Prime Minister Gaston Browne Calls for Greater Sensitivity to Mental Health and Respect for Women

Prime Minister Gaston Browne has used the occasion of his mother’s thanksgiving service to appeal to nationals to be more sensitive to issues of mental health and for fathers and men to have more regard for the females in their lives.

While reading the eulogy for his beloved mother, Patricia Rose Richards, PM Browne said she was well-known in the country, not as a famous doctor, lawyer, architect, or engineer, but as a mentally ill person, and colloquially – and crudely so – dubbed as a “crazy woman.”

He said she became mentally ill in 1976, at the age of 29, shortly after giving birth to her fifth and last child, Casper.

The Prime Minister said while society often saw her as a useless lunatic, “my sister Blondelle and I held her in high esteem, as our gem; our unsung hero, the wind beneath our wings.”

“Despite enduring her psychosis at the tender ages of 9 and 7 and a half years respectively, and the attendant societal ridicule, scorn, and stigma associated with her mental health illness, we never scorned her; we were never ashamed of her; we never demonized her.”

“As youngsters, Blondelle and I defended our mother’s dignity. We actually had to physically and verbally fight a slew of vulturous adult men who sought to sexually exploit our mother’s mental health vulnerability,” he said.

“To this day, I am astonished by – and grateful for – the courage, fearlessness, and fierceness of my then seven-year-old sister in vigorously chasing rapacious and predatory men. Blondelle pelted them with objects, including stones, and even used pails of water as weapons to chase them from our home at Bishopsgate Street,” he added.

An emotional Browne, who spoke through tears, said he shared the experiences of his mother not to dwell in the past nor to lay blame at anyone, and he did so without any bitterness whatsoever.

He noted that in our present-day society, this experience should serve as a means to cultivate a more empathetic and supportive environment for mentally ill persons.

The PM said, “It should also summon the men in our nation to consider the psychosocial impact of their abuse and irresponsible behaviors toward women and children.”