Paula

I am writing to share a family experience with the Voices from Yale-New Haven. My mother had a baby girl in 1941, delivered in another hospital. After 24 hours of labor, my mother's doctor was out of town and the baby was delivered using high forceps delivery. The baby, Paula, my sister, had cerebral palsy from birth, which my parents were told was a result of the delivery and that she would never walk nor be a "normal" child. My parents were encouraged to institutionalize the baby. My mother, being the fiercely devoted and independent person she was, refused to accept this for her child. She located a physician at Yale who worked with "crippled" children, as the term was then known. She took Paula down to Yale at least once or twice a week from Waterbury, where she lived. The Yale physician worked with Paula and my mother to establish a rigorous therapy program for her. Paula was eventually able to stand on her own with braces and to sit up by herself without any assistance. Unfortunately, when she was two years old, she contracted pneumonia, was hospitalized, and died two weeks later.

My mother always spoke of the dedication of this physician and how much his faith helped her as well as my sister. Unfortunately, the physician's name has been lost to our family's history, but his commitment, matched by my mother's determination, clearly influenced the quality of my sister's life. I believe this is yet another humble story of the tradition of caring and dedication that the history of Yale-New Haven represents.

Thank you for letting us share our story.

Freda B. Schroeder
Guilford, Conn.