A poem by an ECT survivor - "ECT Hurt Me"

Sue Clark-Wittenberg an electroshock survivor wrote a poem entitled "ECT Hurt Me"

Sue reads out her poem in this video and the poem is written down below.

Sue had ECT forcibly given to her against her will at the Brockville Psychiatric Hospital on Ward H, in Brockville, Ontario, Canada. Sue was 17 years old in 1973. Sue was in that hospital for 6 months from March to September 1973.

Here is Sue's poem:

ECT HURT ME

by Sue Clark-Wittenberg
2007 (copyright)

The day I got my first ECT
I recall the room was white
the nurses wore white
the doctor wore white
and I was white as a sheet with fright

I lay on my back on the bed
with wires put on both sides of my head
a rubber band put on my forehead
and a rubber mallet stuck in between my teeth

I was scared to death, terrified
I wanted to jump up and run
but I could not
I saw the ECT machine
right to my left
and knew that horrible machine
was going to be turned on
any minute
and it would hurt my brain
and it did

I woke up after the ECT
dizzy, confused and did
not know who I was
where I was

I was put in a wheelchair
I missed my breakfast
and had to wait for lunch

a peer on my ward
told me many years later
that when the staff grabbed me
to take me to the ECT room
I screamed, kicked and bit the
staff and hollered
"Somebody, anybody, please
help me"
But nobody did

ECT hurt my brain
No one told me the
truth about what ECT
would do to me
because nobody cared

So that is why I want ECT
the atrocity that it is
to be banned, to end,
to stop now
so no one else has to
go through the torture
like I did which is called ECT
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• poetry
• poem
• arts
• culture
• ECT
• electroshock
• psychiatry
• torture
• medical
• fraud