
Nurse One: ”Oh my god how dumb can you be? It’s so simple.”
Nurse Two: ”Shut up and just tell me the plan for the psychopath.”
Nurse One: ”We walk in, tell her to come with us to treatment, and BEFORE she sits in the chair, you trip her. That’s literally it. I don’t know why I need to go through this so many times.”
Nurse Two:”I just feel a little weird about it.”
Nurse One: ”Oh my Jesus, look. She’s a nut. Do you really hold her in such a high regard? If you’re second guessing yourself when we go through with this, she’ll probably kill us.”
Dated October Thirtieth, 2006.
I came up with this text exchange to show how these nurses are plotting together to frame a patient as being a “psychopath” and “a nut”. The nurses are clearly scared of their patients, but at the same time are adding to their fears by believing their own lies about the patients.
Treatment.
Two female nurses knock on Maria’s cell door. The blinding lights and highly reflective walls and floor of the room sear into her eyes as she innocently says
”Come in.”
The nurses enter dawning latex gloves and a collapsible wheelchair, they exchange a sinister smile to each other and direct it towards Maria.
“Come along it’s time for your hydrotherapy, Maria.”
Maria, unlike other patients, was calm and seemed indifferent to the nurses. She rose from her bed rack and walked towards the wheelchair. One nurse quickly stuck out her long thin leg into Maria’s path, causing her to trip and fall forward, passed the wheelchair, hitting her head on the door.
”Jesus Christ! What are you doing! You just needed to trip her!” the first nurse exclaims whil trying to be as quiet as possible.
“I thought she would fall the other way! Oh my god she’s bleeding! Is she dead?” says the second nurse anxiously. The first nurse quickly steps over and bends down to check for a pulse. Nothing. She looks up at her coworker with dread in her face.
“No. Oh my lord what are we going to do!” shouts the second nurse. The first nurse jumps up to cover the other’s mouth.
“We tell absolutely nobody. We’ve done a good enough job to make her look as disturbed as can be, nobody will believe we did anything wrong. We need to clean this up and get rid of her and then we write a report.”
Dated October Thirty First, 2006.
”Come in.”
The nurses enter dawning latex gloves and a collapsible wheelchair, they exchange a sinister smile to each other and direct it towards Maria.
“Come along it’s time for your hydrotherapy, Maria.”
Maria, unlike other patients, was calm and seemed indifferent to the nurses. She rose from her bed rack and walked towards the wheelchair. One nurse quickly stuck out her long thin leg into Maria’s path, causing her to trip and fall forward, passed the wheelchair, hitting her head on the door.
”Jesus Christ! What are you doing! You just needed to trip her!” the first nurse exclaims whil trying to be as quiet as possible.
“I thought she would fall the other way! Oh my god she’s bleeding! Is she dead?” says the second nurse anxiously. The first nurse quickly steps over and bends down to check for a pulse. Nothing. She looks up at her coworker with dread in her face.
“No. Oh my lord what are we going to do!” shouts the second nurse. The first nurse jumps up to cover the other’s mouth.
“We tell absolutely nobody. We’ve done a good enough job to make her look as disturbed as can be, nobody will believe we did anything wrong. We need to clean this up and get rid of her and then we write a report.”
Dated October Thirty First, 2006.
I chose to write this dramatic scene depicting the mistreatment of Maria Hope to show how these nurses were trying to paint Maria as a monster, but end up becoming the monsters. The plan was for them to trip her, and later describe in a psychiatric report how Maria is sometimes unable to keep her balance. The nurses are projecting their ideas of what a monster is onto Maria and will lie on reports as well as describe Maria as someone so mentally disturbed they cannot stand upright in order to reinforce their belief that all of their patients are monsters.