My Sister Bobbie
A moving story of caring for a much loved sister by Howard Sutcliffe
Bobbie was born in 1946. She was slow in reaching the various stages of baby development, but the members of the family were not aware of any particular reason for this until, one day, a locum GP said “Has anyone spoken to you about your daughter? You do know Bobbie has Downs Syndrome, don’t you?” Of course, the term used then was Mongolism. Bobbie was eighteen months old, and our parents were then left alone to come to terms with the implications of this news.
Through the combined efforts of an excellent teacher at a local school and the family Bobbie learned to spell and to read and write and even to touch type, although “sums” were always a problem. She became fascinated with words and she took pride in being able to spell difficult words with silent letters, for example pneumonia and rheumatism. Mother recalls a memorable occasion, years later, when Bobbie saw a nude male statue and in a loud voice exclaimed, “Oooh, pornographic”. Throughout her adult life her main relaxations were big jigsaws, which occupied the dining room table for weeks (you moved them at your peril), making lists of presents for her friends by copying entries from an Argos catalogue and visiting neighbours. In addition Bobbie would cut out coupons from newspapers and magazines complete them with the names and addresses of friends and, we discovered later, give these coupons in appropriately addressed envelopes to a dear neighbour who would affix a stamp and post them. Goodness knows how many people received free gifts and catalogues “out of the blue”! Also, Bobbie along with mother and father enjoyed caravanning and my sister became widely known to many other caravan-rally enthusiasts.