Speaking for Ourselves: Antonia Lister-Kaye

Psychotherapist and writer Antonia Lister-Kaye is a contributor to the Speaking for Ourselves oral history of people with cerebral palsy.

Extracts from her life story interview at the British Library Sound Archive are a fascinating insight into how attitudes to disability have changed during her lifetime.

I was kept in a chicken incubator!

“My mother was a Christian Scientist, and she didn’t like doctors. I think it was explained to her that we must at least have a nurse. My father got a chicken incubator from his brother, who was a farmer, rushed to the house, and I never went to hospital.

“I was kept in a chicken incubator in my father’s study, and they did have this nurse, that was a compromise, but my mother didn’t see me for weeks and weeks, because she was quite ill. I don’t think she wanted me anyway. I know she didn’t, because she was only very young, and, you know, didn’t know much. She wouldn’t have had me if she’d known anything. But I think that’s how I came to be how I am.”

“All disabled women should be sterilised.”

“My mother-in-law was absolutely furious because I had a disability, and she thought it was genetic. A fortnight before my baby was born, she suddenly said, ‘Well, you know, personally, I think all disabled women should be sterilised.’”

Legalise cannabis campaign

“My naughty daughter used to get hold of cannabis; this was in the seventies, and bring it home and smoke it, so I said, ‘Oh hey, give us a go,’ and because I knew people who smoked cannabis in the fifties, in Hampstead, you know: well, they do everything in Hampstead, before they do it anywhere else, and so she gave me a joint, and I smoked it.

“I did, I’m not a smoker, so I didn’t inhale properly, but I said, ‘God, Frankie, the pain’s dropping out of me fingertips,’ and so she said, ‘Oh Mum, isn’t that interesting? Have another one. I’ll roll you another one.’ … and after that, I read an article, in The Independent, written by somebody with MS, called Liz, who lived in Leeds, and she wrote about the marvelous effect of cannabis on her MS, so I thought, ‘God, I must find out more about this lady…’”

You can also buy Antonia’s memoir, Broccoli and Bloody Mindedness on Amazon.