Posted on 01/07/2006 11:24:27 AM PST by ncountylee
Born slightly retarded, Rosemary Kennedy learned to read and write, and through her early 20s friends described her as bubbly and personable.
Her famous family, however, feared that Rosemary might get pregnant, catch a venereal disease, or otherwise embarrass the Kennedys. To prevent this, she became one of the first Americans to undergo a prefrontal lobotomy, having the frontal lobes of her brain surgically scraped off in 1942.
This resulted in Ms. Kennedy's paralysis, incoherence, and incontinence. She was institutionalized for the rest of her life, rarely mentioned by the Kennedys or by those who consider the family American royalty.
(Excerpt) Read more at nndb.com ...
Although Ted was very young when Rosemary had her lobotomy, these family values are part of his heritage.
RIP Rosemary.
Well, at least they didn't send her down to the riverside with her brother Teddy...
Her famous family, however, feared that Rosemary might get pregnant, catch a venereal disease, or otherwise embarrass the Kennedys. To prevent this, she became one of the first Americans to undergo a prefrontal lobotomy, having the frontal lobes of her brain surgically scraped off in 1942.
This resulted in Ms. Kennedy's paralysis, incoherence, and incontinence...
...and she was still one of the least embarrassing members of the family. How is it that Rosemary got lobotomized and Ted didn't?
Weren't the rest of the Kennedys as well? Or was it the drinking and other drugs?
Their fears were probably well grounded while her brothers were around....
I still can't believe Joe Kennedy did this
And the Kennedy's nag us about human rights
Bleeping hypocrites!
Rosemary was the brains of the family.
Ted: "I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy."
To be perfectly fair, lobotomy was quite popular in the US from the 30s through the 50s, to treat a wide variety of mental health problems. There is considerable evidence that it may actually have been quite effective in many cases. Its decline in popularity is due at least as much to the development of alternatives such as medication as it is to discovery of bad effects.
Most people's opinion of it is based on One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest and other highly unscientific depictions in the media. There are believed to be somewhere around 50,000 Americans still around who were lobotomized. Many of them have lived quite normal and successful lives, although we will of course never know exactly what their lives would have been like without the surgery.
To give some credit, Eunice Shriver has sponsored the special olympics and contributed a lot to the handi-capped. Her pence for the work of her vicious father and her weak, if pious mother.
I won't put anything past her father. I think he was the one who wanted this procedure done.
If there is a biblical Hell, surely old man Kennedy is in it. It's something to ponder.
Very sad story.
What a sad, sad story. Those who made such a decision for Rosemary lived in far greater darkness than she ever did.
Actually, they did discuss this. Trouble is for years they never mentioned this was never the procedure in use for mental retardation and that that was here problem, not a psychiatric one for which the procedure was employed.
The Kennedy's suck.
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.
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