Uncovering The Story Of An Institutionalized Family Member

Fresh Air

NPR

Tv & Film, Arts, Society & Culture, Books

4.4 • 34.4K Ratings

🗓️ 8 August 2023

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Jennifer Senior shares the pain of her family in a new piece for The Atlantic titled, "The Ones We Sent Away." In it, Senior tells the story of her Aunt Adele, who was institutionalized for her entire life because of her intellectual and developmental disability, beginning at 21 months old. Senior found out about her aunt when she herself was 12, believing up until then that her mother was an only child.

Also, TV critic David Bianculli reviews the new season of Only Murders in the Building.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Support for this podcast comes from the New Bower Family Foundation,
0:04.0	supporting WHY Wise Fresh Air and its commitment to sharing ideas
0:08.7	and encouraging meaningful conversation.
0:11.2	This is Fresh Air, I'm Tanya Mosley.
0:13.8	When Polar's surprise winning writer Jennifer Sr. was 12 years old,
0:17.9	she learned a startling detail about her family.
0:20.5	Her mother was not the only child of her grandparents as she'd grown up to believe.
0:25.2	She had a younger sister named Adele,
0:27.5	who had been institutionalized in the 1950s when she was just 21 months old.
0:33.0	Adele was born with a developmental and intellectual disability.
0:36.8	And her parents were told she'd never know her family member's names
0:39.9	or be able to function in society.
0:42.2	Basically, she'd never live a normal life.
0:44.6	Many families of the time were advised the same thing
0:47.3	to send their children away for the sake of the child and the family.
0:51.7	Jennifer Sr. writes about her on Adele and the September issue of the Atlantic titled,
0:56.1	The One's We Sent Away.
0:58.1	In the piece Sr. gets to know the unt she never knew she had
1:01.6	and tries to restore her unt's humanity and place in the family unit.
1:06.0	Jennifer Sr. is a staff writer at The Atlantic
1:08.4	and winner of the 2022 Polar's surprise for feature writing
1:12.1	for her piece, What Bobby McElvain Left Behind.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of NPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.