Saturday 25 July 2015

Under Private Secure Domestic Psychiatric Care - Enforced Weight-Gain

NOTE: SCROLL DOWN FOR NEW ROGER BENSON POLLS!  VOTING
STILL POSSIBLE!

 "Right!  You have two minutes to finish-up that high-calorie weight-gain meal, young lady - then it's the cane!

Yes, private secure domestic psychiatric care: enforced weight-gain – an interesting concept! 


I saw this picture - and this is what popped into my mind, partly because there has been so much interest in the forced weight control thing I wrote a while back (sorry I've not answered all your comments. I will, given time - that was what I was going to do today, but then this popped up and I got side-tracked.)  

Actually in a way it's an extension of a concept that I have been toying with for some time and have even broached to some extent in some of my books - including a couple unfinished and yet to be published.  The concept of the governess whose control slowly extends and becomes more and more restrictive until she comes to dominate her charge's life to such an extent that the régime comes to resemble something more akin to psychiatric care than disciplinary training.   

I imagine the woman perhaps coming to habitably wear a nurse’s dress and apron and insisting her charge wear pyjamas for longer and longer periods of the day while restricting her charge to smaller and smaller regions around the home and more and more treating her like a mental defective, all the time working on getting her charge to become ever more psychologically dependent on her by various means.  Perhaps at early stage she might allow the girl into the garden, a quilted housecoat worn over her pyjamas, as long as she submits to holding her by the hand, before at a later stage demanding the girl submit to being pushed in a wheelchair if she is to earn that particular privalige, then restricting her to the upper floors of the house – and so on and so on...

Charlotte had returned home from her first semester in college to find a woman in a nursing uniform dress waiting for her, bars on her old bedroom’s window and it, and the small group of rooms around it, furnished like a small hospital department.  The disciplining had started immediately, without her given pause for breath – off with her clothes, on with hospital-style pyjamas; and three nights without sleep, until she submitted to bending for the cane…  It's three months on - and there's still a little fight left in the girl.  Imagine the 'conversation'

"You have two more minutes to finish your high calorie weight-gain intervention meal, young lady, then it's the cane - one stroke for each two grams left!  No, you can stop that right there – you KNOW my rules; you are to speak only when spoken to; and even then, unless you’re asked something specific, I only want to hear ‘yes, nurse’, ‘no, nurse’ and ‘thank you, nurse’. You’ve just earned yourself two strokes of the cane across your bare bottom – AND your toilet privileges are revoked; you’re going straight back to close-supervised restricted bedpan use and toileting discipline.  I want no protestations, no arguments.  Yes I know you were normal weight – slightly above, actually – and there’s plenty of flesh around that big fat bottom and those pendulous breasts DO look as if they are trying to escape from your pyjama jacket, but your guardian wants to see you put on more weight.  And she’s paying my wages… so… 

Oh my! Look at that! Time’s up! And there looks to be a fair bit in that bowl. Right! Out of bed – and go stand on the scales facing the mirror, hands on head, while I fetch my cane… and weigh the remnants! Then you can drop you pyjama bottoms and touch your toes, right under the camera up there in the corner – your guardian LOVES watching your bottom bounce – oh, and don’t forget those extra two strokes for talking!  You know… I think there’s STILL too much ‘sparkle’ about you. I wonder if it isn’t time we increased your sedation – yes, I think I will! And after your chastisement we’ll pop you back in bed - and you can have a nice long nap under heavy sedation until your next meal.  

 What was that? A prisoner – in your own home?  Don’t be silly! For one thing, it’s not YOUR home any more – it’s your legal guardian’s. For another, I know there are bars on the windows and I’ve had them whitewashed so you can’t see out – but that’s all for your own protection.  I suppose your striped pyjamas DO look a little like a prison uniform, but I’m not a guard, I’m here to care for you. I am a psychiatric nurse – and I was hired to keep you under private psychiatric care, until you come of age. And that’s YEARS off yet!  Oh 18 has come and gone, I know, but we’ve opted to accept 21.  Don’t you remember signing the papers? It wasn’t that long ago. Well you’ve got nearly another 3 years in my care to look forward to – and as far as I’m concerned you’re mentally incompetent, just like it says embroidered on the breast pocket of your pyjamas, and I’ll tailor my care accordingly… 

AND you’ve just earned yourself ANOTHER extra two strokes of the cane AND a thorough mouth-soaping for talking again"

1 comment:

Vlad said...

I thought my comment posted, but must have failed a captcha.
This post is great, capturing many of the themes in Institutionalized in a home setting. Now that you have recovered from your birthday celebration, please hurry up and actually publish one of the stories on the shelf. I think you actually had most of a book on doing institutional treatment at home, and since that is a favorite I would eagerly buy it.