Dear Sister in Charge,

EVERY year when First Communion time comes around, my thoughts go back to my First Confession/ First Communion days in Baldoyle Hospital, Co Dublin, in 1954 Ireland.

I was a young patient there for two years, having spent the previous two years in Cappagh Hospital, Finglas, Co Dublin. My First Confession/First Communion day, aged seven, never impressed my memory as I never could remember it. It vanished as soon as it was over. I did go to school in the hospital, learned to read and write and entered second class in my local school when I returned to my rural roots, my family and the local village school.

I remember events before I was hospitalised, like being taken away by ambulance after being carried out in the arms of a neighbour and deposited into the back. Such a scary feeling. My dad went to sit in front with the ambulance driver. I was only four years old. When we arrived at Swinford Fever Hospital, I was looking for my dad but he wasn’t there. Now I can still remember that feeling of been cheated. I was put into an isolation unit and it was confirmed I had contracted polio. I was transported then to Cappagh Hospital to spend two years there. I remember looking for my father and couldn’t find him. I was given a doll to talk to, to help me forget.

Well I have never forgotten the emptiness, the isolation and that let-down feeling.

How come I can never remember my First Holy Communion day? I find it strange now when I see all the glamour, the planning, the photography associated with the children’s “special Communion day”.

It must have been a “get-it-over quickly event day” for us in Baldoyle Hospital then, because I would surely remember something about it. I think it’s lovely for the children today celebrating with their families and grandparents. Think of those like me who never had a ‘‘family First Communion day’’ to remember forever. A very special day to remember in one’s relationship with God. Brid Ni Mhathuna, Co Mayo