Her name was Margaret : life and death on the streets / Denise Davy.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Davy, Denise, 1953- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Mentally ill homeless persons--Ontario--Hamilton--Biography.

Mentally ill homeless persons.

Mentally ill women--Ontario--Hamilton--Biography.

Mentally ill women.

Homeless women--Ontario--Hamilton--Biography.

Homeless women.

Mental illness--Canada--Case studies.

Mental illness.

Homelessness--Canada--Case studies.

Homelessness.

Mental Disorders.

Biographies as Topic.

Jacobson, Margaret, -1995.

Jacobson, Margaret.

Canada.

Ontario--Hamilton.

Medical Subjects:

Mental Disorders.

Biographies as Topic.

Genre:

Biographies.

Case studies.

Physical Description:

xv, 297 pages : illustrations, map ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Hamilton, ON, Canada : James Street North Books, [2021]

Summary:

"Margaret Jacobson was a sweet-natured young girl who played the accordion and had dreams of becoming a teacher until she had a psychotic break in her teens, which sent her down a much darker path. Her Name Was Margaret traces Margaret's life from her childhood to her death as a homeless woman on the streets of Hamilton, Ontario. With meticulous research and deep compassion author Denise Davy analyzed over eight hundred pages of medical records and conducted interviews with Margaret's friends and family, as well as those who worked in psychiatric care, to create this compelling portrait of a woman abandoned by society. Through the revolving door of psychiatric admissions to discharges to rundown boarding homes, Davy shows us the grim impact of deinstutionalization: patients spiralled inexorably toward homelessness and death as psychiatric beds were closed and patients were left to fend for themselves on the streets of cities across North America. Today there are more 235,000 people in Canada who are counted among the homeless annually and 35,000 who are homeless on any given night. Most of them are struggling with mental health issues. Margaret's story is a heartbreaking illustration of what happens in our society to our most vulnerable and should serve as a wake-up call to politicians and leaders in cities across Canada."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: One. "Nobody Came"

Two. "She Does What She Has To"

Three. Psychiatric Titanic

pt. ONE The Childhood Years, 1944-1961

Four. "Quiet, Hard-Working Girl"

Five. "I Haven't Been Very Well"

Six. "Pains of Hell"

pt. TWO The Hospital Years, 1962-1984

Seven. Revolving Door

Eight. "I Still Want Margaret"

Nine. "It Was a Numbers Thing"

Ten. "Why Do You Think God Wants to Punish You?"

Eleven. A Child Is Born

Twelve. "Seriously Deteriorated"

pt. THREE On The Streets, 1985-1995

Thirteen. Princess of the Streets

Fourteen. Kindness of Strangers

Fifteen. Bob and Margaret

Sixteen. The Black Hole

Seventeen. The Snowy Walk

Eighteen. A Lonely Burial

Nineteen. "If Margaret Had Kept Me"

Twenty. "It Was Tragic What Happened to Her"

Twenty-One. In From the Cold

Twenty-Two. "We Know How to Solve the Problem".

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

9781989496329

1989496326

OCLC:

1201665895

Publisher Number:

99987735918