Chapter 29

“I don’t think things are going to work out for me.”

Patricia Booher’s mental retardation was so very slight that she was able to attend school, take part in the EHOVE Career Center’s program, and successfully graduate from Western Reserve High School. Her adaptive skills, the daily living skills needed to successfully work and live in the community, were excellent, and these helped to balance out her slight intellectual impairment.

At the EHOVE Center, where she was involved in the general-merchandising program, she learned how to work in retail sales and how to display merchandise effectively. Her EHOVE tutors helped her learn employability skills, and were quick to praise her enthusiasm and her desire to please. She was well liked by everyone she came into contact with at EHOVE and in DECA, the Distributive Education Clubs of America, an organization for marketing students.

A majority of mentally retarded adults do not work, but thanks to organizations like EHOVE and The ARC, more and more special-needs students and adults with varying degrees of mental retardation are successfully finding and holding jobs in the communities. Patricia learned through EHOVE that she had many career options and she was encouraged to look forward to graduating from school and going to work. She received training and work experience while she was still in school, took part in an individualized education program, and learned the social skills she needed to enter the workplace.

Unfortunately, Patricia’s problems with depression seemed to escalate after she left school, and proved to be an obstacle to achieving many of the goals she had set for herself. She knew how to use the public library and the post office, how to seek medical care and shop for her needs, and how to live on her own, in her own apartment. But transportation was a problem; she desperately wanted to get a driver’s license, and wrote in her diary of her frustration at not knowing how to drive.

“I wish I knew someone who had the time to help me with my driving,” she wrote. “It’s the most important thing to me right now.”

Being able to drive would have made Patricia much more independent and self-reliant, and it would have given Hayward Bissell one less way to control her and dictate when and where she was able to travel.

During all her school years, Patricia Booher worked side by side with students who were not mentally disabled. Such integrated settings are credited with helping slightly retarded students develop adaptive skills much faster; in Patricia’s case, most of her friends never even realized she was mildly retarded. Her many friendships with fellow church members, other residents in her apartment complex and the people she met at the Friendship Club brought her into contact with a wide range of individuals and helped her develop positive attitudes and self-confidence. But each time Patricia suffered a recurring bout of deep depression, much of her self-esteem and optimism was lost.

At some point in their lives, most people with disabilities experience some form of assault or abuse, and the group at highest risk are those people with some form of intellectual impairment. Patricia’s childhood experiences with abuse presented her with a huge obstacle to overcome, but she persevered. She was able to succeed in school and later in independent living, accomplishing as much as she did largely through her own efforts.

Statistics show the rates of depression and other mental illnesses are higher in those with mild retardation as opposed to people with severe retardation. Fortunately, Patricia never hesitated to seek counseling when she felt she needed someone to talk to. Her counselors and friends served as her extended family, providing support and understanding and helping her to cope with her episodes of depression. In Patricia’s case, there is no doubt that counseling and therapy were both essential and highly effective in helping her lead an independent life.

Even though Patty had many friends, far more than she ever realized, she suffered many disappointments through the years in her relationships with men. Her diary was filled with accounts of boyfriends who came and went rather quickly, and she had high hopes for each of them to be the one who would offer true love. But that never seemed to be the case.

Patty seemed to realize, after dating Hayward Bissell for several months, that she was never going to be able to have a successful relationship with him because of his increasingly oppressive, controlling behavior and his threats and criticism.

“I don’t think things are going to work out for me,” she told her sister a few weeks before the murder.

Yet she began seeing Hayward again despite her wish to break up with him permanently. Did she feel she had no other options? Had he worn down her self-esteem to the point that she felt hopelessly trapped in the relationship? It’s a shame Patricia couldn’t have taken an objective look at her own life and realized what she had been able to accomplish by herself, for herself. Maybe then she would have seen that she did indeed have the strength it would have taken to break away from Hayward Bissell permanently. And scores of her friends and relatives would have been right there by her side, ready to help her in any way they could, if only she would have told them.