The Ritual

About the Book

The Ritual is a story of sadness and of strife, written by a woman who struggled with an illness that kept her in mental institutions for much of her adult life. While awaiting insulin shock therapy at Creedmore Hospital, Judy Radi kept a secret journal of her experience. At times, she seemed out of place among the patients, as she was "not the sickest of the sick." but her private journal gives testament to her battle with the demons that occupied her mind and tore her away from her family. Through the pages of The Ritual, Judy Radi shares her most intimate feelings and guides the reader on a journey of survival and self discovery.

About the Author

Judy Radi, who weighed just two pounds at birth, had it rough from the very beginning. "You could fit me in a bread box," she used to say. But despite the odds, she somehow managed to overcome one hurdle after another. Her love for reading got her through the tough years of her life. At 19 years of age, with a high IQ and ranking top in her class, she was accepted into college to study journalism. Writing was her passion. She wrote poems, some of which were published in magazines.

Her story is unique, as she offers a detailed account of her day-to-day struggles and triumphs in an institution for the mentally ill.

"She fought on a battle with a disease that never really ended until her death on May 16, 2001," says her only daughter, Evelyn. "I stood by her side in the hospital on the day she died, and I prayed that in heaven my mother would finally find the solace I so longed for her to have. I am grateful to my mother for this precious book that allowed me to get to know her and to forgive her for leaving me behind. It was her wish that this book be published to tell her story, and it is with loving memory that I have worked to make her dream come true."

Excerpt

I don't remember much about my early years- perhaps because I was too young, or perhaps because I'd rather not remember them- but certain memories cling to me like the cold sweat from a bad dream. Sometimes I try so hard to remember things differently; to relive them in my mind in a different light. A happier, less dysfunctional light.

I imagine Mom healthy, holding hands with my Dad as I play on a swing in the backyard. I blot out the dark, lonely nights I spent crying into my pillow, longing for my Mom to come home.

At first, she was gone just for a short while. Then, her absences grew longer and longer. "An illness," Dad said. "She'll be better soon. She'll come home to us soon." But it wasn't soon, and I couldn't help wondering if I was the reason. Did I cause her illness? Did she leave because of me?

It wasn't until many years later that I gleaned a sense of what Mom went through during those long, lonely years. This book was her gift to me; her loving log that accounted for the time she left me alone. Not because she wanted to, but because she had no choice. "Demons in the mind." I once overheard a lady in a white uniform say, at the hospital that became Mom's home.

I didn't understand what she meant back then. I was much too young to know about demons or to understand the disease that stole my mom's dignity and tore my family apart. My Mom lived for years in a home for the mentally ill, but she wasn't the craziest of the crazy. In fact, much of the time she didn't seem crazy at all. She was confused, and she was frightened. And she had obsessions that were out of her control. But much of the time she seemed like a woman who didn't belong there, in that place with the cold bricks and the empty stares. Creedmore was a place far away from young girls who needed their moms; it was a place for moms who were like young girls in need of care. My Mom was one of those.

So, for many years, I felt lost and alone as I longed for a mom who would brush my hair at night and hold my hand and whisper girlhood secrets in my ear. My mom couldn't give me that. But she did give me something for which I will always be grateful. During her years at Creedmore, when the demons and the ritual occupied her mind and body, my mom kept a journal. I'm quite certain no one at that hospital knew she had the presence and clarity of mind to do it. If they had known, they probably would have taken it from her. They would have feared for their own privacy, their own anonymity.

But betweeen her episodes of extreme illness, between her bouts of insulin shock and her obsessive ritual to find cancer sores growing in her mouth, my mom told me her most intimate secrets through the pages of her journal. She gave me that journal as a gift not long before she died- more than twenty years after she had written it, she told me to share it with the world. She wanted me to share it with anyone who might see a flicker of hope within its pages, or who might see a glimpse of themselves in a woman named Judy Radi. Through these pages, my mom gave me the most precious gift she was capable of giving the gift of knowing her.

I share my mom's story with you now. Confident that you too, will come to know her and understand her as I do.